SEO, Spam, and the Controversy
Ethical SEO Issues Further Discussed

Irina Ponomareva |

August 9, 2005

Category: White Hat vs. Black Hat Stuff |

This article may be reproduced in its entirety provided the proper credit to the author is given, and a valid link to http://www.spiderfriendly.co.uk | added.

Some recent hot discussions about the same old White Hat vs. Black Hat SEO theme have been - quite unexpectedly - very enlightening, and have highlighted a lot of pertinent points and facts. Some of those points are sad, but others give certain hope and show that the SEO/SEM industry might still have a brighter future. And there's another point they have proven: no matter how many discussions on the topic take place, there is always room for another one. And no matter how many articles about ethical and unethical SEO, spam and SEO hats are written, there is always the demand for more. So, I decided to write another article on the topic, summing up several forum threads I have recently read (and, in many cases, got directly involved into), typical arguments used by all parties, my own thoughts, conclusions and predictions.

Thanks in advance for your patience, oh reader!

SEO? Spam? SEO hats? What's it all about?

In short, SEO spam is the common name for various tricks used by crafty search engine optimisers to deceive the search engines and artificially increase the site's relevancy and/or authority, thus improving the site's positions in the search engine result pages (SERPs). My own brief search engine spam classification | written in November 2004 is, perhaps, somewhat incomplete and is getting obsolete, but if you are not familiar with the SE spam concept at all, you might want to check it first to get a grasp of what it's all about. One important thing you need to understand about SE spam, though, is the fact that when the engines discover any tricky technique on the site, they may ban the site (remove it completely from their databases), or penalise it (by moving the site from the good positions to the outside of the top 1000 in all important SERPs). SEOs that practise such spammy tricks are often called black hat SEOs or just blackhats; those who don't spam the engines, are known as white hat SEOs.

How we choose the hat

There are a lot of considerations one has to take into account when making a choice about the colour of the SEO hat to wear. It's all about estimating the consequences: for yourself, for the SEM industry, for society (and since SEM is an Internet-specific industry, and the Internet knows no borders, it's the whole of mankind that gets affected in this case). The black hat SEOs often argue that their choice is the best one because it brings them huge financial returns. It may be true in some cases and a deliberate lie in others. But regardless of the amounts of money involved, a bank robber can brag about the same - but does it mean his career choice is the optimum for everyone? How about an ethical factor? Does it pertain at all when we talk about SEO?

Ethical issues in SEO

Of course it does. Why not? Whatever we do in life, and whatever we consider doing, ethics should be taken into account, otherwise, we are likely to come up with a wrong decision. What's more, ethics should be the core of our reasoning - in an ideal world, of course. Unfortunately, in real life people often put other factors above ethics, morals, and their own life principles; SEO is no exception, what's more, it's one of the most characteristic examples of how often the ethical factor gets neglected in the decision making process.

Black hat SEOs don't think that SEO involves any ethical issues at all, as they view the whole SEO process as achieving high rankings for the sites they work on, and view it from the technical point of view solely. "Everything that brings me rankings is good", they say. Sadly, many white hats share the same point of view. "Spamming or not spamming the search engines has nothing to do with ethics as such" is a very popular point of view in certain communities that, at the same time, view themselves as white hat SEO communities. Perhaps it's caused by a poor understanding of how to define ethics properly in the first place.

The Markkula Center for Applied Ethics has published an outstanding collection of articles | covering the history, the philosophical background and the main definitions of ethics developed by the prominent philosophers of the past. Without going deep into the various approaches to ethics (those who are interested can read the following article: Thinking Ethically:
A Framework for Moral Decision Making | - believe me, it's well worth your time), I'll just quote a small part of it that sums up the issue quite well.

"To analyze an issue using the utilitarian approach, we first identify the various courses of action available to us. Second, we ask who will be affected by each action and what benefits or harms will be derived from each. And third, we choose the action that will produce the greatest benefits and the least harm. The ethical action is the one that provides the greatest good for the greatest number."

Let's keep this simple and concise definition in mind.

Now, back to SEO.

Who benefits from the white hat SEO practices?

First, it's the search engines. Since the white hat SEO concept means making site the best it can be for search engines, friendly, relevant, clean and in full compliance with their guidelines, it will help them deliver the most accurate search results and please their users. There will be no need to bypass unfriendly navigation, bloated code, unfriendly URLs and other things that prevent the engines from doing their job.

Second, it's the Internet as a whole, in many different ways: through acquiring another great resource; through improved SERPs; through better site building traditions promoted silently by a new properly SEO'd site. And besides, the more sites that are developed using clean, white hat SEO techniques, the more trustworthy the Internet will become, from the users' point of view.

Third, it's the site owner / SEO's client who gains better visibility in the search engines and, consequently, better opportunities to promote his/her business online, with no loss to quality, and no risks to reputation. The site is usable and attractive; the visitors enjoy their experience while browsing it; the sale rates grow.

And finally, it's the SEO who has done the work. Everything is done well, the client is happy, the invoices are paid. The new entry in the portfolio adds to credibility, and the SEO is now looking forward to good future clients. No need to look over your shoulder or lose sleep at night: the client's domain isn't going to be banned or penalised, and even if certain rankings get lost in future algorithm storms, others will certainly stay in the same positions, or even go up.

Who gets harmed? Nobody, except, perhaps, a jealous spammer who struggles to get the same positions but can't get them, in spite of all the spam.

Who benefits from the black hat SEO practices?

Only the SEO him/herself. Sometimes the client, too, but for a short term, until the engines work out a new filter to catch the newest spam technique invented by the SEO. Nobody else.

