When dodging the slavering jaws of the spambots, it`s best if your site looks like a lousy supper. That means reducing the rewards of getting the spam message onto the site. Even if spammers make the necessary code changes to help their spambots navigate the web, they may simply decide that it`s not worth the extra work and maintenance if the incentives are too low. My assumption is that spammers are in the hunt for a good Google PageRank score; it`s about boosting their results in search engines. The rel=”nofollow” tag when added to links tells Google and other search engines not to index the link. Admittedly the pace of spam has only increased since the rel=”nofollow” tag was introduced by Google and a group of blog software makers a couple of years ago. My optimistic hunch is that new apps that support this tag from the get-go won`t be as big a target. We`ll see.

So what is the best way to advertise and gain trust from new users looking to buy your product? Some might say it is paying for online ads and having your site show up for a certain product search. Others will go for viral marketing and rely on word of mouth to gain trust.

When a customer reads what previous users of a certain product had to say about it, their attention will be caught more quickly than just a basic advertisement. Searchengineguide explained a survey by Nielsen, in which consumer recommendations and opinions were two of the most trusted marketing techniques while search engine ads were third from the bottom with a mere 34% trust factor.

After reading an online article last week that guided the reader through the process of setting up a social media profile on seven different social network forums, I came to the conclusion that simply signing up on these platforms is not going to do much for you or your brand. Participation is the key.