Good idea to use hidden text for SEO purposes due to picky clients not allowing additional content?
-
I do SEO for eCommerce websites both in-house and for clients. A few of our clients want increased rankings but are not willing to allow us to make the changes internally to help make that happen. One of which is adding content to the webpages since 90% of them have very little to none.
I have a couple clients that are extremely picky about what can be seen on their eCommerce website. They have the site setup the way they want it but it is not SEO friendly in the slightest. The pages (including homepage) have little to no content, and the only things they want changed are things visitors CANNOT see on the webpages (META, ALT Tags etc).
The tactic i am wanting to use is often used by spammers but i have a legitimate reason to use this and wanted to know if this would be a good idea.
They are wanting to target fairly competitive keywords but are unwilling to allow any on-page changes to add any information and keywords to help with rankings. I was thinking about adding text behind images or hide the text in whatever ways to prevent the end user from viewing it (except for the search engines).
My idea was simply to add a paragraph or two of content for the search engines purely to help in ranking because they have a lot of pages that have zero content except for product image and title listings. Is this tactic recommended or does anyone have any other ideas for these type of situations.
Thanks,
Stephen -
That's been specifically called out by Google and can definitely get you penalized. It's very dangerous. Google will not see hiding text because your client doesn't want to put up text as a legitimate use - for one simple reason. They have no way to know that. All they see is a very abused tactic in play, and they can and will penalize it.
-
I guess it's a matter of intent and use. I personally don't believe that just because people use this as a spam technique it should not be used in a legitimate scenario as the one described above. If each product has an info div describing the product which can be hovered over to show the text than the end result is better UX. In my opinion better UX converts better.I think as long as It is used properly and for the right reasons it's not spam.
As far as being SPAM in Google's algorithm, I don't know!
Google has top-secret algorithms designed to detect when text is hidden/positioned off screen. If this type of hidden text is detected, our important red phone rings, and this becomes one of the signals that may cause us to believe your site is deceptive.
The KEYWORD here is MAY.
May cause us to believe your site is deceptive - leads me to believe it is analyzed on a case to case basis. Which if your not spamming like hiding hidden links or 1000 words of text you'd probably be fine.
However this leads to a greater question. Should spammers hijacking legit design techniques ruin them for everyone and keep legitimate needed sites from using them due to fear of being de-indexed?
-
"Another truth is that using “text-indent: -9999px”, or hiding text (keeping text out of the user’s sight in a browser), is common spammer’s technique to hide off-topic keywords and/or links to manipulate search engine rankings."
She says it's SPAM.
Google has top-secret algorithms designed to detect when text is hidden/positioned off screen. If this type of hidden text is detected, our important red phone rings,
lol.... "RED PHONE"
-
Could you provide some background on the statement about not being spam? I'm more familiar with the statements that urge caution, such as this one from a Google employee (Maile Ohye) at http://maileohye.com/html-text-indent-not-messing-up-your-rankings/.
-
Using css create a div positioned left:-9999;
Create an info button or link that with
a.hover divName { left: 300 - or whatever !
Should work and not be spam just cool css at work !
-
The client is more concerned with image then making money. They've been told that this is not good business practice and you won't make more money because of it. They seem to be fine with that because to them like i said, it's more about how they look to the general public then how well they rank.
(they are in the fashion industry)
-
OMG NO!!!
This entire thread is now feeling like one of those "elephant in the room" situations, so I am just going to come out and say it - that is called C-L-O-A-K-I-N-G!!! Don't do it!
The only result you are likely to see from that is a manual penalty from ALL search engines
As for your clients, the problem you have is that they think they know better than the person they hired to provide professional services. This is a situation that will not end well and the quicker you resolve it, the less damage it will do to your business and your peace of mind.
Whenever our company encounters a client who wants to call the shots like this, the response is to send them a legal disclaimer form that they are required to sign. The document basically says that they acknowledge and accept that due to their having chosen not to accept our professional advice with regard to their website, our company can not be held responsible for any failure to achieve the desired results, including rankings, sales and/or other forms of conversion. The document also includes an indemnity against claims as a result of any perceived failure of the campaign.
When presented with such a document and asked to sign it, the response is generally that the client either wakes up to the fact that they are hurting their own business, OR they demand to know why we would expect them to sign such a thing. The polite, but firm response is "you are making it impossible for us to do our job the way it should be done, so without this agreement in place, we will have to refuse the work". At that point, if they are not prepared to either sign or rethink, it is time to part company.
Don't fall into the trap of trying to keep a client like this unless you are protected. This sort of client will never own their mistakes and the worst thing in the world would be to find yourself being sued for a failure of their making.
Hope that helps,
Sha
Incidentally, we have only one client who has ever chosen to accept that their stipulations are likely to prevent us from achieving good results.
-
Tell your client that they are asking you to fight Mike Tyson with your feet tied together.
Tell them that they should not expect anything better than second rate results and an ass kicking.
Tell them that you think they are wasting 80% of the money that they spend on their site.
Tell them that you don't feel good taking their money when they have no chance of winning.
These will not be happy clients. Who would be happy pumping money into a losing site. It will be your fault, not theirs.
You will not be happy doing this work.
-
Sounds like your clients want results without paying for it. You sound willing to do that, using spammer techniques, but it is not a good idea for a couple of reasons.
1. Hiding a paragraph or two of content can get the site lowered or banned by Google instead of increasing its rank. Your customers won't be happy with the cost of recovering from that. And, you will get all the blame.
