Recently I made a mistake that may cost a great deal of traffic to my new web site.

I studied so many books about Internet marketing over the last couple of years that I decided to start a new web site, and share my knowladge and experience with other fellow Internet marketers.

Since I read lots of information about search engine optimization (SEO), I intended to optimize all of my web pages for search engines from the beginning on, expecting Google to be my number one source of traffic in the near future.

I did an extensive keyword research using WordTraker, made a blueprint for my product and article pages, and the time has come to choose a great domain name for my new project.

I went to GoDaddy, the famous domain name registar, tried this and that, and finally came up with a beautiful domain name related to Internet marketing - netmarketingstrategies.com

You probably know that Internet marketing is a very competitive niche, so I was glad that this domain name was still available. I registered it immediately.

My site was up and running in 48 hours. Now I needed some fresh web content, and to get indexed by major search engines as soon as possible.

So, I spent a week or two writing search engine optimized content for my new online business.

I usually don't submit my new web sites to search engines for indexing. I prefer when my sites are found on other web sites and get spidered automatically.

One of the easiest ways to have a link to a web site from other sites is by writing and distributing high quality articles. So, I wrote an article about two-tier affiliate programs and submited it to major article directories.

Within a couple of days I searched for my article title in Google and noticed that it did great. Publishers liked my article and they were publishing it on their web sites and newsletters.

I expected my home page to get indexed very fast.

Time went.

Each week I searched Google to see if my site has already got indexed. It didn't.

I decided to see if my domain has been spidered by other major search engines. Yes, both Yahoo and MSN got it. So, what went wrong? Why Google won't index my home page?

Here's what I think went wrong: my further investigation showed that the domain name had already been used by another webmaster and had been expired half a year ago when I registered it. It seems that the previous domain name owner was using unfair search engine optimization strategies and his web site was banned by Google.

I sent a request to Google explaining the situation and asking to lift the ban from my web site. I am not sure if they will listen and help me.

I am ready to register a new domain name in a few weeks time if I still cannot get my site indexed by Google.

So, don't make the same mistake I did... If you intend to optimize your new web site in order to receive traffic from Google and other search engines, make sure to check out if a domain name you've selected for your online business is not banned by Google before registering it.

Gerardas Norkus has been marketing online since 1997.

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