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I don’t want to discuss the “ethics” of cloaking in this thread. That issue can and has been pursued elsewhere.
Cloaking is clearly an effective technique for SEO if you can stay "under the radar" and not get banned for cloaking by Google or the other Search Engines.
By success, I mean that you go "big time" - that you achieve top rankings in a competitive category. By this definition, I think, you cannot be successful and stay "under the radar".
There is, of course, the “throw away domain” strategy: Get a domain name and offer a cloaked site, gather revenue from it until it is detected and penalized. Then, just get another domain name and do it again. That strategy is unacceptable in most situations because it prevents development of a brand, because it cannot provide consistent results and because it is so unstable.
And, there is the “stay under the radar” strategy: Avoid going head to head in major markets, work in a guerilla style around the edge of the high visibility listings and gather traffic from a lot of low profile keywords. But, I want to specifically address the issue of being visible with top high profile rankings on major keywords.
So, to dig into the issue…
It is clear that, if you achieve top rankings on competitive markets, then competitors will "report" you if they can find a reason.
You can minimize this by cloaking "well" - by making it impossible to detect by your competitors. That implies IP/User agent cloaking rather than simple user agent cloaking and other “best practices”.
Still, even if you cloak very well, you will come under scrutiny by Google if you are "successful" in any big way. Some competitors will "report" you even if they can find no reason in the hopes it will harm you. For this and other reasons, if you are in the spotlight (by being successful), you must expect to be scrutinized.
So the question of whether it is possible to successfully cloak "big time" can be reduced to this:
Is it possible to survive "scrutiny" by Google and other search engines if you cloak? If this is not possible, all your efforts are a house of cards in continual danger of being nullified when you are detected.
Clearly, if Google wants to, they can detect that you cloak. They have all necessary information. They have your spider food. And they can easily get your human food with a browser and a dial up, offsite internet connection. All they need to do is compare them.
So, I guess it boils down to this: Is it possible that Google will “look the other way” in some situations or not notice that the site is cloaked?
1.You might be “forgiven” for cloaking if your site is important or significant in some way. Maybe, because you are a major advertiser on Google (no accusations here, just comprehensively and logically covering the bases).
2.They might review the cloak and determine that it is acceptable. I know Google bully-pulpits that cloaking is never acceptable, but there are good reasons to cloak in some situations and reason to think that they do not, in fact, blindly follow a policy of banning every cloaked site they detect. We cloak product oriented database pages by providing relevant, concentrated, keyword rich summaries of the products in situations in which that is the only reasonable way to “expose” the product data. It is possible that they do not “prosecute” cloaking in this and some similar situations.
3.It is possible that for the above reasons and just because they have been overwhelmed by higher priority activities, they have not gotten around to producing the internal tools necessary to easily detect cloaked sites, so that they only really test for cloaking in very rare instances. (Here, I am not addressing the issue of aggressively and proactively pursuing cloaking (we know they do not do that) by sampling sites with a spider using a different user agent and from an IP address not identified with Google.) To spot check for cloaking, they would have to be determine that the page they are testing has not simply been changed. To do that, they would have to visit the page as a clearly identifiable spider, then as a human using a browser, and then as a spider (or some such scheme) to discriminate between SEO cloaking and a page that has just changed.
I am posting this because it is a kind of a strategic question for my business. My SEO business has been growing. We have, until now, avoided serious problems with cloaking and it has been effective for us in the “under the radar” mode. But, I suspect that we cannot for long avoid scrutiny. So, I am hoping to hear from anybody that has been further down this road than us. Only experience can really tell if Google does, in fact, allow cloaked sites to thrive as I have suggested. I would like to know now if we are just going to get shot down when ever we are successful, rather than wait and go through the unproductive pain of all that. If you have experience in this regard please respond directly on this thread or, if you prefer, sticky mail me.
That's all I've got to say.
Richard Lowe
[edited by: richlowe at 2:48 am (utc) on Aug. 6, 2002]
I respectfully just want to say that I have no bad conscience and believe my activity to be ethical.
I don’t want to discuss the “ethics” of cloaking in this thread. That issue can and has been pursued elsewhere.
...thought they could get away with unethical activities. They were wrong.
I'm apalled. Pardon my ignorance, and someone here will definitely correctly if I'm wrong, but my first reaction is how can anyone make the analogy of corporate thieves taking billions with an SEO cloak? I don't cloak, but I still fail to see the analogy.
I still fail to see the analogy
I am going to honor the request of the person who began this thread and suggest we move the ethical discussion elsewhere. It's his thread, after all.
