Black hat or white hat

There are two basic types of SEO methods as far as Search Engine guidelines are concerned. These are the white hat and black hat methods. For years, although both strategies are recognized by SEO companies, the legitimacy and effectiveness of both approaches have constantly been debated between supporters of each method.

WHITE HAT

The term white hat refers to the collection of SEO strategies or techniques that supposedly do not violate the general provisions set up by search engines such as Google, Yahoo or the like. This constitutes strategies that promote a site without spamming or maliciously deceiving search engines.

White hat methods are encouraged by search engines because they provide more importance on the content rather than on the technical requirements that crawlers look for. This is perhaps the reason why white hat tactics are considered to be the more honest approach to search engine optimization. Some of the more popular and widely-used white hat techniques of San Diego seo companies and the like are as follows:

* Link building
* Submissions and Indexing
* Social Networking Membership
* CSS Validation
* Meta Data Optimization
* Quality Content Writing

BLACK HAT

Black hat, initially and collectively referred to the various SEO techniques that promote a site through underhanded means. Black hat strategies generally focus on how to capture the attention of search engine spiders or crawlers rather than on the content. They are geared towards faster but temporary increase in popularity as a result of technical tweaking.

Most, if not all, seo companies do not use these methods, or at least claim not to. However, some San Diego seo companies admitted to using techniques that resemble black hat strategies. According to them, most seo companies in the world perform these same techniques regardless of whether they're doing San Diego seo work or doing seo work for clients found somewhere else in the world. The trick, according to them, is how to stay below the radar to avoid penalties.

By agreement, sites proven to employ black hat SEO methods are and will be penalized. Ranking of these sites will either be permanently reduced or totally taken away. Some of the recognized black hat techniques are as follows:

* Keyword Stuffing
* Invisible Text
* Doorway pages

Mateo Russel is an SEO Consultant in a renowned web design company based in Los Angeles, California. He shares his expertise through writing and maintaining a successful blog.