Adding an age check page before serving the Home Page

How to keep search engine success

[Jane_B]

Hi We had designed a site for a client which was receiving good traffic and reasonable listings in results on search engines. As it is a site about an alcohol spirit they want to have a page which precedes the current homepage where the reader has to submit their date of birth then - if over 18 years of age - they are taken through to the main site. This page will have very little, if any, html text.
What good SEO practices are still available to me?
Will this "new" homepage affect our current listings on Google etc given currently listings are OK?
Any other comments?

[chris_f]

Search engine bots will not be able to fill in your form. Therefore, they will not be able to crawl past the homepage (unless another site deep links in somewhere, which would make your homepage redundant). Therefore, I would detect the users IP address and if their a search engine I would take them to a different page or alter the page so there is a link instead of a form.

Also, what's to stop your visitors lying.

It seems like a pointless endevour.

Chris

[karakas]

chris_f: What you suggest is cloaking, which is not a good practice from the SEO point of view. It is being constantly discussed on webmasterworld forums. Just do a search on "cloaking" to read all those posts about the (non-)merits of this technique.

[Sinner_G]

I wouldn't call that cloaking, at least not the kind of cloaking that is frowned upon. In some cases, so-called cloaking is permitted IMO and would not lead to automatic exclusion from SE's. It is also the only solution I see to Jane_B's problem, although I'm not sure what would happen then. If a bot follows the link, it will index the pages that come then. So what happens when a kid goes to a SE, does a search and then enters the site from any other page?

[martinibuster]

Sounds silly, I admit, but alcohol and ciggy advertising are strictly regulated. Budweiser and all the other alcohol web sites have the age check thing.

I was wondering if it's possible to do it the way NYTimes does, where if you don't have a cookie you don't get into the site. The cookie check could be done by browser, thus leaving the bots free to roam.

However, someone correct me if I'm wrong, but I remember seeing Ink's bot rummaging about emulating NN 3 & 4.

[RossWal]

martinibuster,
If the client has scripting disabled then the client will get the bot behavior, no? So some extra cautious parent has disabled javascript, thus giving the kid access to the content thery're trying to protect him from. Or, maybe I don't understand :o <== hey, how come my shocked isn't shocking?

On an aside, I'm wondering why a billboard is OK, but a web page needs an age verification? Or is this a contest or something?

[Mike12345]

Im a bit fuzzy on this one, but id go with what martinibuster says, but check for JS enabled as well, if it isnt then prompt to enable or redirect to another page, if its then its OK isnt it. Or am i missing the point?

[tedster]

How about this js/css approach?

Make the age check a thin div at the top of the page. Then follow it with the rest of the successful page in another div, but make it display:hidden until the age check is completed.

You could even use absolute positioning for the age-check div so that it wouldn't have to appear first in the HTML.

[marcs]

Would it not make more sense (for search engine purposes)
to not have an age "verification" on the front page, but the
last... namely the order page.

AFAIK (and I could be wrong), those who are underaged
are allowed to view the site, simply not allowed to place an
order.

If this is not the case, then what about supermarkets?
May those under the legal drinking age not walk in
the beer/wine section?

Could be an issue of advertising to minors, I suppose.
But that would be getting into legalese. What is advertising
vs showin an item for sale...

[webboy1]

Hi, I actually work with Jane_B who started this thread, and it seems to have caused a lot of discussion, and some very valid points.

We have recently asked one of our clients one of the points raised: Why do you need age verifcation on a website when there are TV ads and Billboards out there?

The response we were given was that billboards sell the Brand, where as websites make them look "Cool", "fun" etc. I assume this is because there are such things as games, interactivity.

Its not so much the promotion of the drink that seems to be the probelm, its more the promotion of it as being Fun.

I think a lot of it stems from the Hooch days, when it was accused of deliberatly targeting under agers with its cartoon labels.

It is a rather frustrating topic. Here in the UK it is slightly easier. You really just have to be seen as warning the user they have to be over the legal drinking age, where as in the USA you have to actually make the user put in their age.

But again, as was mentioned in this discussion, there is absolutely nothing stopping the user lying about there age.

We have a couple of methods to get round it. One is to use a layer over the actual page. The age check is in the layer, and the actual page behind cannot be used because of the layer, however, to the search engine it is just a layer, and it continues to read the Source code....including all links.

This seems to be an ok way.....not great by any means, but ok.

I had thought of using a cookie to detect whether or not the user had been on the page before, and if so just let them through. But cookies detect the browser, not the user. So if i were to login on a machine, then the next day a 15 year old was to visit the site on the same machine they would be allowed straight in......not good!

All your ideas are appreciated, and helpful and i will give them all a try.

Anyway, i just thought i would add my bit, please keep talking.....more ideas certainly welcome.

Webboy