Silly Rabbit, Tricks are for Black Hat SEOs

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Silly Rabbit, Tricks are for Black Hat SEOs

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First off, for those that are not familiar with the term "Black Hat SEO" it usually refers to highly controversial tactics used to manipulate the search rankings of a given web page and are generally in violation of search engine guidelines. Second off, if the title of this article seems strange to you, you're probably too young to have been exposed to the "Silly Rabbit, Trix are for kids" TV commercials. No worries. Your enjoyment of this article will not be affected.

On with the article.

If you think you should be using Black Hat SEO or you are missing out, I have only three words of advice: DON'T DO IT!

For those that are feeling unsatisfied with the brevity of this advice, and need more words, let me expand a bit more: BLACKHAT SEO IS NOT WORTH IT FOR MOST WEBSITES. Instead of spending a lot of time and money on black hat SEO, you're probably much better off simply doing things that makes your site and it's associated content more rank-worthy.

Let me say that one more time, for emphasis: The best way to optimize your website and get more/better traffic via search engines is to make the content on your site something people actually want to find. When you do this, you're working with the search engines -- not against them.

Reasons You Don't Want To Use Blackhat SEO

1. Real Black Hat SEOs Might Not Exist In Your World: There's a dearth of people out there that even get fundamental SEO, understand how the various search engine algorithms work and how to do more than just guess at the weight of various factors impacting search results. The number of people that actually know enough to employ really advanced black hat techniques is vanishingly small. The number of these people that you are probably associated with is close to zero.

2. Even if they exist, you can't pick them: Lets say for a moment that there are those elite few people that actually do know enough to apply these highly advanced techniques and you could connect to them. How would you know one if you met her? This is a bit like the public stock market. The chances that some fund manager has figured out a consistent way to "beat the system" are pretty low. Your problem is, even if they're out there, you wouldn't know how to separate those that make the claims from those that can actually do it.

3. Even if you can pick them, you can't hire them: Assuming you had some uncanny ability to really pick out the true uber-experts, chances are, you couldn't hire them because you couldn't afford them. If they're that good, they're either working on some super-big project for some mega-company that can spend some real money -- or working on their own private projects.

4. Even if you could hire them, their ideas may not work for you: There are many, many factors that go into search engine algorithms. Some are more important than others, but it's really, really hard to know whether a specific black hat technique will actually work for you. The more advanced the technique, the more likely that there are specific situations within which the technique works.

5. Even if it does work, it's probably temporary: Even if certain techniques do actually work today (and I'm sure there are some smart folks out there that have figured some out), the search engine algorithms are constantly evolving. Chances are, if somebody has found a "back door" to unduly influence the search results, this door will eventually be closed.

6. Even If It Lasts, It's Really, Really Risky: Assuming you could find some small edge and that will last long enough for it to be worthwhile, you have to balance this benefit against the risks that you're taking. Is a potential increase in traffic via organic search really worth risking having your site banned completely?

So, here's the build-up of arguments: You probably don't know someone that really has the talent to do black hat SEO well. Even if you did, you wouldn't know it. Even if you knew it, you couldn't hire them or afford them. Even if you could hire them, it probably wouldn't work for you. Even if it did work for you, it's probably temporary. Even if wasn't temporary, it's just too risky. Any questions?

Posted by Dharmesh Shah on Mon, Dec 03, 2007 @ 08:46 AM

COMMENTS

Very well written...clear conscise and to the point.
Much like the get rich schemes you see on TV, if they were really that affective, why are they spending time and money hawking them on TV. Stick with the basics, make your site affective the old-fashioned way, work and intelligence, and the occasional topical blog(s).
Tanstaafl (there ain't no such thing as a free lunch) to quote Robert Heinlein...

posted on Monday, December 03, 2007 at 9:38 AM by Bryan Blaylock

You might also add: How do you know if you can trust them? In other words, are they a white-black hat or a black-black hat? I think I've just confused myself, but you get the point. -OT

posted on Monday, December 03, 2007 at 12:05 PM by Oliver Taco

I listened to the VP of engineering at Google in a luncheon last month and he stated that oer 200 seperate algorithms were at work when a user entered a search term... I am not sure Google discusses ANY of them.

posted on Monday, December 03, 2007 at 5:49 PM by Steven William Groves

Great post; well written and concise. Points one through five are very much like finding someone who can "beat the market"; ultimately tough to do. Point number six reflects that just like the financial markets, sustained information asymmetry is generally a quick way to get in trouble.

posted on Monday, December 03, 2007 at 9:21 PM by Matt Jennison

Good call - content is king...forget keywords and beating the system. Just write about what you do and the keywords will come along anyways.

posted on Wednesday, December 05, 2007 at 1:13 PM by Advice Network

As a matter of fact, I have decided to offer consulting services for now. By this I don't mean necessarily blackhat consulting as - indeed - that's a pretty expensive service - but should anybody address me with a question concerning a site ban, or some competitive research, or general strategy development (I still don't have much time for doing your SEO from start to finish - and that would indeed be costly) - then you're more than welcome, just give me a shout.

posted on Sunday, December 09, 2007 at 5:56 PM by IrishWonder

I'm afriad that this is a very naive view of the SEO industry. The search engine marketing industry really does not mirror Star Wars. There is no dark side of the force, although I have heard people compare Matt Cutts to Darth Vader.
"If you go Black, you'll never come back" really doesn't exist in SEO. Most experienced SEOs will understand that most techniques have some shades of gray, and an SEO consultant worth his fee will be able to explain to the client the risk involved with implimenting any technique they're recommending (or not recommending for that matter).
By the same token, "if you build it they will come" does not exist in SEO either. In 1997, the simple feat of launching a cool new website might have attracted attention. Nowadays, you're one in a crowd of thousands. But, if you even bribe a top blogger to mention you in a blog post, you've violated the guidelines of some search engines.
I would really like to hear what you think these "advanced techniques" you speak of, the ones that the "true uber-experts" use. Please do tell! Certainly, your readers are intelligent enough to decide for themselves whether those techniques are White or Black. And, do provide examples.
Oh, and the true "Dark Lords" of SEO certainly wouldn't apply those uber techniques directly to their White sites, right?

posted on Friday, December 21, 2007 at 9:48 PM by Peter Davis

You could really make the same arguments for White Hat SEO; the really good ones are too expensive, too busy, invested in their own projects, and with Search technology changing so rapidly these days, there are no guarantees. Which actually brings up a counter-point: You CAN tell who is most likely Black Hat by whether or not they GUARANTEE first page listings.