A good search engine optimization company will generally use a number of methods to give your site the recognition it <br><br>deserves by the search engines. For example, if your site is new, has been rebuilt, or has an exciting new product or <br><br>service, an SEO company may suggest you do a press release, i.e. a news announcement. As well as sites like Digg, there are <br><br>sites that are dedicated to PR articles – which may be the way to go. Although PRs are not the most reliable way to get a <br><br>steady stream of backlinks (they’re very time sensitive, for one) they are an excellent internet reputation management tool.<br><br>However, too many sites don’t bother with press releases or other domain reputation paraphernalia. They just concentrate on <br><br>doing everything they can to get their pages ranked as high as possible on searches, even if it means using dishonest <br><br>tactics. They deserve to have poor results when it comes to SEO – and generally, they do. Google is quite fly when it comes <br><br>to sniffing out scammers.<br><br>The trouble is, it’s often not the site owner, but the search engine optimization company, that is at fault. For someone new <br><br>to the business, terms like linkbuilding and social media marketing can seen like a foreign language. Even experienced <br><br>webmasters can sometimes be taken in by the spiel. So, how do you know what practices to avoid – and which ones are cheeky, <br><br>but safe?<br><br>1) Link exchange. A lot of link building services offer this, but generally it’s to be avoided. Basically, these are programs <br><br>which trade links – i.e. you put a link to their site, they put a backlink to yours by return. On the surface, it seems to be <br><br>an “I scratch your back, you scratch mine” type of deal, and it actually works pretty well if you’ve gained trustworthy <br><br>contacts with sites that have a relevance to your own.<br><br>However, beware of doing the same thing with link exchange companies – in particular, keep a close eye on the ratio of <br><br>outbound to incoming links. Many disreputable companies will get you to place multiple links to their site, while offering <br><br>little or nothing in return. Worse, they could turn out to be link farms. These have the same reputation among search engines <br><br>as phishing scammers, and could get your site removed from the directories permanently.<br><br>2) Linking to suspect sites. While it’s true that you don’t always have control over where your backlinks come from, it won’t <br><br>do your internet marketing plan any good – especially if you have outbound links to those same sites. At the very least, <br><br>you’ll ignite a flame war, and could even get banned. Again, the best way of avoiding this is not to enter into link exchange <br><br>programs with unknown third parties – they may be kosher, or they may turn out to be bad neighbours. This is a term covering <br><br>all sites that have been reported or banned for unethical or malpractice.<br><br>3) Be carful you don’t generate hundreds of links in a very short time. It may be that your new social media marketing plan <br><br>has gone into overdrive. However, the search engines will see it as bulk link purchasing – and penalise you for it.