But who gets harmed?

The search engines, first of all. Their SERPs suffer through deception; their algos are forced to place the spammy site above the most relevant ones, and to prevent this from happening, they have to constantly develop new anti-spam filters. That takes a lot of time and resources; the genius and skills of their engineers could have been better applied.

Then, the search engine users who have to struggle through results they didn't ask for. Besides, spammy sites are, very often, also low-quality sites; the "rankings at any price" attitude naturally leads to this.

The Internet as a whole suffers in many different ways. It becomes filthier (yes, spammy sites are filth, and they stink). The Internet users (who are, usually, the search engine users, too) might gradually lose their trust in the Internet as a source of information, and go elsewhere. Honest webmasters already tend to avoid linking to other sites for fear of running into bad neighbourhoods; when the spam is done skilfully and is well hidden, it increases the risk. But guess what? The Net can't exist without links!

The client of a black hat SEO, who might have enjoyed good rankings at first, will wake up some day to find the domain banned from some (or all) search engines. We all remember the Traffic Power mass ban case of 2004, but how many other companies do this to their clients, and are now waiting to be caught? A lot! What does it mean? Ruined businesses and livelihoods, bitter tears, and the need to start everything from scratch (with the aging delay issues for new domains and other variations of sandbox working, it's no joke at all).

The competitors of the spammy site are being dishonestly deprived of the positions they deserve (until the spam is discovered). The SEM/SEO industry loses its reputation, because all cases where a blackhat got one or more clients' domains banned, get documented in forums, blogs and articles, all over the Net, and the potential clients read this stuff and lose their trust in the industry as a whole.

But enough of this. It's already obvious, isn't it? Black hat SEO practices obviously do much more harm than good, and so it has everything to do with ethics. That's why we equate white hat SEO with ethical SEO. And that's why we call black hat SEO unethical.

How they justify themselves

Of course, the spammers (aka blackhats), have developed their own arguments to justify what they do, and their arguments are well known to us.

"We do what is the best for our clients, and that's our job. Mind you, we deliver rankings, so we are ethical - more ethical than you whitehats! After all, business is business."

I've already covered the side-effects of this approach in the previous part of the article. Besides, any business that actually harms so many other parties can't be considered a legitimate business in any civilised society. And the fact that black hat SEOs deliver rankings to their clients doesn't make them ethical. What it actually does is makes their client another unethical party, assuming the client understood the issue and approved of the risky techniques.

"We earn more money than you white hat miseries do."

Not necessarily. And even if this is true, your money is actually stolen from legitimate sites, from honest SEO practitioners, and, perhaps, from your client, as well. How many of you would refund the monies when the domain gets banned?

But alas, it's totally useless to talk ethics to such people. They don't understand.

"You whitehats complain about spam just because we outrank you. SPAM = Sites Positioned Above Mine."

Sometimes, perhaps, it is the case, but not very often. Ethical SEO techniques can produce great results, with time and patience, and those results are long term and don't betray you. Most of us are happy and contented, because we have nothing to worry about, and nothing to be ashamed of.

"White hat techniques can't compete. Especially when the terms in question are very competitive."

Again, they can. Granted, there are very spammy niches (usually the most competitive ones) that are so full of spammy sites that it becomes really hard (though possible) to do anything there without spam, but if the competitiveness of the niche weren't abused in the first place as a justification for spam there would never have been such things as "spammy niches". And the latest changes in the algorithms of the major engines show us that spammy niches are getting cleaned up, one by one. The engines are now paying more attention to factors that can't be manipulated, such as the site's age, and give the top positions in the competitive SERPs to really authoritative sites. Go figure. Is there a solution for younger sites? Yes, there is. Research to find less competitive key phrases; there are plenty in any niche.

"Ethics is a marketing trick. Being whiter than white is a USP."

Okay, take it this way if it makes you feel better. Yes, it's a USP, because many potential customers are starting to understand the difference, and make an effort to look for a white hat SEO (preferably with good references). With search engines getting smarter about spam, day after day, isn't it the time to reconsider your USP, too?

"I'm not a slave to engines. Why should I comply with their guidelines? They have no legal power!"

Because at the same time you would like to receive help from them, by getting referrals from their free, organic listings. If you wish to take, be sure to give something in return.

"I used to be a white hat, but the damn engines gave me no rankings, so now I owe them nothing and will do as I please."

Your choice. Remember though, the engines weren't created to give you rankings. They were created to help the Internet users find the information they need. So really, they owe you nothing.

"The engines are unethical themselves."

Perhaps. But how does it justify your unethical conduct?

The predictions

At this moment, our industry is facing the necessity to make a choice: to either distance itself from the black hat SEOs and draw a distinct line between the black and the white, or to lose its reputation and future. Both ways are possible still, and though a lot of industry leaders (and supposed whitehats) now tend to underestimate the harm produced by blackhats and to say publicly that it's "no big deal", the understanding will come to them one day. Because the engines are taking actions. Because common people (who are the majority of this industry), are getting the message, something I know for sure from the feedback I receive from time to time. And because there are still the warriors who will never, ever consider sticking together with blackhats for any reason whatsoever, and never consider quitting the fight.

For the reasons above, I believe that our industry still has a chance to distance itself from the worst and regain its good reputation. But it's too early for us to relax. As I stated at the beginning of this piece, no matter how many articles about ethical and unethical SEO, spam and SEO hats are written, there is always the demand for more. I've just finished another one, and hope it will get to at least some of the people who haven't yet made their choice. I hope they will choose the white.