eCommerce Glossary: Black Hat Vs. White Hat SEO

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Black Hat vs White Hat SEO

What is White Hat SEO?

If you are working on your website’s SEO, you must know the difference between the Black Hat vs White Hat SEO strategy? In case you do not, your SEO strategies might backfire.

White Hat SEO refers to the techniques that follow the legal rules and guidelines for SEO. Using ethical techniques and following the search engine guidelines is called adhering to White Hat SEO. Some of the White Hat SEO tactics include;

Two people collaborating on web design with connected UI components
  • Speeding up the page load time.
  • Making the website easy to navigate through.
  • Getting backlinks from credible websites.
  • Performing keyword research to optimize content.
  • Writing original content and not copying from others.

White hat SEO techniques focus on the users and the viewers. It takes a long term approach. If a site uses these tactics, there are no chances of being penalized by Google.

What Will Happen If a Website Breaks the Rules?

Understanding Black Hat SEO

Black Hat SEO refers to using all risky practices. It is about using the strategies that will work until they do not. This can involve using tactics that go against the set rules and guidelines. It can also include indulging in dangerous and malicious activities.

Black hat SEO techniques focus on search bots instead of the readers. These sites run a high risk of being penalized by Google if caught doing black hat SEO.

If Google sees behavior that is abnormal and not like normal browsing activity, it will change its algorithm to make sure that the techniques don’t work anymore. Some of the well-known Google search algorithm updates are:

  • Panda: This penalized content copying.
  • Florida: This penalized keyword stuffing.
  • Penguin: This penalized specific link practices.

Google can also punish rule-breakers individually. So, if a site experiences a sudden drop in traffic or finds that fewer web pages are appearing on the search pages, it is a sign the site has been penalized.

You can find out about the penalties from Google Search Console. On this website, Google displays if it has taken a visual action against the website in question. This gives the website a chance to fix the problem. Sure, the search rank drops but fixing the problem will help in the long run. Thereafter, you can submit a reconsideration request. Google then checks the site and restores its ranking.

At times, Google can also exclude or ban your site from the search results. So, users will not find the business online, anymore. It kills organic traffic that leads to sales. Bans might not be that common but if it happens undo those mistakes and return to white hat SEO techniques.

Things You Need To Know To Avoid When Working on Your SEO

Black Hat SEO Techniques to Avoid

In this section, you will learn about the black hat SEO tactics that have to be avoided at any cost.

Cloaking

Websites use the cloaking technique for tricking the users and also the search engine spiders. In this process, two different types of information are delivered. The first one is to the spiders for indexing and the other to the users.

For instance, if you clicked on a search result for the query ‘Gold Jewelry’ and it leads you to a spammy movie download page, it is cloaking. Search engine crawlers do not index sites like this. However, at times, they are indexed accidentally. They are removed as soon as they are identified as cloaked sites.

Duplicate Content

Taking content from a website and posting it on your website as ‘original’ is called plagiarizing. Google can identify this in no time. As soon as its crawling spiders find duplicate content, it can de-index the site immediately.

Many plagiarism detectors can check if the content is copied. Most of them provide the source from which it has been copied. So, it is better not to copy content and create original posts. You can use Copyscape or Grammarly to check your content for plagiarism before posting it on your site.

Keyword Stuffing

It is necessary to make sure you are using the right targeted keywords for your website but many tend to have a misconception when it comes to keyword placement. So, they stuff the page with keywords instead of placing them strategically across the content. They do this in hope of generating better rankings. Nevertheless, it will surely backfire. Keyword stuffing can affect readability and can cause Google to penalize the site. So, if a site is stuffing its content with keywords, it can expect a drop in its ranking.

Then again, hidden keywords can also be a problem. To avoid disrupting the readability, the website hides excessive keywords from the users. They match the color of the text to the background color of the website. This makes it invisible to the users but it is still visible to the search indexes.

The basic idea behind this is while the readers still find the content readable, crawlers find the keywords to rank it. But Google can figure out this black hat SEO technique and penalize the site.

Clickbait

Many websites use clickbait titles to obtain more clicks and increase traffic to the website. Clickbait thumbnails and titles create a curiosity in the readers and convince them to click on the link. Nevertheless, when they click on it, they might discover that the content is not even related to the information provided on the website.

So, the users exit the page instantly. This increases the bounce rate. So, apart from being penalized by Google, losing viewers can harm the site’s authority. So, create clickbait titles that aren’t fake. It should include relevant information.

Paid Links

Some sites pay money for links to get a higher ranking. Most of the time than not, it is clear that the links are paid. Buying links can be advantageous for the website and is easy. When the transaction is complete, there is no need to worry about content quality.

Moreover, the anchor text, an important ranking factor is also selected according to the preference of the customer. These two reasons are enough for manipulating search engine ranking. This is the reason the SEO technique is taken to be black hat. Instead of buying links, build quality links. Backlinking is one of the most efficacious SEO techniques. But it is always important to follow white hat link building techniques.

Black and White hat SEO techniques might be easy to describe on the surface but in reality, it is much more complex. For obvious reasons, black hat SEO tactics involve substantial risks. The white hat SEO technique is no doubt a better approach and approved by all major search engines. Make sure you don’t believe anyone who tells you otherwise for quick results to rank your website.