Keyword lists at bottom of page?

(but should I be doing it?)

[giggle]

In an effort to push up throught the SERPs I made a list of the key words I would like users to find us using, and placed them at the bottom of my page. Not hidden, black bold font on a light blue cell background.

The results were really quite good, althought it looks a bit ugly. We moved up on all the phrases that I listed.

Does Google allow this or will I eventually be penalised?

[hurlimann]

I did this on a graphic only front page when one of the PFI's insisted that the page MUST have text on it.

You only see the text if you scroll down.

It is very relevant and not just a list and to date no engine has banned it.

I reckon just a list may be asking for trouble.

[Brett_Tabke]

Scroll down:

[useit.com...]

Jacob is on Googles technical advisory board.

[aus_dave]

Brett, that is a good one ;).

I filled out a spam report...just kidding.

[giggle]

Nice one Brett.

Very small, very hidden, very sneaky.

I'm tempted to run with it for a while, but scared to get bumped off Google.

[gopi]

Wow , Good Find...

But i still think that Google will ban upon a manual review if normal joe's site like us use it ...

[nutsandbolts]

Mmmmm that is annoying. He's naughty. I'm telling! okay, okay.. I won't heh

giggle: Be careful ;) It's a risky move. You could find yourself reported by your competitors if they see a whole truck-load of keywords on your site. Anyway - hidden or not, keyword stuffing still looks crappy on a page.

[vitaplease]

If your pages have any semi-scientific aspect to them, this is a perfectly normal thing to do.

Do a search for: keywords abstract
in google.

Brett - the joke of the day..;)
thinking that he always promotes adjustable text for the visually impaired..

I'm sure this will be picked up by many blogs etc..

[edited by: vitaplease at 4:45 pm (utc) on Jan. 13, 2003]

[atadams]

I actually think I will fill out a spam report. Why should he be able to get away with that?

[Powdork]

I was actually kind of offended by the fact he was getting away with this until I viewed source. It's just some common misspellings of his name.

[Total Paranoia]

<FONT SIZE=1><SMALL CLASS=microtext>

Wouldn't google ignore that tag anyway?

[atadams]

I was actually kind of offended by the fact he was getting away with this until I viewed source. It's just some common misspellings of his name.

Which is fine for him, but stinks if your name is Jacob Nielsen, Jakob Neilsen, Jacob Neilsen, Jakob Nielson, Jacob Nielson, Jakob Neilson, Jacob Neilson, Jakob Nilsen, Jacob Nilsen, Jakob Nelson, or Jacob Nelson and you have a website.

[crash]

It's still pretty cheesy - no reason he couldn't make it visable... and no reason to drop it down so far on the page - unless of course he didn't want it found. When are they gonna learn that dropping things down that far is just a visual indicator of that junk?

[jackofalltrades]

Hmmm...

Doing something for the search engines and not your users.....spam?

JOAT

Here are some common misspellings of my name for the benefit of users.....Microsoft, Hotmail, Britney Spears, Yahoo, BBC, Coca Cola, <ahem> WebmasterWorld :)

[Powdork]

Which is fine for him, but stinks if your name is Jacob Nielsen, Jakob Neilsen, Jacob Neilsen, Jakob Nielson, Jacob Nielson, Jakob Neilson, Jacob Neilson, Jakob Nilsen, Jacob Nilsen, Jakob Nelson, or Jacob Nelson and you have a website.

I don't want to defend the guy and yeah it is cheesy, but. If your name is Jakob Nilsen and your website is being beat by this when people search for your name, you have bigger problems. I almost think maybe you don't care for this fellow.;)

[rfgdxm1]

I would think that you could get penalized for this. What you are suggesting is blatant keyword stuffing aimed solely at search engines. However, so long as you put these keywords in some coherent sentences this should be OK.

[The_Hitcher]

Nah, don't do it. I was penalised myself for this VERY recently. Anything that is pitched at Google and not really user content WILL eventually get you banned, and we a\ll know how difficult that can be to recover from. Sure you could get away with it for a while but if anyone gets upset about it, you have only yourself to blame....

[waynet]

How deep was the penality? I recently put some keywords on the bottom of my opening page of my site. I put them there because it had the highest pr of the pages and I only used keywords that were in my site. I made it look like a site description and not a long keyword list.

[mayor]

Hmmm, great idea Mr. Nielsen ... I've got some too:

<FONT SIZE=1><SMALL CLASS=microtext><lol>
Here are some common misspellings of my travel site (included to help search users): laz vegas hotels, los vegas hotels, ls vegas hotels, las vegus hotels, las veges hotels, las vegas hotls, las vegas htels .....</lol></SMALL></FONT>

[Macguru]

If I had to use them, I would rhather tend to use a tall gif or a table instead of

<P>&nbsp;
<P>&nbsp;
...
<P>&nbsp;
<P>&nbsp;
<P>

Or

<BR>
<BR>
...
<BR>
<BR>

one of these later techniques could someday be easy to spot, if not already on radar screen...

[tbear]

Personally, I find this kind of page design rather amateur and tend to laugh when I come across it. I've even found sites stating, before the list of keywords, that the visitor should ignore the rest of the page 'cos it's
just for the SE's.
I also tend to think that visitors might feel, just a little, 'conned' to see that you are attempting to 'con' the SE's.
Me, I'd try to get 'within' the top 10 and make the best 'use' of what I get. That, to my mind is good business practice.
Who cares who gets nº 1 if nº 2 is such a good site that the visitors prefer it and buy from them.

[aus_dave]

If your name is Jakob Nilsen and your website is being beat by this when people search for your name, you have bigger problems.

Powdork, because his home page is PR 9 it is actually quite difficult to beat this site when searching for these different spellings. I checked a few of his spellings and some beat other pages with the mispelled name in the title.

I wonder what the biggest fall from grace has ever been in Google i.e has a PR 9 site ever been PR zeroed? ;). Anyone know?

[Digimon]

No, aus_dave I don't know this kind of penalization. But I remember a PR8 site wich was drastically divested of its PR... Anyway they should do it because it's not fair to include hidden text. If you and me can be penalized he also should

PD: Brett, how can you find this kind of stuff?
;)

[edited by: Digimon at 10:57 pm (utc) on Jan. 13, 2003]

[Lots0]

Does anyone really expect to see this site penalized by Google? Now if Google were fair and even handed I would say yes.
But, I don’t think Google is a fair company...anyone want to place a bet? I’ll give odds...;)

[arjan]

LOL
:)

[aus_dave]

LotsO - that was a rhetorical question ;). I don't expect to see it banned but I'll take a bet that small text disappears!

[Lots0]

Funny thing I was just arguing in another thread - that Google should not care if you use hidden text as long as it is relevant to the visible content on your page.

But they do care (why escapes me) and sites get penalized for it all the time... So GoogleGuy when are you going to drop the Axe on old Jakob?

but I'll take a bet that small text disappears!

LOL sorry no bet :)

[mayor]

LOL, the metatags too ....

[CoreUnderneath]

I just found the

"Additional high-resolution photos are available for download"

quite amusing.... Why?!?!?!?!

[HayMeadows]

Seems to me a link to a missspellings page would suffice in most situations :)