{"id":402,"date":"2016-10-21T19:30:06","date_gmt":"2016-10-21T19:30:06","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.leadpropeller.com\/?p=402"},"modified":"2016-11-03T18:18:28","modified_gmt":"2016-11-03T18:18:28","slug":"online-seo-guide-part-3-black-hat-white-hat-seo","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lpblog.leadpropeller.com\/?p=402","title":{"rendered":"Online SEO Guide Part 3: Black Hat & White Hat SEO"},"content":{"rendered":"

Welcome to Part 3 of our online SEO Guide for real estate investors, your one-stop-shop for all of the knowledge you need to become an <\/span>SEO pro<\/b>\u2026.get your site ranked for the best keywords, convert that traffic into leads, do some flips and make lots of money!<\/span><\/p>\n

In Part 1 you learned <\/span>how to use the right keywords for your real estate investor website<\/span><\/a><\/span>, and in Part 2 you learned <\/span>how to better optimize yourwebsite\u2019s content for user interaction<\/a><\/span>.<\/span><\/p>\n

When it comes to digital marketing for your <\/span>real estate investor website<\/span><\/a><\/span>, a well-designed site is an important piece of the puzzle. <\/span>But what good is a beautiful site if it isn\u2019t being visited by your target audience?<\/b><\/p>\n

Even the best branding strategy and user design can\u2019t offer much in the way of lead generation if there isn\u2019t consistent traffic being driven its way. Remember, <\/span>your real estate investor website is your business\u2019s storefront<\/b>. If you aren\u2019t getting people to come in to your store, they won\u2019t know what services you offer.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"online<\/span><\/p>\n

Today, the majority of <\/span>organic traffic<\/span><\/a><\/span> – the kind that ends up on your site because of unpaid research results – moves about the internet via search engines. <\/span><\/p>\n

Google, Bing, and Yahoo! have completely redefined the way that visitors interact with, and experience, their search for goods and services. Thus, it isn\u2019t difficult to see why search engine optimization, or SEO, should be a foundational part of any digital marketing for your real estate investor website.<\/span><\/p>\n

SEO Break Down<\/span>
\n<\/span><\/h2>\n

SEO may sound like rocket science, but it isn\u2019t! As we\u2019ve talked about in Part 1 and Part 2 of our online SEO Guide for real estate investors, SEO (or <\/span>Search Engine Optimization<\/span><\/i>) can be difficult if you aren\u2019t already an expert. <\/span><\/p>\n

That\u2019s why we at LeadPropeller have developed an SEO service where we <\/span>manage your website\u2019s SEO for you<\/span><\/a><\/span>. That way, <\/span>you\u2019re free to spend your time hunting for motivated seller leads and converting them into deals<\/b>!<\/span><\/p>\n

SEO involves aligning the design and content of a website to the algorithms that engines like Google use to <\/span>index and rank sites for value and authority<\/b>. The more valuable and authoritative search engines determine a site to be, the farther a site moves up in their results pages. <\/span><\/p>\n

But not all SEO is created equal. In fact, for those investing in an SEO campaign, knowing the difference between <\/span>black hat<\/i><\/b> and <\/span>white hat<\/i><\/b> SEO work could ultimately be the deciding factor in your online marketing campaign\u2019s success.<\/span><\/p>\n

What is Black Hat SEO?<\/span><\/h2>\n

The term <\/span>black hat SEO <\/b>refers to the use of tactics that focus solely on search engines and <\/span>neglect human audiences<\/span><\/i>. As <\/span>WordStream<\/span><\/a><\/span>, an online journal for SEO, points out: \u201cImplementing Black Hat SEO tactics and strategies can get your site banned from search engines.\u201d <\/span><\/p>\n

Black hat strategies almost always involve <\/span>breaking search engine guidelines<\/b>, <\/span>which leads to a site being marked as spam, devalued by the engine, and penalized for the use of unethical techniques.<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n

