Ethics and Emerging Standards

[bruceclay]

Doug suggested that I post this. I suspect it will initiate some active conversation. I am soliciting feedback so that it can be finalized.

http://www.bruceclay.com/EmergingStandards.htm

http://www.bruceclay.com/web_ethics.htm

Be kind.

[ihelpyou]

Welcome to the forums bruceclay! :hi:

I believe those pages are the ethics and standards we all should try and follow.

Kudus to you for writing on paper what many of us do follow on a day to day basis.

Good read for all.

[MazY]

Apologies in advance for my ignorance but what exactly are you wanting us to comment upon?

You'll excuse my ignorance further if I suggest that the compliance standards do seem a remarkably good way to get a potentially very number of good relevantly themed links back to your site. Given the logo that each agreeing person will apply to their site.

Why would any SEO practitioner need to do that? If they are ethical then surely their word is enough and if they are not then they may still apply and let's be honest, the chances of you ever being able to police the integrity of any member is marginal at best.

'twas a tad too long winded for me to read through properly so again, I apologise for not really replying with any great substance as to the content. I just wonder why anyone (more USA SEO practitioners) would provide a link to your site, even though it does literally lead to just the ethics page.

When I have more time I will read the full content and make more constructive criticisms.

Hope you wanted brutal honesty. :)

[ihelpyou]

hmmm, I did not see the seal or link back to thing. You are a site that is right there with me on a few phrases. Not sure if I want to give the BC site an added boost by linking directly to it, especially without reciprocation. :cool:

[ihelpyou]

I am not sure what you mean by a 3rd abatrator in a dispute thing. Could you expand on that? I personally never have a need for such a link.

Well, I guess I may already have one in that the i-Cop.org link is on every page of my site as I am a Founding Member. That would be one of the best resolution dispute orgs you could have.

[bruceclay]

Certainly having folks link to the page wouldn't hurt since I want people to find it, but I am not after links as much as spreading the word. I would like to have feedback about the content on the pages instead of the issues associated with getting it listed in a SE.

[My site is certainly already well linked, and well ranked, and that should help get this listed even if nobody else links to it. The page was created this week -- check the popularity on the Google Toolbar and it hasn't been submitted yet!]

It is my hope that this might be a serious first step in having those that claim to be SEO practitioners think about what they are doing and to move towards industry consensus of a real Code of Ethics.

All wanta-be ethics lists for SEO that I have seen to date actually are lists of "I do this and anything else is wrong". I am really not interested in joining that crowd since it just adds another problem instead of leading with a solution. I do not approve or disapprove of any techniques on this page. I simply state that doing harm is bad and should not happen.

Link or not, what about the content?

[ihelpyou]

Maybe it is simply the wording of this but is something to consider:

you mention sometimes it may be okay to use "doorways" or "cloaking". I do not like either of those.

A doorway should be a full site and not just a page that is put up to manipulate ranks and only serves to lead a visitor to another site on another domain.

Again, cloaking is serving up other content only because the site is not search engine friendly. Well, Get the current site friendly and you would not have to cloak. Again, simply trying to manipulate results.

I also asked a question in the above post about disputes?

[bruceclay]

Re: Cloaking

I, too, do not cloak and do not like it.

If it is January in the US - display the Winter Catalog, but January in Austrailia gets the Summer Catalog. Or pricing changes by country. Or product availability is regulated by the government or by distribution agreements. These may be very valid "cloaking" justifications. Cloaking to offer different pages to different search engines is never valid.

Re: Doorways

This may be okay - maybe.

A TOOL site would probably be dynamic (data base driven) and a great many SE's cannot deep crawl. 5% of your products yield 95% of your sales. Create a doorway page for "Craftsman Wrenches" and drop the surfer directly onto your Craftsman Wrenches page instead of the home page. Fewer pages need to be indexed, the user experience is positive, and sales probability improves. All good things.

But the 'ol "baby shoes" page that redirects to the porno site is a bad thing.

