I'm not going to debate the intent/java/non-java stuff at play here (because I can't

What is most interesting to me is that over time…as the "Results Within Your Social Circle" that the goog is testing become non-beta and a key "decider" of what you see on page 1…that this post and the resulting fallout will have more effect on SEO that any "tactic" anyone can muster up anyway.

Thanks for listing us in the "competitor" list in the comments too. I'd like to see that meeting eh…"We're considering createWOWmedia and Lessing (DASH) Flynn" Nice!

Maybe Push should start a blog. The big difference is I talk about these agencies in actual context AND I link to them. And as you probably know, linking to other Web sites increases their search engine rankings and relevance on Google.

Thanks for reading!

"Push Branding Des Moines"

So. Who's confusing people now?

I personally thought that this tactic was underhanded. They knew that the majority of viewers already had flash — and if the didn't they should have. The truth is they never thought anyone would find out what they were doing and if they did, no one would do anything about it.

But i thought that I would get some more insight on the matter. i asked the Communication Arts community what they thought about this tactic. Some of the words that were used was unethical, immoral, and desperate. They also felt that sooner or later Google would fix the problem.

I then went out and asked several of the companies that were in that list what they thought. Everyone that i spoke to thought that they needed to learn how to play well with others. Other comments included: the design community here is too small to stoop to such low levels; while we are all competitors we are a family; there are certain things that you do not do and this is one of them.

I applaud Lessing-Flynn for bringing this to the community and opening up the discussion.

Then the only question that remains is why list them in your Flash disabled site, and not include them in your all-Flash version?

Let's just cut to the chase. Most people are already going to have Flash installed, and will never see the names of the other companies listed once they enter Push Branding DOT COM.

So the reason, as you have stated, is SEO and to draw attention away from the other companies and to yours. Obviously, you would not wish to draw attention away from your own company, and that is why the list is not on the all-Flash version. Simple.

It is a sad state of affairs when businesses resort to these sort of tactics and I am glad to see that colleges are once again requiring that ethics courses be taken in their business programs.

Thank you for commenting. It just seems that all of those agencies you list on the flash disabled site should show up on your flash enabled home page – like the rest of your content does.

If you decide to keep this code on your site, I think you should add some other Des Moines ad agencies that you missed. Here they are in no particular order:

McLellan Marketing Group http://www.mclellanmarketing.com/
Two Rivers Marketing http://www.tworiversmarketing.com/
Love Scott and Associates http://lovescott.com/
Insight Advertising http://insightcubed.com/
Pepper Ricci and Associates http://www.rjgd.com/pra/port/pra.html
Test of Time Design http://www.testoftimedesign.com/
Lingo Moxie http://www.lingomoxie.com/
Onpurpos http://www.onpurpos.com/
McCormick Advertising http://www.mccormickcompany.com/
Relationship Marketing Inc. http://www.rmarketing.com/
Wesley Day Advertising http://wesleyday.com/
Create Wow http://createwowmedia.com/

If I am missing anyone, please let me know, you can play too.

I invite everyone concerned to please go look at the non-flash version of our website before drawing any conclusions and actually look at what we did. We simply put a list of our peer group companies very publicly on our site. Nothing sneeky or underhanded at all.

If anyone has an issue or concern with what we have done you are more than welcome to call me and I'd be happy to answer any questions you have.

Have a great weekend and enjoy the SuperBowl – hopefully there will be some great ads.

Take care,
Eric Groves
Creative Director/Owner
PUSH Branding and Design
515.288.5278

When asked about our competitors we’ve often said wonderful things about Lessing-Flynn and many others. We appreciate quality work done by others in our industry and though we are competitive and hate to lose bids, we consider it a good thing when a prospect “gets it” and chooses a firm that will take their branding seriously; even if it isn’t us.

Has anyone here actually disabled Flash and looked at our website? There’s nothing hidden or sneaky going on. What you’ll see is just a well-designed non-Flash page telling people to install Flash and giving them a bit of information about our company. The text listing our competitors isn’t hidden or “grey on black”. It uses the same style treatment as the surrounding paragraphs – our secondary color theme distinguished from the primary color theme above.

As our site is all-Flash, this is also the page that is most significant to our search engine ranking. We’ve listed our competitors in order to position us within the minds of our prospects as a company that offers similar services and can competently compete with those listed. When potential clients are looking for a Des Moines-based agency or design studio, we want to them to include us in their list of candidate vendors.

A couple of other points:

Groves Design was our former name and grovesdesign.com our former website. Google’s published best practices instruct us to redirect our previous site to the new one, just as we have done. Again, nothing sneaky.

Your own admavericks.com and lessingflynn.com often do not use a hyphen in “Lessing Flynn”.

If you have more to talk about on this or other matters, you are welcome to call.

Regards,
Ryan Parlee
(515) 288-5278
Co-Owner
PUSH Branding and Design