SEO > SEO: Spamming
Apr. 3, 2008 at 11:27am by Aaron Wall
One Day You’re Optimized, The Next Day You're A Spammer
It is no secret that human review has been playing a bigger role at Google over the past couple years. And we are emotional beings... no matter how logical the guidelines may be, emotions cause human errors. But not all sites that get penalized are penalized in error. Many...
See Related Stories In: 100% Organic, Google: SEO, SEM Industry: Organizations, SEO: Spamming
Mar. 27, 2008 at 8:00am by Jill Whalen
We Don't Need SEO Standards!
Last month I attended the SMX West session in Santa Clara entitled Is it Time for Search Marketing Standards? It was an interesting session, but I wasn't really sure where I stood on the issue at the time. Now that I've had a few weeks to think about it,...
See Related Stories In: 100% Organic, SEM Industry: Community, SEM Industry: Organizations, SEM Industry: Outsourcing, SEO: Spamming
Mar. 24, 2008 at 7:39am by Mike Blumenthal
A New Scourge For Yahoo: Affiliate Mapspam
I've been writing about Mapspam appearing in both Google and Yahoo search results for some time now. Mapspam is where black hat SEOs spam local search and map listings, and like all black hat techniques, it seems to get more sophisticated as the search engines find ways to combat the...
See Related Stories In: SEO: Spamming, Yahoo: Maps & Local
Mar. 4, 2008 at 11:31am by Eric Ward
How Social Media Becomes Link Fertilizer
The title of this article doesn't mean I'm changing my position on social media as link driver. Yes, it's possible, but for the overwhelming majority of web sites, a widespread and costly social linking strategy is a waste of time and money. Go ahead, call me a heretic, but...
See Related Stories In: Google: SEO, Google: Web Search, Link Building, Link Building: Linkbait, Link Week, SEO: Spamming, Search Engines: StumbleUpon, Social Media Marketing
Jan. 24, 2008 at 8:08am by Stephan Spencer
Think You're Successfully Flying Under Google's Radar? Think Again.
Have you been trying to "fly under the radar," engaging in activities outside of Google's guidelines but subtly so as not to get caught? More and more SEOs are moving into this dangerous territory as the guidelines continue to broaden (prime examples of which being the expanded definition of...
See Related Stories In: 100% Organic, SEO: Spamming
Dec. 11, 2007 at 8:18am by Mike Blumenthal
MapSpammers Getting More Sophisticated
After the first relatively unsophisticated Google MapSpam bulk upload attempt became public, I had a long and interesting conversation with a webmaster who had spent many years implementing a "long tail search" campaign on behalf of local business in a major market. He pointed out that with a little bit...
See Related Stories In: SEO: Spamming, Search Engines: Maps & Local Search Engines
Nov. 30, 2007 at 9:20am by Barry Schwartz
Google Adds Report Malicious Software Form
In the aftermath of the major malware attack that hit search results, the Google Online Security Blog announced the launch of a new form to report malware software showing up in Google results....
See Related Stories In: Google: SEO, Legal: Security, SEO: Spamming, Search Features: Safety
Nov. 29, 2007 at 8:54am by Barry Schwartz
Search Spam Is Getting More Dangerous Every Day
Search spam, using techniques that manipulate the search results, feels like it is getting more dangerous every day. Some search spammers go as far as hacking sites to inject link spam into unsuspecting web pages. And some go even further by polluting the search results with nasty malware. Yesterday we...
See Related Stories In: Legal: Security, SEO: Spamming
Nov. 28, 2007 at 8:57am by Barry Schwartz
Malware Hits Search Results -- Google's Malware Warnings Not Working?
Subverted search sites lead to massive malware attack in progress from ComputerWorld reports that Google, along with Yahoo, Live Search have been targeted in a massive attack that puts links leading to malware sites into top search results. Alex Eckelberry, Sunbelt Software's CEO said "So far we've found 27 different...
See Related Stories In: Google: SEO, Google: Webmaster Central, Legal: Security, SEO: Spamming, Search Features: Safety
Nov. 28, 2007 at 8:35am by Barry Schwartz
Google's Matt Cutts On Cloaking & Search Snippets
Matt Cutts of Google has written two posts on the topic of SEO: Detecting more “undetectable” webspam The anatomy of a search result...
See Related Stories In: Google: SEO, SEO: Cloaking & Doorway Pages, SEO: Spamming, SEO: Titles & Descriptions
Sep. 20, 2007 at 8:56am by Barry Schwartz
The Great Google Directory Ban Of Sept. 2007
Earlier this month, a discussion on our Sphinn site looked at how it seemed Google was going after directories with penalties. But was this really happening, or was it just forum noise coming out in particular from Digital Point? Today, Rand Fishkin takes a long look in the issue in...
