Content SEO dont’s
Tiny text
Avoid the use of small text on your page; search engines view tiny text as though you’re using it because you have something to hide. Tiny text has been used in the past to improve keyword density without drastically affecting your human visitor experience of the site. Search engine algorithms have got wise to this technique and consequently, markdown pages for the use of very small text.
Meta refresh redirect tags
This technique is where you set a Meta Refresh tag with a zero second delay. The actual page will display for such a short time period that your visitors will not notice that the original highly
optimized page has diverted them to a human friendly alternative.
Search engines take a very dim view of this because they influence and litter the results with superfluous text. A couple of major SEO firms have used these techniques claiming they would get clients into the top ten on Google but ultimately ended up getting their clients’ domains excluded.
JavaScript redirects
JavaScript redirects can again be used to show your human visitors one page and the search engines another. Search engines ignore JavaScript, as building the ability to read JavaScript into search engine robots would slow them down considerably. JavaScript is very flexible and can be programmed to redirect your human visitors when a particular event occurs.
Cloaking
Cloaking is a similar but slightly more intelligent technique. It involves showing search engine robots a highly
optimized page and your human visitors a normal one. The content seen by the robot can be highly
optimized for that search engine and can be completely different from the page your human visitors will see.
A cloaked web page is actually a script. When an internet browser or spider talks to a web server it does so using a protocol called the HTTP (Hyper Text Transfer Protocol). As part of the HTTP conversation the client machine submits certain details. (IP address, browser type, previous URL)
If the browser type (also known as ‘User Agent’) includes ‘bot’ in the string the ‘cloaking script’ can make the assumption the client is a search engine robot or spider that’s in the process of indexing the page. In which case a highly
optimized search engine friendly page can be served.
If you did ever consider this technique (and I certainly don’t condone it!) it would be very unwise to use it on anything other than a throwaway domain because search engines do not like this kind of manipulation and if discovered, it will result in an almost certain, search engine ban. Meaning the search engines will never list any pages from the domain in question again.
Please be aware that your competitors are likely to be on the lookout for domains using Meta Refresh, Javascript redirects and Cloaking. If discovered they will inevitably ‘turn you in’ and the domains you use them on will be banned from the search engines.
I have not given code examples of these techniques, as I do not agree with them but if you have a couple of throwaway domains there are plenty of resource sites that freely talk about these techniques and provide examples.
It’s worth remembering that these techniques are only concerned with content SEO and as we know that ‘back linking’ is what really determines page rank and ultimately search engines position, it’s really not worth getting your domain banned for the small advantage you will gain.
Invisible text
(using text which is the same color as the background) Never increase your keyword density by hiding text on your web page by making it the same
color as the background it’s located on. Search engines are aware of the technique and the algorithms used can tell if the text is the same
color as its background. This technique is unlikely to get you banned but could see the page seriously marked down in the search results.
Excessive repetition of keywords
As mentioned ‘keyword density’ should not really exceed 20%. Never simply repeat keywords over and over in the hope that this will increase your keyword density. Search engine algorithms look for patterns in your text and are aware if you simply repeat expressions. Again this technique is unlikely to get you banned but could see the page seriously marked down in the search results.
Slow loading pages
Try to streamline your web pages as much as possible; it’s possible to optimize
pictures so the files sizes are very small without drastically affecting image quality. Use fast, reliable ISP to host your site. It’s not only search engines that like fast loading sites, your human visitors will also appreciate simple fast loading pages. I guarantee if your site is slow it will cost you business, customers will not wait for your site to load if your competitors’ open in half the time.
Using irrelevant keywords
Avoid using keywords that are not relevant to the content of the page. Apart from the detriment to the page rank, using irrelevant keywords will also infuriate your human visitors. People arriving on your page to find no content relevant to the search they conducted will frustrate and ultimately alienate these visitors.
Submission of identical or near identical web pages
Never feel tempted to increase volume by simply repeating pages or large sections of content from pages. The way search engines index web pages means they can tell if content already exists. Even if you locate the pages on different domains, if the wording is identical the search engines can tell and will assume the page has been copied. When the search engines identify a copied page they will attempt to work out which page is the original and
penalize the copied page. Unfortunately, they don’t always get it right and in some cases both the original and copied pages will be
penalized.
Be aware of crafty competitors who may simply copy your content to reduce the effectiveness of your highly
optimized pages. It may be worth periodically taking sections of original text from your site and doing quoted searches to make sure competitors are not stealing your content.
Quoted searches are made by simply placing your search expression in quotes “”, this tells the search engines to conduct an ‘exact search’. So you can identify if someone else has written ‘word for word’ exactly the same as you. Eg. This is a phrase from this publication:
“Be aware of crafty competitors who may simply copy your content to reduce the effectiveness of your highly
optimized pages”
At the time of writing the above sentence was totally original and was not indexed by any major search engine. If someone copies this content ‘word for word’ if I search using a quoted search and other search engine entries are present, I can assume my content has been
stolen.
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