Again, I am focusing on the ethics portion, not the tactics. But I can come up with a good and bad for every tactic there is. Like religion or politics, agreement may never occur. But the "no harm" ethics applies to both.

IMO, disputes happen. They are almost always resolved with a phone call, but sometimes there needs to be an arbitration. Ethical companies have nothing to worry about, and so it is not too important. But it should be there.

[ihelpyou]

Yes. I agree with your cloaking example but the problem is we know that SEO will quantify or qualify what they are doing based on their particular situation. For this reason it would be hard to define good and bad cloaking.

The doorway thing can be solved by simply making the index page of a site or root a plain html page only. Even if a site is database driven, you can still make it friendly.

To "drop" in a page in a site database driven is fine. But why not simply make the page a part of the current site? No need for a separate domain that is one page long. Continue to make html pages of the site itself.

There is always going to be the SEO's that continue to justify what they do and how they do it. Lots of "spin" is involved with this. I see it all the time all over the net and in many forums.

[MazY]

Before I spend time really reading the content, I'm intrigued.

Is this a set of "guidlines" drawn up by a body of people or rather just one - yourself?

If it is the former then, to me at least, it carries great credence. If, however, it is the latter then it seems wholly reliant on your integrity, honesty and views.

Now not that I doubt your are lacking in any of them but with the greatest respect, I don't personally know you from Adam so why would I or my company want to agree to them? (I mean "I" in the general SEO Practitioner sense as opposed to just me personally.)

I am sure this will read far more acutely than it is intended but if we assume for a moment that those that are honest are honest and those that are not are indeed not then the purpose seems all the more wasted to me.

The honest ones will already agree to what you write and most likely already state as such on their site, in their own words and ergo, be an authority within themself. By simply stating that "I agree with Bruce Clay" just seems to bolster your public credence with very little return (if any at all) to the individual SEO practitioner. In fact, by stating what they agree to on their site and then providing a link to your etchics page seems to just duplicate an aready stated statement.

Quickly starts writing his letter of apology for what I am sure seems like a very harsh response.

[ihelpyou]

Yes. This is why I said that Every SEO could probably agree to this by "justifying" in their own ways why they do what they do.

This justification type stuff goes on everywhere and for every reason. Not sure if you could simply state what are good SEO practices and what are not. There will always be the SEO who truly thinks that what they do and how they do it is "ethical"..... in their own mind.

I think the search engines are the only bodies who could tell us "who" is ethical as we all have to abide by their rules. Google would be the one SE who could say who is truly ethical in how they work their business. IMHO, of course. :)

[ihelpyou]

How about Mr. Google posting a list of all SEO sites out there who are ethical and abide by their rules day in and day out? :)

We could send Google a list of our clients and the Googlets could check things over carefully and determine which businesses truly are "good" ones in the eyes of Google? Google already is familiar with many of us out there, but may not be familiar with others.

Then, they could list the SEO's on a page in Google?

Yes. I know, very far fetched and probably not doable, but would go a long way to educate EVERY SEO and every potential client out there as to who and what are honest and ethical in their practices. It would also serve to force those SEO's who do "tricky" stuff now to adapt more ethical ways, otherwise, they will never get on the list.

LOL. How's that? :eek:

[bruceclay]

Originally posted by ihelpyou
Yes. I agree with your cloaking example but the problem is we know that SEO will quantify or qualify what they are doing based on their particular situation. For this reason it would be hard to define good and bad cloaking.

So I decided ethics is not about cloaking, it is about harm and responsibility. I cannot police anybody, and the search engines are not up to speed on enforcing uniform rules. Thus the tactics are going to vary greatly. That is why I think we have two intertwined topics - Ethics separate from Standards. We should be able to agree on Ethics. Standards will make this a long post once everybody knows it is here.

The doorway thing can be solved by simply making the index page of a site or root a plain html page only. Even if a site is database driven, you can still make it friendly.

