How long does it take and what effort will it take, to change a misspelling in a Google Search Query? Be it a proper name, Client's Trademarked Brand or Product name?
Dawn Maire (Correct spelling) is CSO at @Rockfish - Having recently changed jobs, Dawn is Chief Strategy Officer and since my new title is Sr. Manager, Content Strategy, Search and Social at Rockfish, that would make her my boss.
While getting to know Dawn and while she was getting to know me on a recent visit to the NWA office of @Rockfish, She asked, "Does that mean you can make me pull up on Google for my real name, instead thinking it’s a
misspelling of WWE Diva Dawn Marie?"
misspelling of WWE Diva Dawn Marie?"
Without thinking much, I said "of course, would tomorrow be okay?", She said "That would be great!" After a bit more thinking, I asked, "What do you want to be 1st for your name?" She said, "I dunno, how about my LinkedIn profile?". Knowing this plays well to using my search skills responsibly, I said "Ok, I'll do it right before 10pm"
So, two blog posts back at the hotel, linking back to her LinkedIn Profile. Just to test the waters, which resulted in her LinkedIn profile being #3 (#1 for her name), below the most commonly clicked on links for the person Google thought the query, "Dawn Maire" applied to.
With the initial testing phase done, we soon realized it would take more "signal" to overcome the frequent misspelling.
Phase 1. Use #whitecoatseo testing group to tweet "Dawn Maire - (linkedin profile link)"
Phase 2. Use Blogs to add "discussions" about the keyword and the link.
You will see Phase 3 listed, but after Phase 2 the situation "almost" corrected itself..
So, mission accomplished? Dawn Maire's LinkedIn profile listed #1 for her name, but we still have the spelling error, does that mean we are not finished yet?
ORM, SEO and Ethics:
We have proven that we can manipulate Google's spell check to make "Dawn Maire" come up first for her name, (SEO for ORM), but how many people actually type in "Dawn Maire" when they really mean "Dawn Marie, the WWE Diva"?
Ethically, is this the place to stop? Should we continue with ORM/SEO and take this until we can overcome the Did you mean: dawn marie ??
Or, would we be doing a disservice to the quality of results in a Google search if we kept going?
What if this is a client's copyrighted/trademarked name? registered trademark for a product name, or Brand? How far is too far? Or when it's absolute, like ABSOLUT, will Google no longer see it as a misspelled word?
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