SEO Cowboys - High Noon for the Black Hats & Google

With all the talk of Black Hats and White Hats in the world of Search Engine Optimisation, it's not hard to think of SEO as the domain of cowboys, fighting to seize dominance in the lawless settlement of the internet. So why has Search Engine Optimisation developed such a reputation?

Sheriff Google Runs This Town!

Search Engine Optimisation - or 'optimization' if you live in the wild west of the colonies - has created the impression that online businesses are somehow tricking the search engines to rustle traffic to their websites. Sure enough, there are some SEO techniques that are frowned upon by the search engines, but does that mean SEO practitioners that continue to use some of these techniques should be classified as black-hatted villains? Standards are important, but the current system seems to favour pushing the responsibility for keeping websites law-abiding onto the webmasters themselves, rather than the search engines, and this is having an undue effect on the way quality websites are built.

There seems to be a commonly held assumption that it is unfair to leverage an advantage over competition in the online world, but as more and more businesses see the advantages of using SEO, the question is becoming less about the unfairness and more about what it is possible to get away with.

Law of the Land

The Google Guidelines for SEO contain the following phrase.

"Avoid tricks intended to improve search engine rankings. A good rule of thumb is whether you'd feel comfortable explaining what you've done to a website that competes with you."

This paragraph has caused quite a bit of discussion amongst SEO practitioners as to what constitutes a 'trick'. Also, in competing with your competition, businesses have for a long time held the view that if it is legal, it is ethical. If a competing business avoids or dislikes an otherwise legal strategy, does that make it wrong if your company were to still use it to gain an advantage?

Google frequently insist that their guidelines are about rewarding quality websites, ensuring users are directed to the most appropriate websites for their search request. As the most popular search engine out there, Google is able to carry a lot of clout with such a statement, but Google may have overstepped its authority by adopting the role of sheriff to bring law to the lawless.

After all, many of the criteria they cite in determining this level of quality are a source of constant debate amongst webmasters.

Outlaw SEO

Are all paid links unworthy of inclusion or are some the result of detailed assessment and appraisal? Is there no excuse for hidden text, or are there sometimes circumstances where it is actually preferable? (Hiding spoiler text, for example, allowing the reader to view it only when highlighted, can protect readers who don't want movies or books spoiled).

The catch-all indiscriminate attitude of the search engine algorithm means that even defensible techniques can cause a website to be penalised - and this places limitations on web design in providing flexible, quality content to our readers, which is surely the point.

So when you hear talk of Black Hat SEO, don't immediately dismiss them as unscrupulous cowboy operators. Sometimes, that black hat only means an unwillingness to be ruled by the sometimes arbitrary decisions of the search engines when designing the best customer experience.