In other words, is there evidence that google uses WoT or other similar sources such as hpHosts.net etc to sculpt its results pages? A client of mine has recently fallen victim to a smear campaign where somebody has managed to get them listed under hpHosts.net list (and subsequently, that gets read by WoT) as a astroturfer (grass roots marketing) - whatever that means in the context of a small e-commerce site and as a 'community spammer' (total lies on both counts). All would have been well if it did not coincide with a big big big drop in SERPs performance of many a keyword and the whole of the longtail. I know that mayday and caffeine came in play as well around that time but am trying to figure out all possible factors that contribute towards the poor performance. If ratings do contribute (and they are unfounded), has anyone had any experience in combating such bad rep campaigns and restoring google positions? http://www.mywot.com/en/scorecard/shoe-envy.co.uk - the references can be seen there. on a side note, if anyone can offer an explanation as to why long tail traffic and head tail brands traffic have dropped so badly, please message me - i am sure my client would love to find out and fix it (against appropriate compensation, naturally)