What exactly is a doorway page?

[JudgeJeffries]

I understand what a doorway page is but I dont understand what a doorway page isnt.
Just how far from a blatant DWP do you have to go before it ceases to be one?
Example. I want to advertise a <business_type> that has offices in all the major towns and I find that lots of people search for <location_business_type> and <'location_business_type'> and <'location_business_type'>, etc etc so I produce 50 generic pages and change the city name for each on the page and tags etc. Now I know that those pages would be DW pages and be likely to be penalised but what if I add one pagagraph say 60 words totally different on each page but all meaning exactly the same thing ie 'if you are looking for an estate agent in XXXX city click here', would that be Spam so far as Google is concerned. (Unique word content but identical meaning.)

[mrguy]

If you created the page strictly to capture traffic from Google and they are not really part of the site, then that is a doorway page and could cause you a problem.

[JudgeJeffries]

Is the above specific example spam?

[curlykarl]

"Is the above specific example spam?"

I dont know for definate, but in my mind as long as there are some unique differences between each page then why would it be considered as spam?

In my industry (auto related) there are loads of sites with repeated content and exactly the same page layout, with slightly different text. They seem to do ok in G and all t'others.

:)

[oLeon]

Yes, it is -
and I agree to mrguy, G may concern this as spam.

The questions is always, whether the content of the DWP is relevant to the target page.
If not, itīs spam.
Additional words like synonyms or flections are alright, but not your example where you target on all thinkable phrases, locations.

It may work a while, but if it is detected by SE, the DWP would be banned.

[curlykarl]

"The questions is always, whether the content of the DWP is relevant to the target page."

If I do a search for "widget sellers" in "smallville" and it comes up with a page with the smallville contact details on, would this be spam?

I personally wouldn't consider this as spam, its giving me what I ask for :)

[oLeon]

right, no spam.

but itīs not far away to think:
someone has searched for "widget bigville" (bigville is nearby smallville), why shouldnīt I create some pages with this keyword, even though I have only smallville in my basket? maybe this searcher can be convinced to have a look on widgets in smallville...what he first notice on the target page.

only this case I want to mention as spam.

[curlykarl]

I think as long as you are giving people the information they are searching for then its fine :)

"bigville is nearby smallville" :)

[Marcia]

If others want to that's their choice, but I'd make sure there's only about 70-75% repeated, understandable because of small pages heavy with common navigation, but the rest should be unique. Google's made specific reference to duplicate content, so it's best avoided.

There are a lot of product catalog pages that are almost identical, which is understandable in cases of database driven sites; but in other cases it can look like auto_generated pages for keyworded text link stuffing and ranking purposes.

[JudgeJeffries]

I'm still confused particularly so when you professionals cannot even agree. More grist to the mill that Google should be much more specific. Their guidlines page really is a masterpiece of waffle. (For scientists they are mighty imprecise!)

[hutcheson]

>I'm still confused particularly so when you professionals cannot even agree.
Everyone's guessing, but it's the _user_ that defines spam. And some users may be more tolerant than others.

>More grist to the mill that Google should be much more specific.
No, rather it's absolute proof that Google CANNOT be more specific. They're still refining their definition also.

>Their guidlines page really is a masterpiece of waffle. (For scientists they are mighty imprecise!)
Precisely. Spam can only be defined as "whatever gets in the way of Google producing what the user would consider the best search results." Which is, functionally speaking, whatever Google can't yet automatically weed out.

Which is the really really important reason that Google cannot EVER afford to be more specific if they could.

[Marcia]

>>really really important reason that Google cannot EVER afford to be more specific if they could.

Exactly. At would open the floodgates. Besides, it's like shooting for a moving target. They'd have to be updating their guidelines every time it wss necessary to make adjustments because of people jumping on the bandwagon for what's stated as safe.

Keeping webmasters guessing means "Less work for Mother."

[tbear]

FWIW
I think, I would look at creating pages related to each office while being sure they are informative and well layed out.
Wether you do it pyramid or circular is another question. But I wouldn't look on them as 'doorway' pages let alone design them that way.:)

[freejung]

Seems to me you can get too lost in the subtleties of this issue, and never get a definitive answer. I say follow one somple rule:

Don't target keywords for which you have no content.

Seems like this should cover most cases, and if your case is so borderline that you don't know how it applies to you, odds are you shouldn't be doing what you're doing.

Conversely, if you actually have content for the keywords, go ahead and target them. If you have the content to back it up, it's not SPAM.

[JudgeJeffries]

But by targetting punters who search for 'location_business_type' you are specifically helping them when they land on your DWP which leads them immediately to the general information that they are looking for. How can that denigrate their experience as they get what they wanted even though you have not provided them with 'unique' content. That being the case how can that page be classified as Spam as everyone (except your competitors) are happy. In my field there are literally thousands of such searches each month but no one has targetted them. I would love to but I'm concerned about having all of the rest of my site blacklisted if its deemed to be spam. I dont believe my competitors are being cautious, rather that they havent cottoned on as they are up to lots of other dubious tricks.

[oLeon]

>>you are specifically helping them when they land on your DWP which leads them immediately
>>to the general information that they are looking for

I agree - but the SE donīt.
There is a main requirement: only pages are allowed that contain content that you find exactly on the target page. What you wrote make sense no doubt about it - but unfortunately itīs a bit beside the guidelines.

[JudgeJeffries]

Thanks for all the advice and I think I can work around the problem and keep every one happy however one more query as I keep seeing suggestions that DWP's are OK provided that you have less of them than ordinary pages on a site.
Is this approach OK or is it just for certain other SE's?

[oLeon]

I īd say itīs okay - for all SE.

A note from another thread [webmasterworld.com] about DWP:

the trick ... with doorways is to interlink well into the site, so they appear to look and feel like the site itself

Thatīs the conclusion! If you do it that way, you are one the right way.