Last week was the week from hell for DealsDirect after the online department store found itself blacklisted by Google.
The problem was a third-party advertisement that hit the site with a piece of malicious code and resulted in Google blocking users to the site.
After the incident occurred, DealsDirect co-founder and chief executive Paul Greenberg told SmartCompany he is considering changing some of the company’s advertising structures.
It was the sort of problem that can strike any business reliant on Google traffic, warns Reseo chief executive Chris Thomas.
He says businesses need to develop policies so they know how to react when their site is attacked, or blocked by Google, saying it could have extremely damaging effects on revenue.
“There are a couple of problems that occur from a situation like this. One is a reputational problem and the other is a trust perception problem. Then, of course, you’re just worried about how much revenue you’re losing because every moment lost is an opportunity for a sale.”
“There would also be ongoing issues with people attempting to visit the site, getting frustrated and then being inclined to go off somewhere else and buy from a competitor.”
Thomas says businesses not only need to address the problem itself, but also any damage to the company’s reputation caused by comments spread on blogs, forums and other social networks.
“What businesses need to do is pull their AdWords straight away, if they are running them, in order to stop the bleeding. You pause all your campaigns bringing people to the site as soon as possible. The second step is to iron out the problem, and then the third is to go to Google and let them know that you’re sorting it out.”
“But there’s also the reputational impact. You need to dive into wherever there are mentions of you being hit or blocked by Google, and reassuring them you have the problem under control. You need to look at popular forums, and discussions, and be very active in that space to ensure people have been reassured that it’s all under control.”
Greenberg says DealsDirect had done exactly that, working to find the root cause of the problem while reassuring users no one would have been affected by the rogue code.
“It’s the same old story, we outsourced our ads capability to better serve us, and one of our outsources had a little bit of a kink. Normally these things can’t get through the door, but through an external software source we’ve had a little bit of a problem.”
“Perhaps… we’ve taken every precaution necessary but in this case it hasn’t worked in our favour. There will definitely be a debrief, but as I said before, no customers were affected by the code at any stage.”
The DealsDirect site continues to operate as per normal.
Patrick Stafford is a freelance journalist and a former deputy editor of SmartCompany.
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