Weekly Task V: Search Engine Optimization and Ethics

What is the SEO?
SEO is a set of methods that will contribute to a higher ranking in search engines. To better fit the ranking algorithms of search engines in the existing site and web pages, some changes are made. For this purpose, additional domains and special pages (doorway pages) are created.

Methods of SEO: White hats
Optimizers accept certain methods and reject others. Accepted by them are called the "civilized" or white hats and not accepted are considered as "uncivilized" or black hats. For example, according to the civilized methods, only the original pages of the site must be optimized for search engines. Also, the constant addition of pages to the relevant theme of the site content, regular updates, adding incoming links, which is tied to the keyword anchor text links, and regular updating of the header tags, these methods will belong to this group. In addition to these standard procedures, there is also the addition of the components of blogs that reinforce the role of the site and enhance its status and attract attention to writing the text for the pages that host certain keywords. 

Methods of SEO: Black hats
Black hat SEO practices attempt to improve a web page’s search engine ranking through SEO methods that are prohibited by search engines or in violation of their Terms of Service.
Black Hat search engine optimization is customarily defined as techniques that are used to get higher search rankings in an unethical manner. These black hat SEO techniques usually include one or more of the following characteristics:

• breaks search engine rules and regulations
• creates a poor user experience directly because of the black hat SEO techniques utilized on the Web site
• unethically presents content in a different visual or non-visual way to search engine spiders and search engine users.

Typical Black Hats SEO methods:

• Keyword stuffing: Packing long lists of keywords and nothing else onto your site will get you penalized eventually by search engines.
• Invisible text: This is putting lists of keywords in white text on a white background in hopes of attracting more search engine spiders. Again, not a good way to attract searchers or search engine crawlers.
• Doorway Pages: A doorway page is basically a “fake” page that the user will never see. It is purely for search engine spiders, and attempts to trick them into indexing the site higher.
• Cloaking: Cloaking describes the technique of providing a different page to search engine spiders than what a human visitor is shown. This technique is abused by spammers for keyword stuffing. Cloaking is a violation of the Terms of Service of most search engines and results in banning of the website.
• Automated Link Software:  Automated SEO software that act as link machines are heavily looked down upon by Google and all other search engines. The entire reason why search engines rely on links to gauge site popularity is because links are supposed to be analogous to third-party votes. But when you use automated software to create these links, you’re basically hiring an army of robots to vote for you again and again.

Moreover, there is a large Black Hat SEO community forum, where practically anyone can easily find answers to his questions, useful tips and advices.



Ethics of the SEO
As a professional of search engine optimization is dealing with at least two clients, in fact there is more than one ethical rule. Firstly, there is ethics in relation to the client - owner of the website. Secondly, and this applies to the most part of the question, ethics has to deal with another client - search engines. Because the needs and demands of these two clients are often diametrically opposite to each other, search engine optimization is often a dilemma.
Search engine optimizer is responsible to the owner of the website and trying to achieve the best possible places in the results page in search engines. It is also necessary to follow the guidelines for webmasters that provide search engines, as these recommendations are a necessary condition of the optimization. It is a very important fact, where exactly a professional search engine optimizer draws the line between the website and search engines, as well as the manner in which the need for those limits is explained to the website owner.
It is also very important and serious discussion about the real goals of the owner of the website and on what level of risk wish to be the site owner to getting penalties from the search engines or complete ban of his site. Not every professional search engine optimizer will go as far, as the webmaster who wants to go out on the territory of the gray and black hats. Different experts have different interpretations of where the boundary between what is written in the recommendations of search engines and what wants to change the owner of the website.