See Related Stories In: Google: SEO, Link Building: General, Link Building: Paid Links, SEO: Spamming
Sep. 11, 2007 at 7:30am by Mike Blumenthal
Yahoo Local Now Features "User Denigrated Content"
After exploring Yahoo's Mapspam, I started investigating Yahoo's end user local reporting features more fully. I may have underestimated Yahoo's features to deal with spam (and to abet it). The new Yahoo Local is making a strong attempt at encouraging user input and content about local businesses with reviews,...
See Related Stories In: Local Search Week, SEO: Local, SEO: Spamming, Yahoo: Maps & Local
Sep. 6, 2007 at 1:29pm by Greg Sterling
Mapspam Now Appearing On Yahoo Local
If spam isn't an indication of the arrival of an advertising medium (e.g. email spam, search spam) I don't know what is. Mike Blumenthal, who identified instances of Google mapspam has now investigated non-local businesses trying to fool the local algorithms on Yahoo into thinking they are local. Blumenthal cites...
See Related Stories In: SEO: Local, SEO: Spamming, Yahoo: Maps & Local
Sep. 6, 2007 at 9:07am by Barry Schwartz
Microsoft's Adult & Pharma Referrals Are Search Quality Tests
I have been tracking a WebmasterWorld thread that has reports of weird Microsoft Live Search referral strings that come from Microsoft-owned IP blocks but show irrelevant keywords in the adult and pharmaceutical space. Today I reported that these findings are indeed valid and are official Microsoft tests. A Microsoft representative...
See Related Stories In: Microsoft: Live Search SEO, SEO: Spamming
Aug. 27, 2007 at 12:18pm by Danny Sullivan
The Promise & Reality Of Mixing The Social Graph With Search Engines
I'm having a bad day. Aside from my desktop crashing, we get another spate of "let's blame SEO" to start my morning off. Robert Scoble uses that theme as a launching pad for a series of videos on how Facebook potentially could be a killer search engine -- regardless...
See Related Stories In: SEO: General, SEO: Spamming, Search Engines: Mahalo, Search Engines: Social Search Engines, Search Marketing: General
Aug. 23, 2007 at 7:26am by Mike Blumenthal
What Should Google Do About Mapspam?
The first widely reported Google Mapspam (and see here) clearly highlighted the potential and pitfalls for local search. Mapspam is a relatively new phenomemon, where black hat SEOs are spamming local search and map listings. It also raised a number of questions for Google, and for the search marketing industry:...
See Related Stories In: Google: Maps & Local, SEO: Local, SEO: Spamming
Aug. 16, 2007 at 1:01pm by Barry Schwartz
How Proxy Hacking Can Hurt Your Rankings & What To Do About It
Google Proxy Hacking: How A Third Party Can Remove Your Site From Google SERPs by Dan Thies gives us a detailed look at the serious dangers of proxy hacking. Dan's detailed article shows the history on how he discovered the issue. He then goes into why the hacking currently works...
See Related Stories In: Google: SEO, SEO: Blocking Spiders, SEO: Redirects & Moving Sites, SEO: Spamming
Aug. 3, 2007 at 4:11pm by Greg Sterling
Bulk Upload 'Mapspam' On Google
Is it black hat "mapspam," a mistake or a creative response to a legitimate business need? Mike Blumenthal has chronicled the history of some recent bulk upload abuse on Google Maps in a couple of detailed posts: TechPro's CEO speaks about Google Maps Bulk Upload abuse and the related Batten...
See Related Stories In: Google: Maps & Local, SEO: Local, SEO: Spamming
Jul. 25, 2007 at 9:58am by Barry Schwartz
From The SEO Trenches: Google Bans Immortality, But College Students Party With Cialis
Google's Matt Cutts explained in a blog post why Google has banned Alex Chiu's web page selling an immortality device. It's not that Google wants to help hide the secret of immortality, as Chiu claims. Rather, it's because of massive and irrelevant keyword stuffing. Meanwhile, Erik Dafforn showed how the...
See Related Stories In: SEO: Spamming
Jul. 16, 2007 at 8:33am by Eric Ward
The Link Saboteurs, And Why They Will Ultimately Fail
There's an interesting thread over at SEOmoz about how some unscrupulous marketers will try to sabotage a competitor's web site by engaging in social media communications and link seeding/spamming tactics that they hope will spark a rash of bad publicity and maybe even trigger some sort of rankings and/or...
See Related Stories In: Link Building: General, Link Week, SEO: Spamming, Social Media Marketing
Jul. 12, 2007 at 8:32am by Jill Whalen
Keyword Stuffing Is Gross And Disgusting!
June was a busy travel month for me. I spoke at the SMX conference in Seattle and SES in Toronto, as well as at our own High Rankings Search Marketing Seminar. The common thing throughout my travels (besides discussing search marketing) was the abundance of food! On the road,...