To "drop" in a page in a site database driven is fine. But why not simply make the page a part of the current site? No need for a separate domain that is one page long. Continue to make html pages of the site itself..

I think that there are issues here as well - some sites have internal search engines, and adding pages is not a good thing. I have created such pages, and they are always on the client site. It is my hope that such pages will no longer be needed once an entire site can be deep crawled. But today even the best SE's limit their crawls so that they will not crash the larger sites - but maybe someday. Until then, indexing the top 5% of the pages isn't as harmful as it is beneficial to the user experience.

When was the last time anybody saw a doorway page well ranked for an important term? I'll bet there aren't many.

There is always going to be the SEO's that continue to justify what they do and how they do it. Lots of "spin" is involved with this. I see it all the time all over the net and in many forums.

Yes - and I'll admit to it. That is why Ethics and Standards cannot be the same thing. I have my reasons to test what works, and who walks the talk, and which SE's allow garbage, and much more, and many times pushing the envelope has landed me in hot water. I also believe that SEO practitioners are loyal to whoever pays them (which is not the SE's), and that if allowed to use a trick, most will. Not too long ago, doorways were not only valid, but encouraged, and cloaking was in. I just hope the day comes where garbage is filtered by all SE's and tricks stop working so that "honest pages" will rule the day.

Say AMEN.

[ihelpyou]

Let us not forget all the so-called SEO's out there who are nothing but a "submission" company but call themself a SEO? Google could put legitimate SEO's on the list and discount all the so-called SEO who truly no nothing about it but post on their sites that they are a SEO.

[ihelpyou]

It is my hope that such pages will no longer be needed once an entire site can be deep crawled.
Amen to that. Here is an example of Google striving to do just that:

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=site%3Aihelpyouservices.com+ihelpyouservices&btnG=Google+Search

You can see Google is indexing ? marks and everything. The only way they could get to them was to follow another dynamic Url. Google is gobbling up every page of these forums, ? marks or not. Every index a couple thousand more pages are added. Shows the effort Google is making in this area.

[bruceclay]

Mazy, et. al.,

This was a list of what appeared to be common rules (even if not enforced) from the SE Add URL pages, the Google Webmaster and Do-and-Don't pages, from discussions with colleagues and clients, and even with Google. [I think Google is the leading SE on this issue, and I really am glad they are stepping up to the plate.] And I clearly opened it up for your critical review AND participation here in this forum.

Actually, I am opening it here as a working document. It is not my intent to "own ethics", but to be a catalyst in getting something accomplished. The SEO "industry" is not singing the same song, and that is doing more harm than good. I really don't care if others link to the page - so please don't get worked up over it. This is not a "stupid link trick". But I think it is harmful to have 2000 different versions of this thing floating around because it will just confuse consumers. There is only 1 Code of Ethics for medical, and legal, and countless others. We only need 1.

I will transform it to a "plain" no signature file that you can all include onto your own sites if it will make you feel better. But it isn't about links to my site -- it is about consensus on the content.

What is missing? What is wrong? What is right?

The honest are honest, and the dishonest are vocal. So the industry suffers. Let's fix that. Let's at least have a common ground for our own behavior that we aren't afraid to express. Let's have us honest ones speak up and start the ball rolling. Someday an industry group may form that will pick up the ball, but til then I think it is worth putting down on e-paper.

As this topic becomes more mature, I expect that the dishonest will attack it and attempt to get us off track. I want to be focused... what about the content?

IMO, it matters not who I am. [I have no complex signatures on my posts. Accept what I have to say on it's merit, not who I am.] It matters that what I say is right.

[ihelpyou]

Yes, but you are MORE than welcome to put your link in your signature so it is there on every post. :)

[bruceclay]

Good point - I will add the link to the page discussed as my signature.

[MazY]

Bruce

Let me clarify. I am not writing to demerit your work, your integrity or any other aspect of the entire document.

