Cloaking

SEO Black Hat Techniques: What NOT to do

What is cloaking

The term cloaking is used to describe the SEO practice whereby content offered to the search engine spiders is different from that presented to human readers.

Why is it used?

Cloaking is primarily used as a technique to increase the ranking of a website. It can also be used to trick a user into visiting a site (and downloading the content) which does not match the search engine description on the results page.

How does cloaking work?

In essence, cloaking keeps the web page content free of extra code and allows the highly optimised pages to be seen only by the search engines. By creating a page of content for the user and a separate page for the search engine spiders, webmasters are able to speed up download times.

Is cloaking always bad?

There are differing opinions as to whether it is a good idea or not. One of the few valid reasons for employing cloaking is to deliver content, such as Flash, which the search engines would take a long time to process.

Those opposed to cloaking see the techniques as a lure, drawing in unwilling users to sites they didn’t search for and don’t necessarily want to see. However, many webmasters feel that cloaking is justified in order to protect content and keep download times within a reasonable range. They also argue that it’s a way of preventing the code of high-ranking pages from being stolen by others.

Yet cloaking is not, in fact, necessary because good programming performs the same function much more efficiently without the risk of incurring penalties.

What are the risks?

Google and the other search engines frown upon sites which have cloaking systems in use, as they perceive them to be deceptive. Appropriate action may be taken, such as removing the site from their indexes and banning them. Using an experienced web content writer will help you achieve the ranking you desire without resorting to underhand techniques such as cloaking.