I am new here so I am hoping I am posting in the correct place, I can't see anything similar on here so hopefully I am not duplicating. I also apologise that my first post is a plea for help but I have run out of options and there are a lot of folks on here with a lot more experience than I who I hope can help. In a nutshell - a personal friend made 2 websites for a new business project. She asked me to critique them which I did and it was no mean feat because, to be honest, both sites were pretty appalling. Anyway, all was well until I went back onto the sites in question to find that not only were they exactly the same ie, equally bad, I also found in the middle of the links pages on both sites and enormous image of my logo and a link to my web design business! I know she was trying to be nice but to be honest the sites are sub-standard and I certainly do not want people visiting them and thinking that I had a hand in designing them which I most certainly did not. I have tried asking her to take the links off (nicely - said that a web design business was not really an appropriate link for her type of business and offered her links to 2 of my other sites which she has used) and this has been going on for over a month now and they are still on there. I have sent her an email a week asking her to remove the links and she is now not speaking to me at all (*sigh*) which bothers me a lot less than those links!! Her SEO is pratically non-existent so I am not anticipating a lot of traffic but she is publicising them extensively on facebook and we live in a small town where I get most of my clients from. I have no personal axe to grind but this could potentially harm my business. What can I do to have these links removed if anything? Any help or advice would be appreciated.
Depends on what platform she built the site. For example, if it is a wordpress you can contact them and try to report logo/image abuse. If it's a standard, custom made html page then only a webmaster (the one who has got FTP login information) can modify it.
Have you tried talking to her in person? I don't see how you can remove the link unless you convince her to do that herself. The only thing you can do is distance your business away from those websites. If you're a designer you probably have a reference page on your website. Anyone who looks at your references can see what you've done. Unless those two websites are in your portfolio, there's nothing to worry about. If anything, she'll generate more traffic to you. Have you ever heard the saying "there's no such thing as bad press"? It's true. If I was to find myself on a crappy website and I saw a big logo "designed by" I would definitely want to check out who the "artist" was and so will others. Once people visit your website and see what a marvelous designer you are, they'll remember you for that. So my advice is, don't worry. This will work in your favor.
Thanks, I am going to try to talk to her again and if not, as you say, have to rely on the links on my own site and fingers crossed people who do find me from her sites are then suitably impressed and employ me!
I think eurojack is right. A link is a link, and if your site is well designed you might change people's opinion. Without the link, they will never even consider you, because they won't know you exist! Moh and it's good for google ranking...
Slept on this and I am going to leave it. You are right. A link is a link at the end of the day and anything that gets people to visit my site has to be a good thing whatever reason they are visiting it!
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