Nor am I what you may term "dishonest" and ergo want to "attack" the document. I thought you opened the document up for debate and so I am, in my own style.

To my often illogical mind, it seems a tad illogical to debate the content before I'm even fully aware of its purpose, intent, origin and weight. The purpose has been clarified and it is, in principle at least, a purpose I agree with.

Something else that I am not is someone who follows a crowd easily, (a trait that has often landed me in trouble) especially as when I don't even personally know who is heading the crowd so you'll forgive my somewhat "why would I" responses.

Yes, there is only one code of ethics for the medical and legal fraternity but I dare to suggest that they are a tad more life-important than our relatively humble SEO. I have yet to hear of anyone losing a life over their poor rankings or indeed being wrongly imprisoned because they got a number 2 ranking instead of a number 1.

The most interesting point is the your latter one. Accept what you have to say on its merit and that what you say is right. This is the problem that I personally have.

The only real time that your name has ever even come close to my eyes is when your ethics were being disputed in Jim's forum for an incident that you assured everyone was accidental. See what I am saying? I would be a tad more comfortable giving the document more attention if it had been drawn up by more than one SEO practitioner. Whether you see it or not, at this stage it does seem like you are indeed going to be "owning the ethics." I doubt that the legal or medical code of ethics was drawn up by one individual.

Anyway, now I'm finally off to read the content! At last.... :)

[ihelpyou]

The more I think about my Google idea, the more I like it. Why not?

I would be willing to pay for such a thing with Google. Checks could randomly be made as to who gets on the list. Google would only offer this to those SEO's who they deem ethical and only offer the "fee" to those SEOs. The list would only be of SEO's who are truly SEO's and not simply submission companies.

?? How about it Google? Whatcha think? :)

[MazY]

OK. So I'm a slow reader but this is what I have thus far:

"Where rules and guidelines are unclear, the SEO practitioner will seek clarification and approval from the appropriate search engine before continuing to utilize potentially harmful technology or procedures."

Being the pedant of good English that I am, this statement indicates that as long as I fire off an e-mail to Google it matters not whether I get a response or not. (Let's face it, invariably one will not.) Perhaps change the "seek" to "seek clarification" and "await approval"?


"All individuals utilizing a search engine to visit a site will not be mislead by the information presented to or by the search engine,"

Should "mislead" be "misled", in this context.

"No SEO practitioner will misrepresent their own abilities, education, training, standards of performance, certifications, trade group affiliations, technical inventory, or experiences to others. "

Hmm. Not sure about this one. I think just about every company I know embellishes the truth a little. This is standard marketing. After all, when did you ever see the advertisement that stated "The BEST Acme Product since..." ever turn out to be the "BEST Acme Product since." I do understand what you are trying to say but I can't help thinking that this is not quite right. Seems to curb any marketing. In an ideal world, every thing we ever read from a company would be 100% honest but I think it's a tall order to try and enforce it. I refer to a satement in your own site "Bruce Clay, LLC has been a distinguished leader in the Search Engine Optimization (SEO) internet business segment since January 1996." Who defined the term "distinguished leader"? Again, not that I doubt that you are but it is just good marketing.

Off to read the rest. Hold my calls, Mrs MoneyPenny.

[MazY]

OK. Read it, agree in principle.

Perhaps a mention of the absurd "guarantees" that we read about too. As we all know, one cannot guarantee something for which ultimately, we as individuals have no real control over.

If I had £1.00 for every "Guaranteed top five position", I have ever read, then I wouldn't even need to work!

[ihelpyou]

and further along that line:

what is the actual guarantee if there is one? What does the client get if the guarantee is not meant? You usually find it in VERY fine print that NO client ever reads.

I agree. CANNOT have any guarantees in regards to positions. Period. You can have a "satisfaction" guarantee however. :)

[JuniorHarris]

Welcome Bruce!~ :thumb:

I read the article and tend to agree with most everything written. I also agree that ethics and standards should be separate issues. But in our combat to control and guide the quality for search engine users, we MUST also include the engines.

