The search engine optimization (SEO) community is divided into two groups, the White Hat SEO and the Black Hat SEO professionals. People often do not understand the difference between these two. Here is a look at both.
White Hat SEO
White Hat SEO as a term refers to the use of the various SEO techniques as well as practices, the way the search engines prefer them.
The term, has been derived from old western movies. In those movies, the good guys tend to wear the white hats which reflected their righteousness. Hence, the term White Hat SEO refers to the use of ethical or righteous search engine optimization techniques.
Some important features:
1) The professionals using the White hat SEO tend to naturally link to others sites rather than buying links which is not preferred by most of the search engines. They tend to select links which are of a genuine interest to the visitors of the website.
2) The White Hat SEO professionals tend to use a web copy that is directed at the website’s visitors instead of the search engines.
3) When it comes to the use of keywords or key phrases, the White Hat SEO professionals tend to use them in their natural context in a website’s content.
4) The White Hat SEO professionals never hide anything from their clients. They tend to keep their clients involved in the search engine optimization process. They never mislead their clients in any way.
Black Hat SEO
Black Hat SEO refers to using the various SEO techniques and practices in a way the search engine do not approve of. It means that the website designers are sometime unethical in their use of search engine optimization.
The term Black Hat SEO has also originated out of the old western movies. It has been derived from the black color of the hats worn by the villains. This does not mean that the Black Hat SEO professionals are villains in any sense. It simply means that they are simply not as righteous as the White Hat SEO professionals.
Some important features:
1) The Black Hat SEO professionals tend to buy links instead of linking naturally. They mostly tend to buy those links that offer financial gains instead of the ones that actually have of any benefit to the website visitors.
2) The web copy used by the Black Hat SEO professionals is usually directed at the search engines.
3) The Black Hat SEO professionals tend to indulge in keywords or key phrases stuffing. This is their way to confuse the search engine to think that a page is more relevant just because it has a lot of keywords.
There are absolutely no grounds to decide which type of SEO is the best. The decision of choosing between the White Hat SEO and Black Hat SEO is completely dependent on the preference of the website owner.