2. Hiding the reality of what it takes to be ranked high in Google from your client is a dis-service to your client. They will expect more from you in the future (until they get pushed to the back of the line in search).
3. Not educating your client on the realities of needing good visible content their customers, not just the robots, can see, reflects poorly on you. Anyone in this business encounters difficult clients unwilling to pay for services is a given. It's a good learning curve for you, more than for them.
I have a client who has just come back to me and my recommendations after a year and a half of trying to get results from others promising them more for less, but never able to deliver.
When you have the confidence and experience to know what your knowledge and skills can do for your customers, and know that what you requires monetary value, than you can calmly lay it out for them.
One option is to let your client know what kind of ranking they can get without adding content to their webpages. Then let them know what ranking they can expect by adding content and at the price you require to do the work and stay in business.
Performing black hat/spammer techniques falls on you, not your client. It's too high of a risk and price to pay for a client looking to get ahead by squeezing you dry.
-
Can you afford to choose different clients?
Is there a way you can convince them of the business case of more information? Modify five medium-traffic pages with more information, and see how those products perform? Make it a business case, not just an SEO case. Find out what the most common questions are to the sales or support team, and answer those questions on the product page. Tell the client you will help reduce their costs (of support), reduce their returns, increase customer satisfaction, etc.
If they just want increased rankings, take a ten-word phrase from the page and show them they are already ranking number 1, and that it's time to focus on sales.
-
Hi Stephen,
Definitely, definitely don't do this. It sucks that your clients don't want to operate with you, but doing this might put them at risk of a penalty. You clearly know that the technique is used by spammers, and even though you might justify you reason, Google will not.
Have you showed your clients some articles or blog posts on the importance of content perhaps?
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Is this still considered true about INTERNAL anchor text? "Penguin seems to be targeting overly aggressive anchor text (both internally and externally), especially from low-quality sources."
Recently I've heard a few people say now it's okay to be aggressive with internal linking. So a link from mydomain.com/news to mydomain/widgets can use spammy anchor text like "best green widgets in California" that are an obvious problem for links coming in from external site. Which is accurate?
On-Page Optimization | | corlin0 -
HTML Site SEO (NO CMS)
I have got a client site, which is dated (2007) and has not been shifted to any recognised CMS yet. It is HTML based. Is it possible to SEO on such a site? Is it even worth it? If it is possible to do SEO on this, any suggestions will be highly appreciated. Thank you.
On-Page Optimization | | ArthurRadtke3 -
Many have stolen our content. Rewrite vs. DMCA content removal?
Hello, We own a medical tourism website and many other sites have stolen (copied and pasted) our content. Our content is more than 2 years old, so we thought we could rewrite the content - but Which is a more wiser decision from you guys' experience? Archive our current content at a different URL and upload a fresh content in the current URL Claim our originality to Google and ask the stolen sites to remove our content. Thank you and appreciate your time.
On-Page Optimization | | joony0 -
Duplicate content: Form labels and field content
I have a site that has 500 pages, each with unique content, the only content that could be deemed the same is the 'Make Contact' form, which has the same labels and placeholder text on each page. Is this likely to cause any duplicate content penalties?
On-Page Optimization | | deployseo0 -
SEO value of old press releases (as content)?
Howdy Moz Community, I'm working with a client on migrating content to a new site/CMS and am wondering whether anyone has thoughts on the value of old press releases. I'm familiar with the devaluation of press release links from early 2013, but I'm wondering more about their value as content. Does importing old press releases (3-5 years old) create contextual depth of content that has some value for the site as a whole (even though the news contained within is useless)? Or, do these old press releases just create clutter and waste time (in migration). The site has a wealth of additional content (articles and videos), so the press releases wouldn't be covering up for thin content. I'm just wondering whether there's any best practices or a general rule of thumb. Thanks!
On-Page Optimization | | MilesMedia0 -
Is Disqus as good for SEO as a built in comment system on your website?
Disqus is a simple tool you can use to easily get comments up and running on your website. Does it have the same value as a built in comment feature such as a Wordpress blog or does Google not attribute the Disqus comments to the websites content as it would for Wordpress?
On-Page Optimization | | Trellis0 -
Any benefit to using HeadSpace AND All in One?
I noticed that somewhere along the line (outside developer or SEO) I ended up with HeadSpace AND All in One on one of my WP sites. There are functions that I appreciate with both and I wonder if there is any danger to completing both forms for a post or page? Is there really any benefit or just a waste of time? I keep finding articles that compare the 2, but nothing that talks about using them together. If I get rid of All in One, …. WOW. Mid question, i realized I'm a dum-dum. All in One has the same no follow options I thought I would miss from HeadSpace. So new question…if I uninstall headspace, will I lose the data/settings that it was used to set up? Jenn
On-Page Optimization | | vernonmack0 -
Trying to SEO a site that used Header Tags for Design
I am trying to SEO a website that was built years ago and uses Header tags for design. The site must have 25 and tags used for design purpose. Is there any way to work around this problem? Perhaps a code that tells Google to ignore these as Headers? The web designers say that they are looking to fix the problem sometime this summer but you never know if that means it a month away or years away. I really want to help this website but I believe that the Header tags are one of the reasons that his site does not show in the top 100 rankings for any keywords. Any help would be great. www.wallybuysell.com Chris.K
On-Page Optimization | | CKerr0