by Mike Moran

I am increasingly getting a question from organic search marketers about where the "line" is between sharp SEO tactics and spam. Basically, it's the SEO equivalent of "how many miles per hour over the speed limit can I go without getting pulled over?" If this sounds like an interesting question to you, I'd like to humbly respond that you don't get it. You don't get search marketing in particular or Internet marketing as a whole. And it's holding you back more than you probably realize.

Image via Wikipedia

Now, don't misunderstand me. Many folks make a living by fooling Google and the other search engines. These "black hat" SEOs are extremely clever and hardworking, and they keep at their craft every day. They stay on top of the trends and they surf the changes each day so that they can stay on top of the results.

There's just one problem with this description. It's not you.

I mean, if you are a top black hat SEO, what are you doing reading this column from me? If you're reading this column, you are not anywhere near the knowledge level of a top black hat SEO. I know that because I am not either. I couldn't begin to do what they do, even though I have decades of experience in search technology and have forgotten more about SEO than most people will ever know.

So, if you are asking where the lines are, because you want to go right up to those lines and then stop, you are fooling yourself in several ways. First, you think that I know the answer—I don't. Second, you think that if you knew the answer that you'd then be able to skillfully manipulate your site so that it ranked highly—you probably won't.

But the biggest problem is that it is entirely the wrong question for you, borne out of the wrong attitude toward search marketing. Your goal for search marketing ought not to be to manipulate the search engines to show your pages and manipulate your customers to buy. No, I am not here to help you get into heaven—if you can live with your conscience after manipulating folks, I am not here to condemn you or absolve you from your sins. No, I am counseling you against the manipulation approach for a more basic reason—it won't work.

You won't succeed at manipulating Google. And you likely won't succeed at manipulating customers, either—at least not for very long. The Internet, and social media in particular, has changed that game. You might be able to fool one person, but you can't fool everyone and they talk to each other all the time.

So what is the right strategy? It's simple to understand, but difficult to execute. You need to have what people want (the product or service they want as well as the information they want) and you must promote it and optimize it and draw attention to it. In other words, you must do your marketing.

If you do, people will notice and eventually Google will, too. But if you instead want to see how fast you can go without getting caught, you'll find out that you made very good time, but you didn't know where you were going.

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