Black Hat SEO is any SEO technique that Google considers subversive. These techniques could result in Google penalties that can be severe for your website and online business.
Let’s begin with a definition. Black Hat SEO is web positioning techniques that aim to get fast results while violating search engine rules. In other words, they deceive or manipulate search engines and this obviously does not like a hair-to-dad google.
The unusual name is a reference to American Western movies in which bandits wore black hats that covered their faces (black hat).
The White Hat SEO is Clint Eastwood, and the Black Hat SEO is the outlaw on duty. This metaphor can be used to describe American cinema. White Hat SEO techniques follow Google’s guidelines.
They are more time-consuming and more laborious, but you will see your website rank well organically. Google won’t penalize you. White Hat SEO techniques are the best to improve your SEO position.
Brian Dean, the author of Backlinko, said that he used Black Hat techniques at the start of his blog. These techniques, often due to ignorance, can generate temporary results but they don’t work long-term. Today, the Google algorithm is changing rapidly.
Black Hat SEO techniques change as the Google algorithm updates. Some are outdated while others may be new. These are the most well-known:
This is the most well-known and used by many SEOs and content writers today. However, it is not recommended. This is when you use the same keyword in all content, including the Meta Titles and H1 titles.
Google believes keywords should be valuable to users and not just used to position themselves. That is why Google is moving towards semantic SEO, where quality and useful content will reign supreme. Your website will not rank highly in the SERP if you repeat the same keyword repeatedly.
Google suggests that you write useful content in a natural, understandable manner for your user using synonyms and LSI keywords (keywords Google considers semantically related to a topic).
This is one of the oldest techniques. This involves inserting keywords and links into the web page, but not showing the user anything. Only search engines will notice.
Ewerton Silva explains that it is possible to do this in a variety of ways. For example, you can apply the same color as the background to the text or change the font size to zero.
Google has already implemented mechanisms to penalize and identify this type of website. It is extremely dangerous to use this method.
It is also known as ‘camouflage’. Helena Alcoverro says that it basically involves creating two websites. One is optimized for search engines to find and upload to the top spots, while the other is not readable by the user. A second, lower-quality website is presented to the user without optimization.
This is a dangerous tactic that could lead to a serious penalty. Google clearly states that the web interface must be identical for both the user and the search engine.
It literally means “link farm”, Silva states. This technique involves many websites agreeing to create links between them, which improves the page rank. Because each word is given a link, it creates content that is hard to read.
This technique is equivalent to a penalty due to the importance Google places on quality content.
Cloaking is not the only dangerous technique. This involves hacking web content using a program that generates more articles from the same article. However, some phrases may be changed or synonyms used.
This content is not of any value to the user.
These are links that one website generates in exchange for money or a discount. This means that you pay another website to generate links you can use for positioning.
Silva says that this Black Hat technique is the most difficult to Google recognize. It is because Google cannot identify that you asked a friend to create a link to your website one Sunday morning in cafe.
Google can identify this technique in two ways. The first relies on the semantics of your web. For example, it’s not common for a website about porcelain dolls to link to a site about meat products. Google will also start to notice if a website starts to acquire many links over night.
Google may penalize you if you use techniques that are contrary to its policy. You may face different sanctions depending on the severity of your situation (Silva 2020).
Google maintains a webmaster guideline document that is almost always updated. This document contains all information you need to create content and index your sites in order to rank high in the SERP.