Richard Lowe
Here, I am raising a very pragmatic and direct issue. What is experience can people relate about the possiblilty of successfully cloaking? I am not looking for general or vague assertations about this topic from people who have no experience but have strong opinions based on ill formed ethical positions. I can make those decisions for myself.
The question is: If you cloak and become successful, are you really (in fact, from experience) only going to be knocked down by being banned.
To expound on this a bit. At the entry level, cloaking seems to be the safest way to do SEO. As evidenced by all the discussion in at WebmasterWorld, most of the "classic" SEO techniques (hidden text, link farms, link exchanges, etc.) that are used to deliver optimized or concentrated content to the search engine spiders without clouding the user experience with irrelevant repetition and inappropriate links have resulted in disaster (PR0). We have found cloaking to be a much safer and higher quality technique. We are able to rank well for relevant search terms and deliver a high quality user experience. Maybe it is a kind of in the know secret, but I can say, based on 1 1/2 years experience, cloaking works. We have successfully promoted a large number of sites with no PR0s due to cloaking. Google loves us. (We recently did receive a PR0 for one site, but that was due to their inability to allow us to land anywhere but on their home page - so we got snagged for duplicate content. All our doorway pages showed their home page).
BTW. Our cloaking is always very relevant. Why would anybody put different content in their spider food pages than their human food pages (the scare example is showing kids toys to the spiders and porn to the humans)? Cloaking, from my experience, is just the safest and most direct way to present concentrated and summarized content to the se spiders while maintaining a quality human user experience.
Just like anybody in SEO, we are advertising our clients. We are learning to focus only on good clients with quality sites and something to offer and we help these clients to gain visibility on the search engines. Our activity can be no less ethical than that of any advertiser or marketer and, in my opinion it is much preferable to email spam, uninviteed popup windows and ugly and useless affliliate doorway landing pages with links PFC links.
The issue is that we are poised to move beyond this. Is cloaking only an effective technique for small time players? Does anybody know of major high visibility cloaked sites? Has anybody taken a cloaked site to high visibility and either reaped the rewards or suffered from the visibility? Some people on this forum must have this experience.
I would assume that any serious replies will be done via sticky. Most of us know that there are successful cloakers out there as evidenced by the SERP's.
Certain types of cloaking are accepted by certain SE's. Google's stance as stated from their Webmasters FAQ is...
What is cloaking?When "cloaking," a website returns altered web pages to a search engine accessing the site. That is, the webserver is programmed to return different content to Google than it returns to regular users, usually in an attempt to distort search engine rankings. This can mislead users about what they will find when they click on a search result. To preserve the accuracy and quality of our search results, Google may permanently ban from our index any sites or authors who engage in cloaking to distort their search rankings.
I'm not too certain there is any room there for misinterpretation or reading between the lines. I've been visiting this board for over two years now and rarely see much dicsussion in this particular forum. Why? Because those who cloak remain cloaked themselves. I can't see anyone who has posted here regularly coming out and saying, "sure we cloak and Google loves us", that just wouldn't be a wise decision based on the above statement from Google.
Based on various comments I've read from a multitude of resources, mostly here at Webmaster World, your best bet is to present Google with the real site and then present your cloaked content to those who accept it in the manner you describe. That is, if you are in it for the long term. My understanding is that cloaking and disposable domains are synonomous with one another and one of the in terms. Fortunately I've not had any disposable clients so I cannot comment on that one.
In the scenario you are describing, ethics may or may not be an issue. What is an issue is what Google has publicly stated in their guidelines. This last line from the above kind of makes you wonder if there is validity to your statement...
Google may permanently ban...
[edited by: pageoneresults at 4:19 am (utc) on Aug. 6, 2002]
now:
BTW. Our cloaking is always very relevant. Why would anybody put different content in their spider food pages than their human food pages (the scare example is showing kids toys to the spiders and porn to the humans)? Cloaking, from my experience, is just the safest and most direct way to present concentrated and summarized content to the se spiders while maintaining a quality human user experience.
You're right. That's why I really don't have a problem with cloaking, as long as it is relevant.
And I'm sure you know you're playing with fire. Your original question: 'can a cloaked site survive google scrutiny?'. IMHO: No. and then again, Maybe. If it survives, its because the filters allow it. If it fails, will you know for sure the reason why?
Does anybody know of major high visibility cloaked sites?
I think they'd be exposed, if not here, on other sites. Then, the question is, if they're that important, do we look the other way?
