http://blogfather.net/blogs/seoserviceonline.xml SEO Services by The SEO Master-Butch Hamilton, Michigan SEO Services, Search Engine Optimization, SEO, Search Engine Marketing, SEM, Butch Hamilton-SEO Master (c) 2007, veretekk.com. All rights reserved. http://internet-tales-and-tips.com/viewforum.php?f=10 RSS Feeds <P>RSS (most commonly translated as "Really Simple Syndication" but sometimes "Rich Site Summary") is a family of web feed formats used to publish frequently updated works—such as blog entries, news headlines, audio, and video—in a standardized format.[2] An RSS document (which is called a "feed", "web feed",[3] or "channel") includes full or summarized text, plus metadata such as publishing dates and authorship. Web feeds benefit publishers by letting them syndicate content automatically. They benefit readers who want to subscribe to timely updates from favored websites or to aggregate feeds from many sites into one place. RSS feeds can be read using software called an "RSS reader", "feed reader", or "aggregator", which can be web-based, desktop-based, or mobile-device-based. A standardized XML file format allows the information to be published once and viewed by many different programs. The user subscribes to a feed by entering into the reader the feed's URI – often referred to informally as a "URL" (uniform resource locator), although technically the two terms are not exactly synonymous – or by clicking an RSS icon in a browser that initiates the subscription process. The RSS reader checks the user's subscribed feeds regularly for new work, downloads any updates that it finds, and provides a user interface to monitor and read the feeds. Tue, 25 Aug 2009 17:36:16 GMT http://butchhamilton.com Cloaking <P>Cloaking refers to any of several means to serve a page to the search-engine spider that is different from that seen by human users. It can be an attempt to mislead search engines regarding the content on a particular web site. Cloaking, however, can also be used to ethically increase accessibility of a site to users with disabilities or provide human users with content that search engines aren't able to process or parse. It is also used to deliver content based on a user's location; Google itself uses IP delivery, a form of cloaking, to deliver results. Another form of cloaking is code swapping, i.e., optimizing a page for top ranking and then swapping another page in its place once a top ranking is achieved. Tue, 25 Aug 2009 17:34:48 GMT http://butchhamilton.com URL Redirects <P>Taking the user to another page without his or her intervention, e.g., using META refresh tags, Flash, JavaScript, Java or Server side redirects Tue, 25 Aug 2009 17:34:13 GMT http://butchhamilton.com Mirror Sites <P>Hosting of multiple websites all with conceptually similar content but using different URLs. Some search engines give a higher rank to results where the keyword searched for appears in the URL. Tue, 25 Aug 2009 17:33:26 GMT http://butchhamilton.com Referrer Log Spam <P>When someone accesses a web page, i.e., the referee, by following a link from another web page, i.e., the referrer, the referee is given the address of the referrer by the person's Internet browser. Some websites have a referrer log which shows which pages link to that site. By having a robot randomly access many sites enough times, with a message or specific address given as the referrer, that message or Internet address then appears in the referrer log of those sites that have referrer logs. Since some search engines base the importance of sites by the number of different sites linking to them, referrer-log spam may be used to increase the search engine rankings of the spammer's sites, by getting the referrer logs of many sites to link to them. Tue, 25 Aug 2009 17:31:36 GMT http://butchhamilton.com Wiki Spam <P>Using the open editability of wiki systems to place links from the wiki site to the spam site. The subject of the spam site is often unrelated to the wiki page where the link is added. In early 2005, Wikipedia implemented a default "nofollow" value for the "rel" HTML attribute. Links with this attribute are ignored by Google's PageRank algorithm. Forum and Wiki admins can use these to discourage Wiki spam. Tue, 25 Aug 2009 17:30:49 GMT http://butchhamilton.com Comment Spam <P>Comment spam is a form of link spam that has arisen in web pages that allow dynamic user editing such as wikis, blogs, and guestbooks. It can be problematic because agents can be written that automatically randomly select a user edited web page, such as a Wikipedia article, and add spamming links Tue, 25 Aug 2009 17:30:02 GMT http://butchhamilton.com Spam in Blogs <P>This is the placing or solicitation of links randomly on other sites, placing a desired keyword into the hyperlinked text of the inbound link. Guest books, forums, blogs, and any site that accepts visitors' comments are particular targets and are often victims of drive-by spamming where automated software creates nonsense posts with links that are usually irrelevant and unwanted. Tue, 25 Aug 2009 17:28:44 GMT http://butchhamilton.com Cookie Stuffing <P>This involves placing an affiliate tracking cookie on a website visitor's computer without their knowledge, which will then generate revenue for the person doing the cookie stuffing. This not only generates fraudulent affiliate sales, but also has the potential to overwrite other affiliates' cookies, essentially stealing their legitimately earned commissions. Tue, 25 Aug 2009 17:27:12 GMT http://butchhamilton.com Buying Expired Domains <P>Some link spammers monitor DNS records for domains that will expire soon, then buy them when they expire and replace the pages with links to their pages. See Domaining. However Google resets the link data on expired domains. Tue, 25 Aug 2009 17:26:17 GMT http://butchhamilton.com Page Hijacking <P>This is achieved by creating a rogue copy of a popular website which shows contents similar to the original to a web crawler but redirects web surfers to unrelated or malicious websites. Tue, 25 