Can comment tags hurt you?

[webgator]

We all know that comment tags are useless when it comes to SEO, but could their use at all by a webmaster trigger any spam filters at the major search engines, especially Google? We are working with a web developer who wants to use comment tags to make it easier for different people to update sections of the site and he wants to be sure that we aren't going to raise any red flags by doing this.

[Macguru]

Since they have no effect at boosting a site position, why would search engine indexer care about it? I believe non indexed content such as comments, can be checked for stuffing. But I believe most of it's content is just skipped by most indexers.

I think if you use short comments for what they where intended for,you are on the safe side. Performance could suffer from page size, or content to code ratio, but I doubt very much it could trigger any flag when used properly.

[Jon_King]

Do the comment tags count in the keyword density calculation? If so, can we conclude there is an impact?

[Macguru]

Hi Jon_King,

No, I dont think so. I believe most indexers just ignore this zone and focus on visible content as far as on page factors are concerned.