Black Hat vs White Hat Site Optimization

[CHR]

A couple FC members asked for a definition of Black Hat SEO after reading the thread about the new Bloomnet sites and directory.

Here's a brief description from Wikipedia:

SEO techniques are classified by some into two broad categories: techniques that search engines recommend as part of good design, and those techniques that search engines do not approve of and attempt to minimize the effect of, referred to as spamdexing. Some industry commentators classify these methods, and the practitioners who employ them, as either white hat SEO, or black hat SEO.[29] White hats tend to produce results that last a long time, whereas black hats anticipate that their sites will eventually be banned once the search engines discover what they are doing.[30]

A SEO tactic, technique or method is considered white hat if it conforms to the search engines' guidelines and involves no deception. As the search engine guidelines[31][17][18][19] are not written as a series of rules or commandments, this is an important distinction to note. White hat SEO is not just about following guidelines, but is about ensuring that the content a search engine indexes and subsequently ranks is the same content a user will see.

White hat advice is generally summed up as creating content for users, not for search engines, and then making that content easily accessible to the spiders, rather than attempting to game the algorithm. White hat SEO is in many ways similar to web development that promotes accessibility,[32] although the two are not identical.

Black hat SEO attempts to improve rankings in ways that are disapproved of by the search engines, or involve deception. One black hat technique uses text that is hidden, either as text colored similar to the background, in an invisible div, or positioned off screen. Another method gives a different page depending on whether the page is being requested by a human visitor or a search engine, a technique known as cloaking.
Search engines may penalize sites they discover using black hat methods, either by reducing their rankings or eliminating their listings from their databases altogether. Such penalties can be applied either automatically by the search engines' algorithms, or by a manual site review.

One infamous example was the February 2006 Google removal of both BMW Germany and Ricoh Germany for use of deceptive practices.[33] Both companies, however, quickly apologized, fixed the offending pages, and were restored to Google's list.[34]

Wikipedia also has an article about the tactics used by Black Hat SEOs to improve their sites' rankings.

Search engines do a pretty good job of catching most of it, but you can always submit reports to alert them, too.
Google spam report
Yahoo spam report
MSN spam report

In the case of the BloomNet spam, I would not report it now for fear that the florist sites could be banned - even temporarily. Let's hope the HQ guys handle it before the SE's do.

 

[CHR]

In the past, Google's search guru, Matt Cutts, outed a florist site that used black hat SEO. Crappy Doorway Pages

Here's a comment in one of Matt's posts from a Brantford, Ontario webmaster whose attempts to created multiple sites with basically the same content got them ignored/banned from Google. He's asking how to get reincluded:

For years I was the webmaster for a Brantford florist’s web site which enjoyed #1 ranking on the big 3. Early on I wanted to take the same website to other communities (cities), as the results achieved and the cost were far lower than methods used by the major city to city florist referrers. This year I put the plan into motion in August. Each site is the same except for prices, addresses, names, and telephone numbers.

Didn’t even think to check for Google guidelines, as it was very obvious that the majors had nearly identical sites in different cities. Plus all my sites have been squeaky clean for years.

In mid-August we sold our first site. Marketing then suggested we put up a few more sites so that potential out-of-town clients could see exactly what they woould be buying. All extra sites had dummy data for names, addresses, phone numbers etc.

The starting off rankings in Google were much less than I am am used to. Research lead me to the aversion Gooogle has to duplicate content. As a means to make pages less similar, I created artifical names, address, and non-working telephone numbers. In a matter of days, all the sites except 2 diasappeared, and the remaining 2 went to 100+.

NEVER include a phony address or telephone number on your website!!
All home pages have unseen links to password protected areas where clients can add comments to their pages and change prices.

As this is written, 3 sites have rankings betwee 41 and 48, 2 are way over 300, and 9 have been indexed, but cannot be found in Google even when viewing EVERY entry Google returns.

My first question is how can I fix this mess? Secondly how can I persuade Google that similar content on websites for unique cities are not spam, as the content is no good to anyone outside that city. Lastly, the big guys in the flower delivery business are providing similar content in different cities.

I am looking for a level plaing field for the smaller mom & pop flower shops.
All comments are appreciated. Excel worksheets are available at
aquilifer-web-design.com/xls/

Emphasis mine. BTW, the main (original) site is #1 for its city. Not sure about the copies since the URLs weren't disclosed.

Hope these examples help explain a bit about black hat activities.