The Importance of Providing Quality Content

I was just on Google’s Webmaster Central Blog reading a post about web spam.  This is an important topic for anyone who is interested in marketing online.  For many, especially people new to online marketing, the idea of quick cash can be enticing.  This leads people to do all sorts of crazy things to try and get ranked in the search engines.

Internet spam techniques

While spam can take many forms I’m going to talk about a few techniques that people use to help get their site ranked in the search engines.

When promoting your website there are many factors that are considered important that can help you show up in the search engines.  One factor that is considered important is keyword targeted back links.

Google considers links to your website from other websites as a vote for the quality of your site.  It seems natural to think that if someone else is willing to link to your website then you must have something interesting to say.  Furthermore, the anchor text of the link to your website also gives Google an idea of what other people think your website is about.

It is true that it is important to get quality back links to your website if you want to improve your rank in the search engines.  However, some people take a somewhat short sighted view of this and create websites with the sole purpose of having keyword targeted back links to their website but which offer no other value.

To achieve this people will create a website with page after page of nonsense with the occasional keyword targeted link pointing to their website.  This technique is very easy and relatively inexpensive to do.

I don’t recommend doing it, though because Google can detect it.  And if their algorithms miss a site they have a page for people to report spam.  If Google thinks you are spamming the web they will just stop showing your website in the search results altogether.

Sustainable profitability

Let me ask you a question: would you rather have $100 dollars tomorrow or $100 a day, every day, but only after three months from now?  Many spammers don’t realize that this is the type of decision they are making.

When it comes to making money online you need to think long term.  Creating quality content requires effort, but so does spam.  The difference is that spam will quickly be detected and removed from the search results (and your website will likely be put in the Google sandbox, never to be seen in the search results again).  Google also has systems in place that for people to report spam.  Google reviews these reports and tweaks their algorithms to remove spam.

If you are depending on spam to promote your website then you are drastically limiting your income potential – both short term and long term.  You are also risking having your site de-listed altogether.

Internet marketing without spam

When you are deciding on ways to promote your website always consider the following points:

• Does this technique look like spam?
• Does this technique add value?
• Will this be considered spam in the future?

Always choose techniques that are known and accepted, look natural to the search engines, and most of all add value to the internet.  There is no shortage of techniques to get back links, and there are many other effective ways to promote your website (such as article marketing).  If you do everything in an honest and upfront manner your site will show up in the search engines and you will get traffic.  It just takes a bit of time, patience, and consistent effort.