SEOs Who Party Like Its 1999
Digital Zoom Versus Optical Zoom
The digital camera is but a technological advancement of the conventional analog camera. And thus every component of .....
Search engine optimization has come full circle in the lastThe digital camera is but a technological advancement of the conventional analog camera. And thus every component of .....
couple of years.
Back in the mid 1990s it was easy to achieve high search engine
rankings. Just tweak your META tags and site copy with keywords
and submit. Then, as more and more webmasters started to catch
on to META Tags, it became more difficult to beat the
competition. Many companies turned to spam tactics such as
hidden text (the same color as the background of the page),
hidden links (using 1 x 1 pixel gifs to hide them), doorway
pages stuffed with keywords and cloaked content, all designed to
be seen by search engine robots and not humans in an attempt to
trick the search engines into giving the site a higher ranking.
Thankfully, over the past few years, achieving high search
rankings has become fairer and more straight-forward. The search
engines have given less weighting to META tags and more
relevancy weighting to sites that are popular, of high quality
and contain unique, relevant information. Most search engines
Getting The Right Digital Camera For You
There are really great advantages in digital photography:
You can shoot till you .....
have developed comprehensive spam filters that weed out theThere are really great advantages in digital photography:
You can shoot till you .....
spammers from the legitimate sites and penalize sites caught
trying to cheat the system. Google in particular has led the
charge for quality over quantity.
Fortunately, the web site aspects that most search engines
prefer are also those that visitors prefer. Build a quality site
with plenty of text, up-to-date, relevant content that other
sites link to, a solid navigation system, submit it by hand to
popular directories and search engines and you will be on your
way to high rankings in no time. It's not difficult, it's not
tricky and it certainly doesn't involve any black magic.
That's why I find it difficult to understand search engine
optimizers who party like it's 1999 - using invisible text and
hidden links in some pathetic, misguided attempt to trick the
search engines into believing their site content is the most
relevant. I mean, what are they thinking? I've heard excuses
like "the search engine guidelines are unclear so we have no
Beat Google's Dampening Link Filter With SEO Articles
choice but to push the envelope". Give me a break. The searchMost Search Engine Optimization (SEO) experts agree that links back to your site have a great impact on your ranking in the major search .....
engine guidelines are quite obvious to those who are actually
good at SEO and understand what is necessary to achieve results
for their clients. Many search engines even publish their
guidelines clear as day on their sites. Unfortunately, it seems
this industry is full of lazy non-performers who prefer to rely
on outdated cheat sheets that haven't worked for years.
I am so sick of all the cowboy SEO firms who clog up the search
engine indices with meaningless keyword-stuffed pages, in a vain
attempt to dominate the search rankings with their client's
sites. Don't they do any research? Don't they read the search
engine guidelines? Don't they understand these tactics are
fruitless and ineffective? Don't they know these techniques
haven't worked for years and are regarded as spamming? Don't
they realize they are putting their client's sites at risk of
ranking penalties or outright banning? Don't they care about the
Don't Put All Your Promotion Eggs In The SEO Basket
One of the most frequent questions I get asked by my clients is "What is the best .....
long term effects and the future of their client's web sites?One of the most frequent questions I get asked by my clients is "What is the best .....
To see an example of these blatant spamming techniques, visit
Google.com and type in a search for "new zealand power
companies". Visit the first site in the results (a doorway
page), right click the page with your mouse and choose "select
all". Run your mouse over the darkened area at the bottom left
of the page. See all the hidden links? All leading to yet more
doorway pages.
This second example is trickier to find because it appears that
Google has already penalized it. Go to Google.com and type in a
search for "shopping new zealand must involve a visit". Check
out the second page in the results (another doorway) and have a
close look at the little arrows in near invisible font at the
bottom of the page next to "more". Each one of those arrows
leads to another doorway page stuffed with more keywords. I've
even seen examples of companies hiding thousands of keywords in
CSS tags or tables that are coded to an extreme left or right
position so they don't actually appear on the visible page.
What is the point of these tactics? Even if they go unreported,
Google will eventually locate the spam and degrade or ban the
pages. It makes no sense to me why SEO firms would take such
risks with their client's sites when it is so much easier to get
good results using the methods recommended by the search engines.
But as bad as spammy SEO firms are, there are worse offenders.
These are the spammy SEO firms who like to propagate myth and
legend by publishing articles that are misleading, deceptive and
often downright false. No wonder webmasters are confused when it
comes to search engines and no wonder there are more cowboy SEO
spammers springing up every day. With the amount of incorrect
information floating around out there, it is extremely difficult
for newcomers to sort out fact from fiction.
The sad thing is that many of these spam propagators justify
their rubbish with endorsements from big name marketers or
influential web marketing firms who allow them to speak at
conferences and seminars and spread their misinformation. Some
of these spam propagators have even set up their own training
schools to educate people in deceptive SEO tactics.
It really rankles me when I see faulty advice such as the
following being circulated to unsuspecting webmasters:
"...you could place content inside of the tag, even
though the site isn't in frames...it's also not something that's
likely to get you in trouble with Google as long as the content
is relevant to your page."
Creating content designed to be hidden from viewers and shown
Do Higher Digital Camera Prices Mean Better Cameras?
Understanding digital camera prices makes finding the best camera value much .....
only to search engines by misleading use of a tag meant for aUnderstanding digital camera prices makes finding the best camera value much .....
frames-based page? I am almost certain Google would have a
problem with that. What type of example are these people trying
to set? To think they are actually teaching these tactics to
future webmasters is beyond comprehension.
So what can you do to fight back the spam propagators? For
starters:
1) Study the search engine guidelines such as those outlined at:
http://www.google.com/webmasters/guidelines.html
http://insite.lycos.com/searchservices utorial.asp
http://ask.ineedhits.com/programterms.asp?n=u#spam
2) Circulate articles like this one to other webmasters
3) Spend time in knowledgeable webmaster forums such as
http://www.ihelpyouservices.com/forums/
4) Make sure you report any cases of search engine spamming to
Google (http://www.google.com/contact/spamreport.html) and the
other search engines as soon as you spot them.
When we cut spammers off at the source, we can stop the spread
of misinformation and all benefit from the results.
Copyright 2003 by Kalena Jordan. All rights reserved under
U.S. and international law.
About the author:
Article by Kalena Jordan, CEO of Web Rank. Kalena was one of the
first search engine optimization experts in Australasia and is
well known and respected in her field. For more of her articles
on search engine ranking and online marketing, please visit High
Search Engine Ranking.