Black hat SEO is used by companies who only value immediate results and trade significant long-term Google devaluation of their site for immediate, albeit marginal, signs of growth. These company\u2019s sites are <\/span>eventually banned from search engine results<\/b>. Be warned, if you use black hat SEO tactics, you will be penalized one way or another.<\/span><\/p>\n

Black hat SEO gives the illusion of positive ROI, or <\/span>return on investment, <\/span><\/i>but in reality <\/span>leads to major losses for websites<\/b> and will cause loss of search rankings.<\/span><\/p>\n

Black Hat SEO Techniques:<\/span><\/h2>\n

\"black-hat-tactics<\/a><\/p>\n

1. Link farming<\/span><\/h3>\n

Link farming is stuffing your pages full of fake links that lead back to your website. Plane and simple, <\/span>link farming is scamming<\/b>. <\/span><\/p>\n

What\u2019s worse is, Google will absolutely punish your website for doing this. The algorithm Google uses to determine the ranking of your website is very sophisticated and <\/span>will find your fake links<\/b>. Google will then rank your site poorly. <\/span><\/p>\n

You do not want that. If your website ranks badly from using black hat SEO tactics, <\/span>your potential clients won\u2019t be able to find you online.<\/b><\/p>\n

2. Blog content spamming<\/span><\/h3>\n

Have you ever been on a website reading something, or watching a video, and then all of a sudden – BAM – you\u2019re hit with an advertising box that is impossible to click away from? That\u2019s content spam.<\/span><\/p>\n

While this is very common online (yes, even big name websites are known to do content spam) it is still black hat SEO. <\/span>The main reason website\u2019s use content spam is to get emails and conversions.<\/b><\/p>\n

That seems innocent enough, but when it becomes too much for a viewer, it will cause them to leave your site for a less spammy one. <\/span>This will badly affect your websites click-through-rate<\/b> (or CTR), which Google does look at when determining relevancy of a website. <\/span><\/p>\n

3. Posting duplicate content on multiple pages<\/span><\/h3>\n

Posting lots of copies of the same content all over your website is not in itself a punishable thing to do, but it is risky. <\/span><\/p>\n

Google has stated that, \u201c<\/span>duplicate content on a site is not grounds for action on that site <\/span><\/i>unless it appears that the intent of the duplicate content is to be deceptive and manipulate search engine results<\/i><\/b>.\u201d <\/span><\/p>\n

Basically, websites that do this are taking some of their content, slapping a new title and description on it, and trying to pass it off as new original content. This is problematic for a website because it <\/span>no longer will appear relevant and useful for Google<\/b>.<\/span><\/p>\n

Think of it like inflation. If you fill your site up with lots of the same thing, your website will begin to lose value. <\/span>You always want your content to stay relevant to the market<\/b>. If you\u2019re just reposting content from 4 years ago, you run the risk of republishing inaccurate information.<\/span><\/p>\n

4. Hiding unnatural anchor text<\/span><\/h3>\n

We all know what anchor text is. It\u2019s the blue highlighted and underlined words or phrases that, when clicked on, will lead you to another website or web page. Typically, <\/span>anchor text is relevant to your content, and to the page that it will take a viewer to<\/b>.<\/span><\/p>\n

For example, earlier in this blog we anchored the phrase \u201corganic traffic\u201d that then brought you to a relevant web page about organic and non-organic traffic for websites. That is a good example of anchor text because it is relevant to our blog about SEO, and is <\/span>helpful to our readers who might not have known what \u201corganic traffic\u201d is<\/b>.<\/span><\/p>\n

Using anchor text like that helps Google know what a particular web page is about, and will rank it accordingly. So, if we had used the anchor \u201corganic traffic\u201d, and more anchor texts like that, but had written a blog about cookies, <\/span>Google\u2019s algorithm would have determined the page irrelevant to searches<\/b> for cookies.<\/span><\/p>\n

You see, some websites will hide unnatural anchor text to artificially make a page seem like it\u2019s about something that it\u2019s not. Take our cookie page for example. Because the page would have been advertised as being about cookies, stuffing it with links that are anchored \u201corganic traffic\u201d wouldn\u2019t be relevant. That would <\/span>get our site penalized by Google because the anchor text would have nothing to do with our content<\/b>.<\/span><\/p>\n

