What not to do for your site:

In a hurry to ensure quick rankings in the search engines, and get more traffic, some web masters are ready to go to any length. I was called to a client to give presentation to a client who wanted his site to be listed at page one or at the most page two on search results with some leading search engines. I explained the all the steps that were required, offered them a decent bargain, which probably was just sufficient to cover my costs and suggested a time frame of about three months for very good results. My next competitor who was waiting to give presentation immediately after me, offered a much cheaper deal and amazing time frame of less than one week. No prizes for guessing who finally got the order and yes he managed too.

I saw the client (rather; the could be client’s site appearing at 7th place in search engine results. May be the person who bagged the deal was wiser and I needed to learn.
But, last week, I realized in fact, it was he who needed to unlearn. I got a call from my client that, his site is not appearing any where in Google or yahoo results. He wanted to consult me. As the things unfolded subsequently, it was discovered that the other ‘web specialist’ had used some shady scripts such as Traffic equalizer and others to gain the traffic. What basically such scripts do, is to create virtual multiple pages of your sites and in a way spam search engines. Of course, the client gained the ranking, but only till Google and Yahoo woke up. Now his site has been dropped form index and what I understand from various forums, it is not soon that site gets back into index again.
Phony Blogs
Some other enterprising webmasters manipulate the affiliate system by creating phony spam blogs that by use of scripts generate content by copying bits from other targeted Web sites, mixing in popular keywords, then signing up the resultant product as a Google or Yahoo! affiliate. There are some software that even reword and translate the text selected from a web site. But if there was such a sustainable shortcut to success, there would not have been any strugglers. Such strategies enable listing such sites high on the search results list, thus generating traffic, generating ad clicks. When unsuspecting Internet searchers visit spammy blogs, and end up clicking the ad links in a frustrated attempt to find some coherent text. In fact these are too profitable to be readily discouraged. I have seen many frustrated webmaster, just failing to get traffic through honest means, resorting to such tactic. According to a leading Brooklyn-based firm that sells automatic-blog software, such sites earn tens of thousands of dollars a month in PPC income, all without any organic touch, with the use of machines only.
Phony Links
Another worrisome part is emerging network of self style professionals, claiming to get you links at click of mouse. New webmasters and not so popular sites are most likely victims of this network. Never ever go for phoney links co controlled by rogue software. Quite often, these softwares, without your knowledge would install a script in your ftp and would continuously send spam or execute a host of other unacceptable events. The robot machines create clicks from all around the world at apparently random intervals, making them difficult to identify. Now a days, all major search engines have mechanics to detect such clicks and would give your site a lower rating accordingly.
Spam mails
Spam is major irritant. Never spam. Even your server, if he is a decent one would warn you if you start sending spam. Sending unsolicited mails, frequently, or without any ostensible reason would lead the recipient to block your site. Send only relevant mails with a purpose and allow users an option to unsubscribe from mailing list.
Article courtesy by Ms Manju . She is free lancing in site optimization and is working with a leading hosting company and content management company in India. She is also on board of IT education in Government college for Girls, Chandigarh.