This sums up everything that is wrong with folks who limit themselves to a narrow focus on SEO hat tricks: "It’s easy to preach great content when you have a great subject. But no one gives a shit about non-clog toilets or pulse oximeters or single phase diode bridge rectifiers."<p>The missing ingredient that the author can't figure out is CREATIVITY. If you're an advertising creative you can make non-clog toilets sexy to their intended audience (who will be building contractors, architects, etc.). This is the sort of 101 problem that any average PR or advertising person tackles in a day -- how to make the product a hero.<p>The problem with many SEO folks is that they're so obsessed with gaming algorithms that they forget that it's really all about creating content that your audience cares about. Honestly if you can't make insurance or incontinence products sexy you're in the wrong game. Folks from David Ogilvy to copyblogger have spent years documenting how to make the mundane interesting. If you can't so it yourself, then hire someone who can...<p>PS Radio Shack made a solid business for years by cramming a geektastic catalog with products like a diode bridge! The key is knowing your audience and knowing how to engage them.
If anyone who read this was like me and generally unfamiliar with how SEO people self select into hat color I did a bit of googling. It would seem that some techniques considered "grey" would be paid link building, cloaking - the act of showing the crawlers one thing and visitors another, and purposely duplicating your competition's content so that all locations of it rank worse due to unoriginal content filters. I'm sure that's no where close to a complete list, but it gave me a sense of where he's coming from. I would have thought that stuff would have been "black", but apparently that's just reserved for SQLi's, comment spam and what not.
Wow I cant believe this little post made it all the way to HN. TBH I do believe in most of what I said but the post was intentionally over the top. It was a bit of rantbait. The irony which sadly only one commenter seemed to figure out was that it was a post on how whitehat doesnt work which demonstrated it does. That post got tons of links in a very short time.<p>That being said my real point was don't limit yourself or the client because you believe google guidelines somehow translate to ethics. Instead do an honest evaluation of the clients expectations, budget, and risk tolerance.<p>Provide service based on that information. Google is in it for google. SEOs should be in it for the client. Even if that sometimes means bending googles rules.
I think the post makes an excellent point, if you're willing to take the time to understand what the author is saying, rather than bristling at his rant. Google makes ITS rules, but they're made for their benefit, not that of our clients. It's up to SEOs to guide their clients through the process of an educated risk/reward assessment, and implement a campaign according to their wishes. If the client wants me to do something I'm not comfortable with, I walk away. But if I'm going to stick around and take their money, they deserve my best effort, regardless of what the search engines might say.