No matter what ethics or standards are set, there will always be those that abuse them. The engines also need to abide by similar ethics and standards as well. Some engines are better then others, while some are just outright abused!~ :eyes:

As long as there are engines susceptible to spam, there will be those who use it!~ Most engines would improve the quality simply by removing any URL which has an ip address for domain, and proactively responding to reports of spam.

Not only should these domains be dropped, but there should also be methods in place to track "ownership" back through to the registrant, and where applicable, banning existing and future registrations from the same applicant. This would include the registrar's responsibility to verify and authentic applications.

[Sharon & Roy]

Hello Bruce and Welcome to the Forums, :hi:

Here is our 2¢ ...

We think you have a good start toward the beginnings of an SEO Association there.

A neutral Web Site with a searchable member directory for SEO Professionals is certainly what our industry needs. (Where EVERYTHING is provided and done on a volunteer basis (there's no bias this way) and where ANYONE is freely admitted with a mandatory probationary period to evaluate their ethical standing. We are sure that a reputable hosting company somewhere would provide such an organization with some free space in return for a small signature line at the bottom of each page and that a small committee could be assembled that would have access to the server to design and create as needed.)


---------------------<><><><><>-------------------

Suggested Domain Names ...


Search Engine Optimization Association - [SEOA]

http://www.seoa.org/ <-- Look, it's waiting for us!

The Association of Search Engine Optimization Practitioners [ASEOP]

http://www.aseop.org/ <-- Look, it's waiting for us, too!

---------------------<><><><><>-------------------


A Web site that would rank high for search engine optimization, positioning, registering, etc., that the general public could EASILY FIND to learn more about our industry and to "browse" for an SEO. A place where potential clients could fill out a single Web form that would be sent out to all members, who could then reply back with their individual quotes.

A place where the general public could be reasonably sure that "shopping" for a potential SEO would be a wise one and that the chances of accidentally hiring an unethical company would be an extremely remote one.

A place that could be considered a "watering hole" for all SEO students, whether brand new or experienced, because a searchable directory would also be in place to point to the best SEO resources all over the Net.

A place where potential clients could read the interviews of all SEOs. These interviews could be similar to the ones in this new eBook (http://www.ihelpyouservices.com/forums/t722/s.html) just out that features only a very small handful of SEO firms.

We are sure that a few members would be glad to volunteer their time to conduct similar interviews with all of SEOs and place the results in a database that could be freely accessed by anyone. Separate free downloadable eBooks could be designed to help prospects in narrowing down their decision making process. Local or Regional versions would be extremely helpful for folks who prefer to interact with an SEO on a face to face basis. So many, many useful resources could be made available to the general public, for instance, a special addition to each "SEO Profile/Interview" could be a quick look of their Online persona, by reading their public involvement and interaction in Public SEO Forums or eMail Discussion Lists, etc., in other words, the more information that can be provided and is easily accessible for each SEO, the better informed the public would be to make a wise and unbiased decision.

As for the Emerging Standards and the Search Engine Optimization Code of Ethics that you have currently written, we truly salute you, Bruce, for getting the ball rolling.

We are of the mindset that once a committee has been formed, that they all get together and draft up a similar code whereby all have had input and that no one person had all the say. In other words, a Code of Ethics by SEOs for SEOs.

[ihelpyou]

Very good idea s and r but would be extremely hard to implement and keep up to date, etc. Would involve a handful of people willing to devote great amounts of time for no compensation. Very hard to do.

Another problem would be ... who is to decide who is ethical and who is not? Many things involved with this as it has been discussed before.

[bruceclay]

In thinking about this (maintaining a single code that we all can use without my receiving link popularity or blatent ownership), I have completed the following:

http://www.bruceclay.com/cgi-bin/seoethics.cgi

It should look the same.

