Black hat SEO was the hottest thing that helped websites to gain a high rank before the search engines started cranking out several algorithms for ranking, which include quality content, relevancy, as well as links. Black hat SEO is responsible for consisting of several optimization strategies, which are currently considered to be unacceptable by search engines. Earlier, Black hat SEO was considered to be extremely appealing for marketers. These SEO strategies could help in the growth of organic search. Presently, using Black hat SEO tactics can harm your website and can also cost you dearly. Given below is a list of the Black hat SEO tactics that you cannot carry forward any longer.
Hidden text
You probably remember the invisible ink pens that you used as a kid. Back then, marketers used invisible or hidden text on websites for trying and enticing search engines to give them a high rank in the search engine results. For instance, if a website had a white background, sneaky marketers would consider placing several keywords of the same color of the background, thereby making it invisible for users, scrollable for search engines. Hidden texts were normally put in those places where visitors would not notice, like the footer. Currently, this strategy is not accepted by search engines and it is considered to be one of the most unacceptable SEO strategies, which can lead to low organic rankings.
Cloaking
Cloaking is undoubtedly a sneaky manner of showing a website to search engines and another website to the users. According to Google, one example of cloaking is when a website is showing flash content to the audience while showing HTML content to the search engines.
Link farms
Google as well as other reputed search engines consider internal as well as external website links of extreme value and use the links as an important factor of ranking. Most of the website owners were responsible for paying money for receiving additional links from link farms that would point to the website. However, currently, all the search engines are aware of this Black hat SEO tactic and analyze websites that follow this strategy.
Keyword stuffing
Keyword stuffing was undoubtedly one of the most effective techniques for receiving ranks in the search engine results. However, this is not at all true anymore. The thought that was running behind this Black hat SEO technique was that if you could inundate the website with relevant keywords that you were interested in ranking for, Google would be responsible for ranking the website higher for those keywords as well as user queries.
However, since the time the Panda update has been released by Google, keyword density is one of the most important things that is monitored closely and regularly by Google. As opposed to using keywords on your website, it is a good idea to create user-friendly content. Use natural language and work on relevant content so that you can appease the reputed search engines.
Hidden links
As already mentioned above, search engines are responsible for considering link equity when ranking websites. Hidden links are those links that users will not be able to find but the search engines can crawl. Common ways of hiding links include placing the links behind images, using links that have zero font size or adding links that have the same color as the background color of the website.
Duplicate content
Duplicate content is responsible for coming in several forms and the search engines do not forgive websites that duplicate content. Before the search engines started catching this technique of Black hat SEO, website owners were responsible for placing the same content on various pages within a website for improving page rankings. Not only that, but they were also responsible for stealing content from several other websites. Currently, search engines are responsible for taking duplicate content seriously. Your website can even be banned. This is why it is suggested that you avoid duplicate content as far as possible.
Clickbait
Clickbait is one of the most devious ways of enticing users to visit websites by using deceptive headlines for catching the attention of the users. It has been observed that often the title of the page or the Meta description is going to say one thing and the website will be responsible for saying something else. For example, websites can entice users by giving titles like, "Earn millions of dollars." When users click on the link, they will be redirected to websites that do not have anything to do with making money.
Most of the website owners who are responsible for using this technique are trying to make more money based on the website clicks. However, the present algorithms of the search engines have started noticing this and you need to ensure that you are avoiding this as far as possible.
Misusing structured data
Structured data is a kind of data that is responsible for making the content searchable on search engines. This is also referred to as rich snippets. Structured data helps in making your website credible. However, website owners were responsible for resorting to several unfair means associated with gaining popularity. They would do this by modifying the entire content of structured data. However, this is something that you cannot do currently because your website can be blacklisted.
Reasons for avoiding Black hat SEO
Two reasons as to why you should avoid Black hat SEO include:
- Firstly, Black hat SEO strategies can be responsible for the unpleasant experience of the users. If you visit any website and find out that the website is not providing the information that you thought it was supposed to provide, you are not going to visit that website ever again.
- Secondly, search engines can easily understand when Black hat SEO strategies are being used. They are going to demote the website in the search engine ranks, which will make it tough to attract potential customers.
According to www.forbes.com, Black hat SEO tactics currently mean that you are trying to deceive Google, which is not possible. To know more, you can contact the professionals of the reputed New York SEO Company.
Conclusion
The algorithms of the search engines have completely changed and they can easily detect Black hat SEO techniques. Make sure that you know about all the techniques that have been mentioned above so that you do not use them for improving your rank within the search engines.
