What is Black Hat SEO?

There are two main search engine optimization (SEO) strategies: the Black Hat strategy and the White Hat strategy. 

Black Hat SEO (in contrast to White Hat SEO) is not considered to be an ethically correct strategy, considering that its methods often involve using deceptive and disapproved techniques, which are usually against search engine rules and regulation.

Therefore, websites usually use a Black Hat strategy for quick ranking results.

However, Black Hat SEO does not come without consequences.

Apart from the possibility of being banned from search engines, Black Hat SEO techniques create a poor user experience and can be bad for the reputation of a site.


Black Hat SEO techniques include the following:

Keyword stuffing – listing a load of keywords inside content without any actual “substance”.

Invisible text  using a white background to hide text that’s just packed with keywords. Again, a deceptive way of abusing how search engines crawl pages.

Using doorway pages –  webpages that are made for the sole purpose of including keywords, visible only by specific search engines and their spiders.


White Hat SEO vs Black Hat

It should be noted that a Black Hat strategy is usually not the way to go.

Why?

Because you run the risk of your site being banned if you use Black Hat techniques and it can significantly jeopardize the reputation of your website.

If you want to help boost your site’s ranking then it is a better idea to have a White Hat strategy.


Related links:

What is SEO friendly HTML?

What is SEO friendly content?


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