Google/webserver name cloaking issue

CSU

I don't know if the title is correct for the problem I'm having, I'll explain.

The staff member whom maintained our website has left the company and forked off into their own but exact same sector. The company now has a new website, new web host and new contact details but there is something going on with Google search results and the old webhost.

The whois results for our old company domain name and the whois results for their new company domain name is suggesting that the new company's website is located on the old company's and same webhost and here is where it get's interesting.

Given that our company's website is in it's infancy and for some time don't expect huge returns outside of adwords results, search results from Ask.com and google are turning up odd results. Google, when searched for our company name will return the number one result as our fork-off company, Ask.com will always return the other company details before ours.

In wording and relevance terms the two sites are very similar as we are in competition in the same market sector, but the company names (the results of the Google searches) have very little similarities, only the first letter in fact.

Obviously we need to protect our company name (as we have stickers on our product all over Ireland displaying our name) , if someone here could point us in the direction of information to our problem we would be in great depth.

Thank you

Gavin

If you have an adwords account, contact Google, they take this fairly seriously.

bhickey

CSU wrote: »

The staff member whom maintained our website has left the company and forked off into their own but exact same sector. The company now has a new website, new web host and new contact details but there is something going on with Google search results and the old webhost.

"The old webhost"? Are you both not now (and were you not always) on the same webhost?

The whois results for our old company domain name and the whois results for their new company domain name is suggesting that the new company's website is located on the old company's and same webhost and here is where it get's interesting.

Okay well nothing wrong with that.

Given that our company's website is in it's infancy and for some time don't expect huge returns outside of adwords results, search results from Ask.com and google are turning up odd results. Google, when searched for our company name will return the number one result as our fork-off company, Ask.com will always return the other company details before ours.

What URL's from fork-off are Google returning and do those pages contain your company name in them?

CSU

Gavin wrote: »

If you have an adwords account, contact Google, they take this fairly seriously.

Thanks Gavin,

This didn't occur at the time of posting as I had only started using Adwords last night and was not familiar with the concept.

I think it's quite obvious what's going on.

Thanks;)

bhickey

CSU wrote: »

This didn't occur at the time of posting as I had only started using Adwords last night and was not familiar with the concept.

I assume that your original post was about Google natural search results? Are you saying that they're also bidding in Adwords where the search term is your company name?

CSU

bhickey wrote: »

"The old webhost"? Are you both not now (and were you not always) on the same webhost?

No, we parked the old domain names untill everything panned out. Now their new Company has their own www.com on the old webhost. At the time of posting I was not familiar with the concept of keywords in Google Adwords and thought there was something going on with the old host and it's admin or something.

bhickey wrote: »

What URL's from fork-off are Google returning and do those pages contain your company name in them?

new company name.com , but on the same (old) webhost[/QUOTE]

bhickey wrote: »

I assume that your original post was about Google natural search results? Are you saying that they're also bidding in Adwords where the search term is your company name?

It would appear so, I'm up to speed now

bhickey

CSU wrote: »

www.the new company name.com , but on the same (old) webhost

Sorry I'm confused. Can we just say for now that your old website was website A, your new one is website B and the fork-off's website is website C?

So website A has been decommisioned? You say you've parked the domain names? What happens when I type website A's URL? Am I redirected to your new site?

Website B is your new website. Is it live? Where is it hosted.

You say that if I search for your company name in Google, I will get results from website C. I assume then that when I click on these results I will taken to website C. Now the question again - do those pages have your company name in them?

Let's forget about webhosts for now and just talk about websites.

bhickey

CSU wrote: »

... I'm up to speed now

http://adwords.google.com/support/aw/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=6118

Okay well Google Adwords is a completely separate thing. Now I'm no trademark expert but I think that the fork-offs are quite entitled to display an ad in Adwords for their own company as long as they don't use your name in their ad. So if someone types in your company name in Google then they'll see an Adwords ad for the other company. As far as I know that's okay but I'm open to correction.

CSU

So website A has been decommisioned?

- Yes

You say you've parked the domain names?

- Yes

What happens when I type website A's URL? Am I redirected to your new site?

- not yet, I have sent a letter of proof of ownership to my webhost and they will redirect to my new site.

Website B is your new website. Is it live?

- Yes

Where is it hosted.

- register365

You say that if I search for your company name in Google, I will get results from website C. I assume then that when I click on these results I will taken to website C. Now the question again - do those pages have your company name in them?

- No, but the content is exactly the same. All but company names and logo's are the same (as said in the OP the person who left maintained and wrote most of the content and wording so he's welcome to it.)

