Indeed, the color-coded terminology of SEO is so old-school. Search Engine Journal helps you discover why these semantics are no longer applicable today and must be focused on instead.
Experienced SEO professionals are the goal-oriented workers. They work with the clients or employers to clarify expectations for traffic growth. The successful SEO professional evaluates where the company stands in terms of sales and domain authority. It creates an action plan to choose and improve key performance indicators.
SEO professionals meet the employer’s objectives and mainly need to enhance the site’s Google PageRank. SEO pros work in Google’s framework and many assume they follow Google’s guidelines to succeed. The history of Google dependency led SEO professionals to categorize the ranking strategies based on their adherence to the user expectations of Google.
The color-coded terminology of SEO has been used for many years legitimizing and criticizing different SEO tactics. It becomes clear these days that this terminology harms more than being good for SEO.
Color-coded SEO terminology
Although the color-coded SEO terminology uniqueness has distinctions lying on the subjective spectrum, most SEO professionals have recognized the basic definitions of the following terms:
Black hat
The term refers to unethical SEO tactics violating search engine guidelines to manipulate ranking. Here are the common strategies associated with black hat SEO:
- Cloaking
- Content automation.
- Guest posting networks
- Keyword stuffing
- Link farms.
- Paid links
Using these tactics results in a Google penalty.
Gray hat
It is the SEO tactics, neither white nor black. Using these tactics results in a Google penalty.
White hat
These are the ethical SEO tactics attached to Google’s guidelines and don’t result in a penalty called white hat strategies. The practices involved in the white hat are:
- Creating useful content
- Keyword research
- Improving loading speed
- Optimizing your site for mobile
Current SEO semantics
Continued use of SEO terminology rather than helping SEO professionals hinders the evolution and growth of the SEO industry. The problems with the color-coded designations reach their subjectivity.
The language creates several dilemmas:
- Current terminology depends heavily on ethical principles
- Current terminology creates unnecessary loads
- Current terminology will encourage SEO pros to ask the wrong queries
- Current terminology implies universality
- Current terminology never accounts for search engine transformations
New evolution
Using color-coded hats symbolizes SEO concepts has flaws, but what is the alternative?
SEO profs need a way of conveying the level of risks and rewards with rank-boosting strategies. Instead of using the current white and black hat uniqueness to classify the ranking methods, SEO professionals must use quantitative metrics to understand and examine the tactic’s outcomes.
You need to be more specific than labeling a strategy as a white or black hat SEO. Explain which KPIs the tactic helps the company achieve and the cost – both resources and risk of penalization.
It is useful for SEO pros to explain the difference between slow-growth and growth-hacking strategies to their clients or employers.
Hats off to problem-solving SEO pros
SEO professionals have complex responsibilities and take on significant risks. The best SEO pros are the ones who see the past white-and-black terminology learnt from error and trial and put the needs of the company first.