Whose job is it to police SEO spam?
 

I was trying to find some link exchange partners only to find three websites in the top 10 for one of our KW's that were all using 'invisible text' - about 100 words in really tiny white text on a white background. This is completely rediculous. I reported the first guy to Google, then I wanted to email the second but then thought, what if these guys sit there and click thru my Adword ads all day and cost me a fortune.

I'm up against keyword spammers and traffic power customers. I hate competing with cheaters!

Whose job is it to police this crap?

clickfraud is a huge problem now days -

I stopped all overture ads for now (lots of clicks, poor conversion)
and started monitoring adwords daily - disabled the "content" so I'll get only clicks from biG, not their affiliates and I compare ref ammounts and check IP referrals... :rolleyes:

hate cheaters...

I beleive you should report shameless abusers and try to
beat them fair-play... :bond:

search engines.

most stuff can be beat using legit techniques if you are willing to invest the time and money into it and can create a better site / idea from the start.

IMHO seo is about cheating...its about doing what is wise to make your stuff rank well. there are some ways that are more risky and some that are less.

Yahoo! edits their results so they may be more likely to respond to spam reports than google

hi Aaron,

I think that eventually good and quick responds to the search environment can be classified as wisdom rater than a cheat... ;)

p.s - the MSN beta crashed... will someone explain what the f*** are they doing? :huh:

IMHO Seo is about making the valuable content on your site just as valuable to machines as it is to humans.

Content is always King, and that is how Google is setup. Google is setup to help people find information. If you don't provide valuable information on your site, yet are still trying to optimize your site to rank well, then you are doing exactly what Google is trying to prevent - making a useless site seem useful to machines and not humans.

If you have a site with tons of great information, then a child could optimize it.

IMHO it is not the Search Engines job to police SPAM. It is the people who use Search Engines job. (ie. You and Me).

When we see spam we should report it to Google. Google will then alter it's algorithm to help elimate spam.

It's setup almost like our our justice system. Google (the courts) creates laws. When we find a site breaking those laws (SPAM), we report them to google. Google then penalizes those sites, and creates new laws (algorithms) to make the web better.

If you don't report spam when you see it, then you don't have a right to complain when sites SPAM their way to the top of the SERPS. - That is my view.

I think not. IMO there needs to be a redress in the way seos and webmasters think about poor quality serps.

Here's a quote from NFFC in a thread over at sew

This is in answer to "who should take responsiblity for spam" - or some similar earlier point in the thread


The fact is, Google cant control their own algorithm so, in the best tradition of cluetrainesque smoke and mirros PR (public relations) they blame the users of the system.

Dont fall for it.

Nick

not true. usually its worthwhile to make stuff seem great, but most people are too lazy to create something amazingly worthwhile...yet when you search for dvd players you still get a result.

sure your own site should be good, but most people do not want to make an amazing website...they just want the profits as if they made one.



is it our job to share in the financial profits when the algorithm works well?


Google rarely penalizes the sites you turn in. I make my site for whoever I want, but not 100% of the site design and concepts are made specifically for google. they are no court and they are making millions or billions of dollars of profits from people blindly following the things that help their business model.


you have the right to complain about anything you want. just because you report it dones not give you some special privilege.

I see I struck a chord among fellow SEO's. The good news is that I did report all three sites to Google and copy /pasted their invisible text just so Google know that I'm not just trying to sabotage a competitor.

Secondly, one of the sites I emailed to ask them why they feel the need to stuff their home page with KW's replys with an apology and they said ( in really poor English ) "we don't read webmaster guidelines". Fine, but know the text is gone, so I feel I did some good.

Seguey...

So all this brings up another subject. What is grey-hat SEO? I was reading over at seochat about a new cloaking method that this guy says works like charm. If SEO is about getting top placement in the SERP's than why refrain from using risque techniques?

As someone said earlier, just take responsiblity for your own site. If someone else discovers your shadiness, only then must you be accountable for your actions.

>>invisible text

What? Are you high? - that stuff dont matter unless you're in the most uncompetitive of fields possible! - what a waste of time....

>>risque

ROTFLMAO! - dude, you mean risky, not risque - unless of course your planning on putting a saucy bra and panties on your source code :eek:

Seriously, if you cant beat some muppet that thinks hidden text is going to help them rank, you need to rethink your seo strategies.....

Nick