Forum Moderators: open
<body link="white" alink="white" vlink="white" bgcolor="white">
They have been ranked #1 in Google for a long time with our keywords. I haven't been the type of person to turn another site in, but isn't this supposed to get caught?
Jaeden
[webmasterworld.com...]
reporting them to google may not get them banned. It does help them to strengthen their spam algo.
A hidden link farm, can't say I've seen that yet!
They were #4 when I typed in a good key phrase.
After looking agian I don't see why they are hiding the links. They all are a part of their site. Why not just list them at the bottom of the page? Seems strange.
<a bit of truth, a bit tongue in cheek> It just doesn’t seem fair that in the pursuit of a less risky strategy for site development, one that draws targeted and focused traffic, building from the existing site rather than optimizing outside of it; some of us are appear to be taking a more conservative approach.
I see folks trying to tie that up in discussions on ethics but that’s not where it’s at for me. For me it’s the bottom line, where the buck stops, and what accountability I have to my clients.
Remember about two years ago we were talking about using punctuation to hide links. Obviously it’s still working although we started cautioning restraint back then. If it’s a disposable site, even for research purposes, then who knows, I’m sure if it’s still working then people are using it.
I’m glad people are catching these, not to turn them in but so we can see that they are still tricks out there. Instead of googlewhacking we can start a new game that finds keyword searches where one of the top three sites is using an obvious trick. Who can spot the most creative or unusual trick? Hahaha
Seriously though, what could we learn from that? How can this knowledge help us be more successful?
At the top of the page (right below the free host banners) in bright yellow on a black background was a paragraph which, under normal circumstances, would probably describe the page and the pictures that followed furth down the page.
Nooooooo. The paragraph read something like this:
"The following information is for the search engines: [person's name] revealing, topless, photos, revealing, topless, [movie name], picture, revealing, topless, [person's name], [another movie name], revealing, topless" and so on.
Talk about keyword stuffing. Remarkable.
G.
I don't like to use any spamming myself because I'm afraid that I might get caught, by filter or by fink, and since I represent my company and its sales, I don't want to be responsible for losing 30+ percent of it's traffic. This board has been terrific at not only pointing out what NOT to do, but what an honest webmaster SHOULD do, and those are the things that are helping me to gain ground.
KEEP IT UP GUYS!
I know people don't like it, but if google tightens their filters on this - LEGITIMATE pages are going to get banned. SOmeone that was a little trickier could make a link structure color scheme that no filter would detect. You would end up with the same problem.
The page is somewhat relevant and they aren't smart for doing it this way.
I do like Jeaden's honesty "I don't like to use any spamming myself because I'm afraid that I might get caught"
The reason that I think using a filter would be unfair is:
1) Legitimate webmasters - especially those that use dreamweaver/front page - might accidently leave hidden links on the page - especially when using tables/css/etc...
I know I have left links on pages with no anchor text. This was accidental, but should I get banned, just because I am incompetant.
2) Some pages like:
www.fireflyfans.net/thread.asp?b=5&t=284
use hidden text to hide spoilers.
3) It won't work against those who know what they are doing. Using a gif background and link of same color makes it almost impossible for google to catch automatically - and therefore you only punish the incompetant "spammers". This speeds up the evolutionary process - where people that know what they are doing are more likely to rise to the top. Then your competiton is much harder.
my 2 cents
