That is the lesson that KinderStart.com has learned as their case against Google is thrown out of court by Judge Jeremy Fogel of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California. The judge also imposed yet-to-be-determined sanctions on KinderStart legal counsel Gregory Yu for making unsupported allegations against Google.
If you recall, KinderStart filed a lawsuit against Google last year alleging that it suffered crippling financial harm after its web site got dropped from the search engine’s index.
Many who market sites via search engine (myself included0 were of the opinion that due of the lack of quality in KinderStart’s site, they did not deserve to be ranked well in Google’s search results. Besides that, Google has the freedom to do as they wish. It is their search engine.
Apparently the judge felt the same way. Not only did he throw the case out of court, he granted Google the right to seek attorneys fees for the costs of defending against these specific charges.
Is Google pleased? You bet they are! “We always felt these claims were unjustified, because courts have consistently rejected complaints over search engine rankings, so we’re pleased that Judge Fogel promptly dismissed this case,” Google litigation counsel Hilary Ware said in a company statement.
The lesson learned by all of this: if Google (or any other search engine) thinks your site is crap and does not deserve to be ranked above other sites that are not crap, don’t try to sue them over it. Rather, spend your time and money on making your site worthy to be ranked well.
David Wallace, co-founder and CEO of SearchRank, is a recognized expert in the industry of search and social media marketing. Since 1997, David has been involved in developing successful search engine and social media marketing campaigns for large and small businesses.