First, I would like to personally apologize for any misunderstandings with richlowe.
No offense taken.
I appreciate your reply. I hadn't seen that statement from google. I assume that the bolding of "can" and "may" are yours. I hadn't understood that Google had stated that they will use discretion in this regard. That is enlightening. And encouraging.
Which, I think, is how it should be.
The only thing that is confusing there is the part about "usually in an attempt to distort search engine rankings". That sounds a bit slanted. Isn't all SEO activity and attempt to distort (an unfortunately colored choice of words) content?
So that would lead me to believe that, a cloaked site that fairly and clearly concentrates and summarizes the content of the pages MIGHT survive scrutiny.
Thank you, also, bobriggs,
If the environment is so freaking uptight that we cannot even raise these issues in an environment where we are generally annonomyous, then where are we?
I understand what you are saying about "playing with fire". All the more reason discuss it. If things are so fragile that we cannot even mention certain topics, then it is time to go ahead and break something. If I am "incriminating" myself as pageoneresults implies, by saying "I cloak and I'm proud", then to hell with it.
Of course, I suppose, I am trusting Brett to not divulge what he knows about my identity. My SEO business is my livelyhood.
Still, the uptight and indefensible demonization of cloaking as a technique is ugly. It reminds me of bookburning and witch hunt. People who react so self-righteously and indignantly need to be challenged and engaged in rational discourse. I will not accept the stigma of being evil or something for this.
Ironic, isn't it that, as I absorb pageoneresults' contribution of Google's statement on the issue, it seems that Google is more enlightened on the topic than many members of this forum.
And, please, if you do have experience with this and have something to interesting to say, but are reluctant in this forum, feel free to reply directly to my hotmail account or by sticky mail. My primary intent is to get a clear understanding as to the viability of my business strategy. It takes a lot of work to develop the content and build traffic. I really want to know if I am going down an dead end path.
Maybe another way to state the question is this:
Do you know of a site that is cloaking and has been reviewed by Google and found (under the "may" and might type clause from Google) to be relevant and not a distortion of rankings? No names required. You don't have to post it here. But, I need to know if my business can be viable for the long term.
> I'm not too certain there is any room there for misinterpretation or reading between the lines.
I should have really said...
> I'm not too certain there is any room there for misinterpretation, but, you may be able to read between the lines.
Incriminating may not have been the correct term either. How about exposing. I just don't think anyone who visits here regularly or particpates in forum discussion is going to publicly offer their experiences when it comes to cloaking.
The term cloaking probably needs to be rebranded just like doorways. I hate to associate the two like that, I'm sure a sharp pain shot down your back. ;) If there are two terms in our industry that immediately conjur images of spam, its cloaking and doorways.
I see one of the SE's who approve of particular cloaking methods refer to it as Trusted Feeds. What you are doing is very popular with the SE's that allow you to cloak. In Google's case, I doubt very seriously they would ever publicly state that they allow cloaking. You've got to assume that they know who's who when it comes to your industry.
As long as trusted feeds continue to thrive, so will the type of business model you are discussing. In my mind, its a risk not worth taking with Google unless one of the more serious cloaked lurkers sends you a sticky with some inside information. ;)
Cloaked? Lurker? Kind of synonomous with one another, huh?
[edited by: pageoneresults at 5:25 am (utc) on Aug. 6, 2002]
I will accept that as your attempt to be informative rather than some vague attempt to imply that I am dense or something. As I hope you can appreciate, I suffer under the same information overload as we all do. Isn't the issue today not that whether or not the information exists, but that we are so overwhelmed by so much information that we need help highlighting that which is most relevant?
I am not embarassed to have never noticed that paragraph...
I think this is any easy answer. No.
There is no way for us to hide or to detect a cloaked spider on a cloaked IP. If Google spot checked by only calling out the Cloaked Spider on PR7+ sites most of us would never need to worry. And if you were a PR7+ site you would most likely not be able to detect which user is real and which one is fake due to the size your site must be. I stay far away from Cloaking because I know it is like playing chess against a 1000 grandmasters.
I am trying to clearly understand what you are saying. By "cloaked spider on a cloaked IP", I think you mean that Google might send out a spider that is identified as a broweser (by its user agent) on some random IP address that is not associated with any search engine. I agree. To go further, they could randomize their visits and such. I agree with this. It bears on the point I am trying to understand.
To cloak successfully, you must assume that Google knows you are cloaking. I am not deluding myself to with an illusion that one can hide from Google that one is cloaking, especially if the site is successful.
That is the point.