Aug 2009 17:25:25 GMT http://butchhamilton.com Spam Blogs <P>Spam blogs, also known as splogs, are fake blogs created solely for spamming. They are similar in nature to link farms. Tue, 25 Aug 2009 17:22:52 GMT http://butchhamilton.com Sybil Attack <P>This is the forging of multiple identities for malicious intent, named after the famous multiple personality disorder patient "Sybil" (Shirley Ardell Mason). A spammer may create multiple web sites at different domain names that all link to each other, such as fake blogs known as spam blogs. Tue, 25 Aug 2009 15:25:10 GMT http://butchhamilton.com Hidden Links <P>Putting links where visitors will not see them in order to increase link popularity. Highlighted link text can help rank a webpage higher for matching that phrase. Tue, 25 Aug 2009 15:24:23 GMT http://butchhamilton.com Link Farms <P>Involves creating tightly-knit communities of pages referencing each other, also known humorously as mutual admiration societies Tue, 25 Aug 2009 15:23:15 GMT http://butchhamilton.com Link Spam <P>Davison defines link spam (which he calls "nepotistic links") as "... links between pages that are present for reasons other than merit." Link spam takes advantage of link-based ranking algorithms, such as Google's PageRank algorithm, which gives a higher ranking to a website the more other highly ranked websites link to it. These techniques also aim at influencing other link-based ranking techniques such as the HITS algorithm. Tue, 25 Aug 2009 15:22:23 GMT http://butchhamilton.com Scraper sites, also known as Made for AdSense sites, are created using various programs designed to "scrape" search-engine results pages or other sources of content and create "content" for a website. The specific presentation of content on these sites is unique, but is merely an amalgamation of content taken from other sources, often without permission. These types of websites are generally full of advertising (such as pay-per-click ads), or redirect the user to other sites. It is even feasible for scraper sites to outrank original websites for their own information and organization names. Tue, 25 Aug 2009 15:21:34 GMT http://butchhamilton.com Gateway or Doorway Pages <P>Creating low-quality web pages that contain very little content but are instead stuffed with very similar keywords and phrases. They are designed to rank highly within the search results, but serve no purpose to visitors looking for information. A doorway page will generally have "click here to enter" on the page. Tue, 25 Aug 2009 15:20:48 GMT http://butchhamilton.com Metatag Stuffing <P>Repeating keywords in the Meta tags, and using meta keywords that are unrelated to the site's content. This tactic has been ineffective since 2005. Tue, 25 Aug 2009 15:20:06 GMT http://butchhamilton.com Hidden Text <P>Disguising keywords and phrases by making them the same color as the background, using a tiny font size, or hiding them within HTML code such as "no frame" sections, ALT attributes, zero-width/height DIVs, and "no script" sections. However, hidden text is not always spamdexing: it can also be used to enhance accessibility. People screening websites for a search-engine company might temporarily or permanently block an entire website for having invisible text on some webpages. Tue, 25 Aug 2009 15:19:24 GMT http://butchhamilton.com Keyword Stuffing <P>This involves the calculated placement of keywords within a page to raise the keyword count, variety, and density of the page. This is useful to make a page appear to be relevant for a web crawler in a way that makes it more likely to be found. Example: A promoter of a Ponzi scheme wants to attract web surfers to a site where he advertises his scam. He places hidden text appropriate for a fan page of a popular music group on his page, hoping that the page will be listed as a fan site and receive many visits from music lovers. Older versions of indexing programs simply counted how often a keyword appeared, and used that to determine relevance levels. Most modern search engines have the ability to analyze a page for keyword stuffing and determine whether the frequency is consistent with other sites created specifically to attract search engine traffic. Also, large webpages are truncated, so that massive dictionary lists cannot be indexed on a single webpage. Tue, 25 Aug 2009 15:18:33 GMT http://butchhamilton.com Spamdexing Continued <P>The success of Google at both producing better search results and combating keyword spamming, through its reputation-based PageRank link analysis system, helped it become the dominant search site late in the 1990s. Although it has not been rendered useless by spamdexing, Google has not been immune to more sophisticated methods. Google bombing is another form of search engine result manipulation, which involves placing hyperlinks that directly affect the rank of other sites. Google first algorithmically combated Google bombing on January 25, 2007. Tue, 25 Aug 2009 15:17:24 GMT http://butchhamilton.com Spamdexing <P>Spamdexing (also known as search spam or search engine spam) involves a number of methods, such as repeating unrelated phrases, to manipulate the relevancy or prominence of resources indexed by a search engine, in a manner inconsistent with the purpose of the indexing system. Some consider it to be a part of search engine optimization, though there are many search engine optimization methods that improve the quality and appearance of the content of web sites and serve content useful to many users. Search engines use a variety of algorithms to determine relevancy ranking. Some of these include determining whether the search term appears in the META keywords tag, others whether the search term appears in the body text or URL of a web page. Many search engines check for instances of spamdexing and will remove suspect pages from their indexes. Also, people working for a search-engine organization can quickly block the results-listing from entire websites that use spamdexing, perhaps alerted by user complaints of false matches. The rise