Black Hat or White Hat – What’s Your SEO Style?

Search engine optimization (SEO) comes in several different forms. There is white hat SEO which is playing by the rules and tends to be more organic and there’s the black hat SEO which is the direct opposite.  Anything a black hatter can do to increase their site rankings is okay by them.

Black hat methods vary and it’s possible to do some of them unintentionally. By trying to game the system, however, you are susceptible to any changes to a search engine’s algorithms. In other words, black hatters may be in the top few listings one day and sent to “the dungeon” the next.

The problem many people have is that they aren’t always sure if what they are doing is considered black hat SEO or not. While there are many different things you can do for search engine optimization, there are a few basic practices to help you stay on the white hat side of the fence.

• Do Not Stuff Your Content With Keywords – A common mistake is to assume that if using your keywords a few times will boost your rankings, then using them even more will boost your rankings. The problem with that, however, is that your visitors will find your message difficult to understand because too much repetitive words sound unnatural.

• X-Ray Vision Needed – Do not use invisible text. This is a variation of keyword stuffing. Black hatters use the same color for both the text and the background for any words they want to hide. They’re not as clever as they think since the search engines can see it and will penalize them for it.

• Avoid Doorway Pages – These are the fake pages that only exist for the purposes of attracting search engine crawlers. There is no intention of anyone actually seeing these pages. They are only there for keyword stuffing.  Again, you run the risk of being dropped completely when the search engines find out.

• Play by the Terms of Service (TOS) Rules -  Just about any site you use to help boost your rankings will have a TOS. It’s up to you to read and follow them to the best of your ability. Once you start looking for loopholes or justifications, you are moving into black hat SEO territory.

Doing the above things will go a long way toward avoiding the risk of being dropped by the search engines. If you want to rank higher in the search engines, you’ve got to put on that white hat and play by the rules.  Consistency is the key.

Click here to get a free Search Engine Optimization Starter Guide.