It has several parameters:

site=
header=
comply=
footer=

Mine would be:

http://www.bruceclay.com/cgi-bin/seoethics.cgi?site=http://www.bruceclay.com&header=SEOEthicsHead.htm&comply=SEOEthicsComply.htm&footer=SEOEthicsFoot.htm

Feel free to review these files in my root directory.

To use on your site, create the same (so you can omit the parameters) named files in your server root that have your page layout, logo's, etc., and link to it as:

http://www.bruceclay.com/cgi-bin/seoethics.cgi?site=http://www.yourdomain.com

In this way I can roll in all of your notes and generate a page that is always current and have it based on your site look and feel. It has a robots exclude statement so I pick up no links. You can always freeze it by view siurce, cut, paste, save, but that defeats the purpose.

BTW, I also exclude cgi-bin in my robots.txt for all SE's.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

As for the association idea... I have been willing to participate since day 1, but felt that having it operated by a practitioner is like having the inmates run the asylum.

I can host it on my servers for free. If ihelpyouservices donates the chat software and setup, I will buy the URL in the name of the association. BUT we need to immediately invite the SE's and strategic colleagues (Danny and Detlev come to mind) to be major participants. One way or the other, everybody has a vested interest in seeing it work. Lots of work? Yup! Worth it? Yup. Who wants to move forward on this? And how (obviously volunteer)?

I also suggest people from other forums EVENTUALLY be informed of this discussion - ideas always welcome without ego's.

[MazY]

I'm certainly happy to promote it to the UK side of the pond, which is already well under-represented I feel.

I am certainly more confortable now that the idea/concept is not being seen as owned by any one individual. Apologies again if I caused any grief. Just have to get things right in my own mind before I "sign up" as it were.

Anything you need assistance with that I can possibly help with, just shout.

Regards...

[ihelpyou]

This chat software and setup cost me a buck99 to implement. It is not free. It is vBulletin software with a license involved.

[Sharon & Roy]

Originally posted by bruceclay

As for the association idea... I have been willing to participate since day 1

Before anything else, we need a committee and a rough draft of what the association is, does and will do.

BUT we need to immediately invite the SE's and strategic colleagues (Danny and Detlev come to mind) to be major participants.

But even before that and above all, we should have before us some sort of a "BLUEPRINT" (or outline) to show other "SEOs and SEO Association Supporters" as well as the aforementioned colleagues so that we can have an idea of WHO'S IN and who's not, but based upon a lot more information than we currently have to offer.

I can host it on my servers for free. If ihelpyouservices donates the chat software and setup, I will buy the URL in the name of the association.

As Doug mentions, "It is not free. It is vBulletin software with a license involved."

Once we have the "blueprints" to show folks, it may not be all that difficult to get vBulletin (and/or others) to "donate" or to "provide us in exchange for the association's recommendations and endorsements of said products/services"

One way or the other, everybody has a vested interest in seeing it work. Lots of work? Yup! Worth it? Yup. Who wants to move forward on this? And how (obviously volunteer)?

For the record, we're IN and we certainly want to move forward on this.

---

For starters, we think it would be quite appropriate for those of us who want to "help" and to be an active part of the "foundation committee" so to speak, to please post here to show your public support, if for no other reason than to do just that, show support.

This does not mean that you'll be asked to do anything more than you are willing to volunteer for. This is not anything formal and you'll not be signing your life away <WINK> nor are we asking you to donate anything at all. It is to merely be an informal show of hands to show us (and others) the type of support an SEO Association can expect to have.

So that we can easily search for all the folks that have volunteered, please use the following term to show your willingness to help bring the vision of an SEO Association to fruition.


Count Me In For The SEOA Committee


I also suggest people from other forums EVENTUALLY be informed of this discussion - ideas always welcome without ego's.

We absolutely agree, the more input we can have from some of the other SEO Forum Leaders and Members, the better we'll know what to expect.