of spamdexing in the mid-1990s made the leading search engines of the time less useful. Tue, 25 Aug 2009 15:15:53 GMT http://butchhamilton.com Off Page SEO <P>Off-page optimization are strategies for search engine optimization that are done off the pages of a website to maximize its performance in the search engines for target keywords related to the page content. Examples of off-page optimization include linking, and placing keywords within link anchor text. Methods of obtaining links can also be considered off-page optimization. Tue, 25 Aug 2009 15:15:01 GMT http://butchhamilton.com The Organization of Search Engine Optimization Professionals (seopros), is non-profit organization of search engine marketers founded in April, 2001. <P>The stated goals of the organization are to promote and develop "best practices" for search engine optimization consultants and developers. In addition to providing educational materials and information to consumers, and members of the industry about "best practices," the organization is one of the first to offer certification on search engine optimization. <P>SEOPros.org is referenced to by numerous online resources to SEO, including the leading SEO forums, including Webmasterworld.com, High Rankings Forum, SearchEngineWatch.com Forums, SEOChat, DigitalPoint Forums and others. USA Today advised website owners that want to improve their search engine rankings to hire an SEO consultant with affiliations to the Better Business Bureau and SEOPros.org. Tue, 25 Aug 2009 15:13:13 GMT http://butchhamilton.com Wikipedia attracts many links and contains a large amount of content on a broad set of topics. As a result, Wikipedia pages tend to rank well in organic search, and to acquire high PageRank on Google, the most popular search engine as of 2007. These factors create a strong temptation for editors to add linkspam to promote their own sites, whitewash negative articles about themselves or their organizations, or astroturf articles to create a positive spin. Indeed, some search engine optimization (SEO) specialists have recommended tactics that violate Wikipedia's policies in published articles. Tue, 25 Aug 2009 15:12:07 GMT http://butchhamilton.com In recent years, the terms white hat and black hat have been applied to the Search Engine Optimization (SEO) industry. Black hat SEO tactics such as spamdexing, attempt to redirect search results to particular target pages in a fashion that is against the search engines' terms of service, whereas white hat methods are generally approved by the search engines. White hats tend to produce results that last a long time, whereas black hats anticipate that their sites may eventually be banned either temporarily or permanently once the search engines discover what they are doing. Tue, 25 Aug 2009 15:10:17 GMT http://butchhamilton.com Site owners started to recognize the value of having their sites highly ranked and visible in search engine results, creating an opportunity for both white hat and black hat SEO practitioners. According to industry analyst Danny Sullivan, the phrase search engine optimization probably came into use in 1997. Tue, 25 Aug 2009 15:09:39 GMT http://butchhamilton.com Webmasters and content providers began optimizing sites for search engines in the mid-1990s, as the first search engines were cataloging the early Web. Initially, all a webmaster needed to do was submit the address of a page, or URL, to the various engines which would send a spider to "crawl" that page, extract links to other pages from it, and return information found on the page to be indexed. The process involves a search engine spider downloading a page and storing it on the search engine's own server, where a second program, known as an indexer, extracts various information about the page, such as the words it contains and where these are located, as well as any weight for specific words, and all links the page contains, which are then placed into a scheduler for crawling at a later date. Tue, 25 Aug 2009 15:08:42 GMT http://butchhamilton.com Another class of techniques, known as black hat SEO or Spamdexing, use methods such as link farms, keyword stuffing and article spinning that degrade both the relevance of search results and the user-experience of search engines. Search engines look for sites that employ these techniques in order to remove them from their indices. Tue, 25 Aug 2009 15:08:13 GMT http://butchhamilton.com The acronym "SEO" can also refer to "search engine optimizers," a term adopted by an industry of consultants who carry out optimization projects on behalf of clients, and by employees who perform SEO services in-house. Search engine optimizers may offer SEO as a stand-alone service or as a part of a broader marketing campaign. Because effective SEO may require changes to the HTML source code of a site, SEO tactics may be incorporated into web site development and design. The term "search engine friendly" may be used to describe web site designs, menus, content management systems, images, videos, shopping carts, and other elements that have been optimized for the purpose of search engine exposure. Tue, 25 Aug 2009 15:07:41 GMT http://butchhamilton.com As an Internet marketing strategy, SEO considers how search engines work and what people search for. Optimizing a website primarily involves editing its content and HTML and associated coding to both increase its relevance to specific keywords and to remove barriers to the indexing activities of search engines. Tue, 25 Aug 2009 14:44:11 GMT http://butchhamilton.com Search engine optimization (SEO) is the process of improving the volume or quality of traffic to a web site from search engines via "natural" ("organic" or "algorithmic") search results. Typically, the earlier a site appears in the search results list, the more visitors it will receive from the search engine. SEO may target different kinds of search, including image search, local search, and industry-specific vertical search engines. This gives a web site web presence. Tue, 25 Aug 2009 14:35:28 GMT