5. Linking pages with irrelevant content<\/span><\/h3>\n

Very similar to hiding unnatural anchor text, posting irrelevant content is just announcing to Google that you\u2019re trying to scam the system. <\/span><\/p>\n

We talked about this in Part 2 of our online SEO Guide with the example about cats. Since this post is about SEO to make your real estate investor website better, having a link to cats in it wouldn\u2019t make sense for the reader. <\/span><\/p>\n

What\u2019s worse is that having a link about cats in blog about SEO would tell Google that we <\/span>aren\u2019t relevant to our target audience<\/b>, and would therefore rank our website poorly.<\/span><\/p>\n

Each of these methods will set a site back in the long run, especially in light of Google\u2019s most recent update: <\/span>Penguin 4.0<\/span><\/a><\/span>. As many online marketers have found, <\/span>the Penguin update now includes more anti-spam detection features<\/b> than ever before, making it difficult for websites to do well under black hat SEO tactics.<\/span><\/p>\n

What is White Hat SEO?<\/span><\/h2>\n

White hat SEO, on the other hand, focuses on <\/span>optimizing a site to provide high-quality content that is relevant and helpful to search queries<\/b>. These strategies target human audiences in real, intuitive ways and add value to the search experience. <\/span><\/p>\n

Rand Fishkin, a content writer for <\/span>Moz Blog<\/span><\/a><\/span>, simply states that \u201c<\/span>the choice of going 100% white hat will pay massive dividends every time.<\/span><\/i>\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

While white hat strategies are a long-term solution to site-optimization rather than an overnight fix, they also <\/span>yield long-term successful results<\/b>. <\/span><\/p>\n

Think of it this way: <\/span>black hat SEO is spam, and white hat SEO is real content<\/b>. People are always going to want to read, and interact with real content more than they\u2019ll want to deal with spam. You always want to be sure your website is full of quality content, not junk.<\/span><\/p>\n

Creating quality content is such an important part of white hat SEO because it <\/span>displays to search engines that a site has a unique voice to contribute to the online conversation<\/b>. Ultimately, the more content-rich a site is, the more valuable it is. <\/span><\/p>\n

White hat SEO techniques include<\/span>:<\/span><\/h2>\n

\"white-hat<\/a><\/p>\n

1. Keyword research and selection<\/span><\/h3>\n

Researching your keywords is very important for proper white hat SEO. As we talked about in Part 1 of the online SEO Guide, <\/span>the biggest mistake you can make is assuming which keywords will work<\/b>. That\u2019s why researching the best keyword will make your website stronger<\/span><\/p>\n

Backlinko, and <\/span>online marketing strategy journal<\/span><\/a><\/span>, suggests finding your keywords by knowing your <\/span>niche market<\/b>. So, as a real estate investor, it wouldn\u2019t make sense for you to use a keyword like \u201cdog\u201d, because that doesn\u2019t have anything to do with your market. <\/span><\/p>\n

Instead, researching the keywords your target audience searches regularly – words like \u201csell my house fast\u201d, or \u201cwe buy houses\u201d – will benefit your business. <\/span>SERPS, <\/b>Google\u2019s keyword search tool<\/span><\/a><\/span>, is a great place to<\/span> start research on keywords<\/b> to use in your website\u2019s content. <\/span><\/p>\n

2. On-page audit and implementation<\/span><\/h3>\n

\u201cAn SEO audit is the process for <\/span>evaluating the healthiness of a website<\/b>,\u201d <\/span>Reliablesoft.net<\/span><\/a><\/span> explains, \u201cThe auditor will check the website against a checklist ans will come up with recommendations of what needs to be fixed (because it is wrong) and what needs to be changed so that <\/span>the performance of the website in search engines is improved<\/b>.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Basically your website will get a check up, then you can go back and fix anything that might be wrong with it. SEO auditors look for things like:<\/span><\/p>\n