Our Initial Thoughts:

While there are many issues and concerns that can be raised by any one of the three main players (http://www.bruceclay.com/EmergingStandards.htm), as Bruce has so aptly identified as ...

Clients
Search Engines
SEO Firms
... We believe that it should be the absolute first and foremost foundational goal of the SEOA to "EDUCATE" the Clients (and/or the general public) about what SEO IS and IS NOT.

There definitely needs to be a place where folks can go to learn about SEO Firms (like how to distinguish the ethical from the unethical) and to be reasonably sure that they will be getting their money's worth when they hire an SEOA Member, especially when the SEOA has the respect and the endorsements of the search engines (if that's even possible) as well as the SEO industry leaders.

Our pet peeve is that many so-called SEO Firms prey upon the public's false perception that submitting your Web pages to "thousands of search engines" is the answer to top rankings and therefore the answer to lots of incoming traffic from said engines ... AND that if they don't pay them for the continued monthly submission of their pages that somehow they will no longer be listed.

Based on this, we are of the mindset that any so-called SEO Firm who "specializes" in "just" submitting a Web page to the search engines (whether 1000 or 100 or 10) not be included and/or defined as an SEO Firm and therefore not eligible for membership in the SEOA. Also not eligible should be any SEO Firm that "implies" that submission (without actual ethical optimization) will get your pages listed atop the search engines and therefore lots of traffic and therefore lots of sales.

So what are your thoughts on this issue?

Another issue to discuss would be whether or not an SEO Firm is responsible for "sales" or "high sales conversions" as opposed to just high rankings for keywords that "should" lead to monetization and/or a high ROI?

Also, who is ultimately responsible for identifying the PROPER keywords to optimize for, the Client or the SEO Firm?

And lastly what would you say are some of the "misconceptions" that clients have that an unethical SEO Firm may not address upfront or worse, such as take advantage of it at the client's expense. In other words, what are the most common client complaints when it comes to their understanding (or misunderstanding) of what an SEO Firm will actually do for them.

[MakeMeTop]

I've thought long and hard about posting my comments. I have long felt that there is a need for some sort of body that gives people who are looking for search engine optimisation services an idea of what a 'good' company does over a 'bad' one.

We who work in this industry know the 'bad' ones - but those of us who do this for our bread and butter have a single bottom line (as outlined by Bruce). We are paid to get our clients top representation in search engines. We all do it in different ways and have our own ideas of ethical SEO. My own are very simple:

a) The searcher should be able to type in a keyword/phrase and if they click on the listing I have produced, they get a satisfactory result which is totally appropriate to the search they made.

b) The searcher is attracted to my listing by me showing a SINGLE result on the page they are looking at rather than by me diluting the search results by stuffing the SERPS.

I believe these are the bottom lines that separate a good SEO from spam merchants. As such I can agree with Bruce's set of ethics. The problem we all have is defining the methods which we each individually use and then seeing if we view them as spam.

Is hidden text spam? I say yes - I don't use it - but Google has many sites with it - even when they have been reported to them. I know that if a site has a specific PageRank then the spam trigger of hidden text is turned off - the site is considered worthy.

Is cloaking spam? It certainly can be. But take the situation of a pharmaceutical company which MUST have certain people from different countries led to a specific page for legal reasons - but wants to come up for totally relevant search terms worldwide. For them I cloak. Am I a spammer? Some will say yes. I don't think so - but that is my opinion.

As far as I am concerned, the ethics of SEO boil down to my bottom line. An ethical SEO will endeavor to produce search engine listings that are totally appropriate to the search the surfer has made. Any standard less than this is, frankly (IMHO), wrong.

The methods one uses to achieve this are ones that should be dictated by the search engines. Google views me as a probable spammer. Other search engines have called me up to ask about certain issues I have raised in other fora and (if anything) have boosted my rankings for producing relevant results.

I believe that the only common denominator between us and search engines is the fact that we both want the surfer to get a satisfactory search experience. Apart from that, we are worlds apart. We manipulate results - 'ethically' or otherwise and search engines want their results to be pure.