Assuming that Google knows you are cloaking. They will look at the site. It is impossible to hide it. They have all the information - you are cloaking.
The question is, does that necessarily warrent a PR0 or some kind of banning of the site? That is: will Google ever look at a site and say: Yeah, they are cloaking, but they are not misrepresenting the pages or misleading the users. So, we will leave them alone. In partucular, I am wondering if there is any hard knowledge about this rather than speculation.
I now understand from their FAQ that they leave open the possiblilty that they will accept this.
The clearest example is that I have clients that have product information in database generated pages. They have no real "content". They are an ecommerce site. They have the stuff at good prices. I cloak pages for them that mention the product and say some stuff about each product. This content is not well written. It is mainly says the keywords associated with the product.
Can this be a stable business? Or is it doomed. Will Google just say: "they cloak - ban the suckers!". I'm sure people here have done this. Maybe it is working out fine. Maybe they won't say because they don't want to threaten their position by encouraging others to do it. Or, maybe they have tried it and know that it can't be done.
IMO, no; Hostage to Fortune, and Sword of Damocles spring to mind ;-)
There is no other reason.
Most web designers know that flash has not been indexed in the past and therefore the majority of the time cloaking should not be permitted because it alters the keyword density from the visitors eyes compared to the spiders eyes.
I have personally believed for a long time that Google will check random pages from sites using a normal browser agent on a normal looking IP address.
If you succeed with high results and are cloaking I am sure you will be reported.
Having said that, some of the other engines do permit cloaking, just not Google.
I can say that I've had success with cloaking on every major search engine, including Google, but I do not recommend cloaking to Google to people who ask.
The primary reason I don't recommend cloaking to Google, is that even if you are not penalized, it doesn't do much good. Since pagerank is the primary factor in obtaining a decent ranking for your chosen keywords, the doorway page technique that cloaking proponents usually use is not very effective.
The best method to obtain a good ranking for Google is to put together a website with content that other websites in your "theme category" will want to link to. Submit your site to various directories such as the Open Directory Project (dmoz.org), Yahoo, Zeal, etc. Request links from similar websites not owned by you.
I have had successes cloaking to Google, but the pages I cloaked were only incidentally listed in Google. I believe the reason they were included is because there were off-site links pointing to those pages from unrelated domains.
With the rise of Google, cloaking is just not as necessary as it used to be in SEO. I would say it's more of a usability issue now, and that the future of cloaking will be to provide content customized for various browsers, platforms, etc.
> Since pagerank is the primary factor in obtaining a decent ranking for your chosen keywords, the doorway page technique that cloaking proponents usually use is not very effective.
That one statement alone should clarify for all that Google and cloaking do not mix. When it comes to the other SE's the scenario differs. But, how long before they start implementing similar guidelines to Google?
To date, the keyword-based sites rank in the top 5 positions in their respective keyword categories on Google. However, the target site appears to have been penalized 10 positions for each keyword. Every attempt to improve the target site ranking has caused it's ranking to deteriorate further. In additon, many of the sites ranking ahead of the target site are far more irrelevant to the keyword.
What I am taking from that is that Google is much more aggresive against linking abuses than cloaking. Almost all of the PR0 posts I see in the google forum are from people that have link spammed, or those that don't know what they have done to get penalized. I never see one where someone says "I cloaked and got PR Zer0ed".
Yup, I think Google dislikes abusive linkers more than cloakers.
The absence of posts on this topic, and the lack of "Help me I've ben Zer0ed!" posts, do lead to believe that cloaking might not be as dangerous as pepole try to make it look like.
Thus, ignoring the fact that once Google Zer0es you you can be sure as hell that the domain is worth Jack, imo, cloaking seems a viable alternative to hundreds of hours of page streamlining, js optimisation, href alternatives, redesigns, more redesigns and more streamlining.
Being able to serve up a SE spider optimised website makes only sense for example:
oh, and yes of course, keywords receive a boost through higer density by cutting out the baggage
So here we have a web server, that has 2000 webpages, all database driven all with loads of UI and all source code formatted with thousands of tabs (for us poor programmers who need to be able to read all the garbage we create) being crawled over and over by search engines, spam engines, spam search engines, and being scrutinized for pumping out streamlined pages to automated systems?
I think what Google is trying to say is following:
"we are a search engine, who searches for the best content. Let us figure out what is the best content and please don't try to tell us what is the best content. Of course you can help us find your content, but don't try to fool us into thinking your content is the best. As long as your content is what we think it is and what everybody else thinks it is your content is good for us."
