Who would want to be called social outcast? Well, if you are blacklisted, there’s every chance of being one on the web – especially on Google. So the crux of it all is – don’t get blacklisted. A further read would help you to find answers on ‘what is Google blacklisting’, ‘why it is harmful for you’ and ‘how to avoid being blacklisted’.

Let’s start with knowing the aftermaths of being Google blacklisted.

What harm Google Blacklisting can inflict on you?

Knowing the positives of being amongst the top pages on Google, the fever pitched competition is rising to a new high everyday. The need of being on top has pushed us to try our hands in practices that Google recognizes as agents that reduce quality of search experience of a visitor.

Every webmaster who is hell-bent to make a cut on web by driving his/her website sail above others on ranking via one or many of such practices, is liable to be blacklisted.

Result: instead of enjoying the high of being on track to the top, the website of the overzealous webmaster would languish in the ignominy of being untraceable. No trace = no traffic = no future!

Google makes it pretty clear: "If an SEO creates deceptive or misleading content on your behalf, such as doorway pages or 'throwaway' domains, your site could be removed entirely from Google's index."

Are you reading?

What is Google blacklisting?

Google, the leaders of all search engines, furnishes a list of cautions to every website owner. If you are one amongst these owners and believe in the maxim that being found on the web can add to your profits, you would want to keep a tight noose on your SEO personnel. In most of the times it is the little extra zeal that can throw your site back by good 50 slots on Google’s Search Engine Result Pages (SERPs) - if not vanishing it entirely.

Keep a check if you are knowingly or unknowingly participating in any of the following activities. Why? Because this a filtered list of most prevalent reasons that have led to the ouster of the websites from Google ranking.

To stay out of harm’s way, keep wary of the crimes of,

•    Running mirror sites
•    Bad redirection
•    Duplicate content
•    Over optimization
•    link farming
•    linking with too many comment spam
•    Placing neighborhood links from own blog or website
•    Paid linking with ‘Dofollow’ tag
•    Excessive link Exchange

if you are participating in any of the above practices, time is ripe to tell your SEO personnel to be a little discerning.

How to steer clear of being blacklisted?

Avoid all the steps that Google asks you not to participate in. Points below would make it a little more lucid for you while devising an SEO strategy next time.

•    Avoid hidden agendas: Do not place hidden texts or hidden links on your site

•    Stop befooling others: Don't employ cloaking or sneaky redirects

•    Don’t let a robot do it for you: Don't send automated queries to Google

•    Let your keywords say it all about you: Don't load pages with irrelevant words

•    No duplicates: Don't create multiple pages, subdomains, or domains with duplicate content

•    Don’t mislead a visitor – Crawler or a human: Avoid placing "doorway" pages, or other activities that include instances like affiliate programs governed by little or no original content

How to check if you are blacklisted or not?

If you are unsure about your status, and seeking a way to know if your plunging search ranking has anything to do with blacklisting, follow the points below

1.    Check through info, site, or link commands on Google search bar. Any ‘error’, ‘page not found’ or ‘did not match any documents’ message, augur possibility of blacklisting.

2.    Check your status through Google's Safe Browsing Diagnostic Tool - http://www.google.com/safebrowsing/diagnostic?site=google.com

3.    If in both the cases the results point to a possible penalty (blacklisiting), contact Google for a solution - http://www.google.com/support/webmasters/ - or seek help of a professional with experience in retrieving banned sites.

In the end, go by an old saying, ‘prevention is better than cure’. Why trudge on being blacklisted, when a little discretion and patience can help you stay on track to top?