As long as the set of ethics that are laid out understand the quandry - and set base rules (which I believe Bruce has done) then I'm happy to go with them. To lay down the rights and wrongs of particular SEO techniques will always cause problems.

I don't use hidden text, spam keyword tags, use hidden links, use link farms, do meta refreshes, use multiple domains/subdomains, auto generate pages and believe content is king! But however much I may dislike these practices, I would not complain to a search engine about a site that uses these - unless I could plainly prove that the surfer did not arrive at a site that matched their requirements.

We should not (as an industry) condemn methods of SEO (although we may have our own opinions) - that is for search engines to do. We should (IMHO) condemn strategies which attempt to mislead surfers, corrupt search engines (by stuffing SERPS with multiple listings), and guarantee impossibilties (top 5 in Yahoo in 2 days type guarantees).

Our major problem, as an industry, is that there are many people offering dreams. I know that my fellow posters on this forum try to offer their clients realities. Our aim should be to give the person who is looking for the solutions we between us all offer (regardless of our own SEO methods) - how we differ from the crooks.

My 10 cents - I'm now off to bed. But I really would like this idea of ethics to work.

[Advisor]

There are already two other organizations out there with a similar mission. WAIM comes to mind, plus Webmaster T's org, which I can't think of at the moment.... SEOpros, maybe?

It seems silly to start a third one. Let's all join one of the already formed orgs and work together instead of apart.

Jill

PS. I do believe both Danny and Detlev are members of WAIM.

[MazY]

Jill... You are such a font of information.

I knew there was a reason that you were my favourite female in the entire forum, whos name beings with J and contains two Ls!

Knowing what I now know, I agree. A third association certainly does seem a tad redundant!

[bruceclay]

Jill, I have been watching them as well….

WAIM has an Ethics page (http://www.waim.org/ethics.html) that says very little considering they have been around for many months (and I don’t think it contains any real Ethics statements). The participant list is quite impressive and I respect them all. Quite frankly I expected more, and certainly sooner.

SEOPros (http://www.seopros.org/org/) is new (the forums are still empty), and the navigation focuses on “Best Practices” and includes indications that it is going to assume the role of SEO Police. There is even a “blacklist” area. This will fragment the SEO practitioners right away -- a mistake if we want a uniform Code of Ethics and broad acceptance of standards.

Neither appears to offer an Ethics-centric association that is not going to be judgmental. We need to consider, propose, adapt, and adopt standards formed by a consensus of SEO practitioners, search engines, and clients. I personally think we need such an association, with a sense of urgency and purpose, focused solely on SEO. We need something constant that can be accepted (Ethics separate from Standards), and then evolve the rest.

I would like to see an association formed of concerned “make it happen” citizens that can lead without being police, and has the membership mix to intelligently argue all sides of an issue. Only by having the entire SEO community participate in the process can you have them each feel ownership of the results, and feel satisfied and supportive whatever the outcome. I think the other associations will stall out and not realize their potential, leaving us in the cold.

I do not think of this as a third association, but rather as the first to do it right.

But that is just my opinion.

[JuniorHarris]

We should not (as an industry) condemn methods of SEO (although we may have our own opinions) - that is for search engines to do. We should (IMHO) condemn strategies which attempt to mislead surfers, corrupt search engines (by stuffing SERPS with multiple listings), and guarantee impossibilties (top 5 in Yahoo in 2 days type guarantees).Very good point! We MUST focus and condemn strategies which mislead surfers. The engines need to take an active stance against spam. Yes there are still spammy sites in Google, and Inktomi seems to have more then their share as well.I would like to see an association formed of concerned “make it happen” citizens that can lead without being police, and has the membership mix to intelligently argue all sides of an issue.Agree, I would also like to see the engines and registrars become active participants as well. This would truly make it "different" from any of the other "active" associations out there.