CSU

bhickey wrote: »

Okay well Google Adwords is a completely separate thing. Now I'm no trademark expert but I think that the fork-offs are quite entitled to display an ad in Adwords for their own company as long as they don't use your name in their ad. So if someone types in your company name in Google then they'll see an Adwords ad for the other company. As far as I know that's okay but I'm open to correction.

I hope you're wrong.

We have stickers up all over the country displaying our company name, is it legal for our competitors to outbid us using OUR name in THEIR adwords triggers???

[mod: please move this thread to correct forum if needs be]

bhickey

Any chance you can post (or PM me) the names of the domains you're talking about 'cause this doesn't add up? It'd be much easier to give advice if we knew what domains we're actually talking about.

bhickey

CSU wrote: »

......is it legal for our competitors to outbid us using OUR name in THEIR adwords triggers???

Read the post again, I said "...as long as they don't use your name in their ad". If they use your name in their Adwords ad then yes Google will sort that out for you. But that ONLY applies to Adwords.

ronkmonster

If they have the exactly the same website bar a small bit of rebranding (name, logo) then all the google optimising your site has, theirs has.

Also, who created the site? If the ex employee made it while working for you, then you should own the site and they shouldn't be taking your site to compete with you

CSU

bhickey wrote: »

Read the post again, I said "...as long as they don't use your name in their ad". If they use your name in their Adwords ad then yes Google will sort that out for you. But that ONLY applies to Adwords.

wasn't shouting there, sorry came accross that way:o


anywho, I don't want to start linking to the site from here untill I know more - thanks for your offer to have a look at it I might take you up on it a bit later.

@ ronkmonster - yes that is all thats different to what it was, our new site contains 75% same wording and 0% same CSS and general layout and feel.

bhickey

CSU wrote: »

wasn't shouting there, sorry came accross that way:o

No worries. Now back to the matter at hand - who looks after your website B and how long has it been live? Do you know if Google has started to crawl and index it yet?

CSU

bhickey wrote: »

No worries. Now back to the matter at hand - who looks after your website B and how long has it been live? Do you know if Google has started to crawl and index it yet?

It's live since late last month and was built and maintained by yours truly and yes the crawlers are all over it every day...oddly enough Google says there's only 2 out of 150 URL's in web index. Reading through some of the comments in google this seems to be the norm I think, well, at least when new anyway.

bhickey

CSU wrote: »

It's live since late last month and was built and maintained by yours truly and yes the crawlers are all over it every day...oddly enough Google says there's only 2 out of 150 URL's in web index. Reading through some of the comments in google this seems to be the norm I think, well, at least when new anyway.

Yes that's normal enough. Have you added it to Google Webmaster?

Now the URL's from fork-off's website that are returned when someone types your company name into Google, it's odd that you say your company name (i.e. the search terms in this case) appear nowhere on fork-off's website. Is your company name in the domain name of fork-off's website? Can you look at the cached page that Google has for fork-off's website and see if your company name appears anywhere there? Finally look at the source code of the web page on fork-off's website and see if your company name appears anywhere there? It's just really off that Google would return fork-off's website for a search term that appears nowhere on it.

Unless that is, fork-off's website is actually your old website with some changes made that Google hasn't taken account of yet! Hard to say without knowing what sites we're talking about.

CSU

bhickey wrote: »

Yes that's normal enough. Have you added it to Google Webmaster?

Now the URL's from fork-off's website that are returned when someone types your company name into Google, it's odd that you say your company name (i.e. the search terms in this case) appear nowhere on fork-off's website. Is your company name in the domain name of fork-off's website? Can you look at the cached page that Google has for fork-off's website and see if your company name appears anywhere there? Finally look at the source code of the web page on fork-off's website and see if your company name appears anywhere there? It's just really off that Google would return fork-off's website for a search term that appears nowhere on it.

Unless that is, fork-off's website is actually your old website with some changes made that Google hasn't taken account of yet! Hard to say without knowing what sites we're talking about.

Yes I have the webmaster tools installed and all that jive.

...is it not as simple as Company B has Company's A's name in their Adword keywords?

bhickey

CSU wrote: »

...is it not as simple as Company B has Company's A's name in their Adword keywords?

If you're ONLY talking about Adwords, then Company B can advertise when someone searches for Company A. That's fine as long as Company B doesn't have Company A's name in their ads. If they do and Company A doesn't like it then things are simple - Company A contacts Google Adwords and states their case.


Adwords has got nothing whatsoever to do with Google search engine results and rankings. For Google search engine results and rankings, we're talking about site content, crawling, indexing etc.