Search engine optimization, or SEO, is a controversial topic endlessly discussed in the online community. There are those say that the practice is unethical, as it aims to trick search engines, while others say that highly aggressive optimization is necessary for online survival. But just what exactly is SEO? Why is it important, and why is it so controversial?



You can think of SEO as one way of boosting traffic to your site. If you have set up a site for profit or promotion, you will find that even the best designed, informative site will not generate revenue without visitors. There are many avenues by which visitors will come to your site: advertising in print media such as magazines, online pay-per-click advertising, advertising in e-mail magazines, word-of-mouth, domain recognition (i.e., someone typing your site's domain into their browser), and so on. Many webmasters hope to bring visitors to their site through search engine searches, as this is a form of free traffic. No matter which form of site promotion you choose, you will want to maximize its effectiveness. Pay-per-click ads should be carefully writing, domain names should be carefully chosen, and so forth.

SEO is a way of increasing the amount and quality of the traffic your site gets through search engine queries. For example: your site sells widgets. A potential customer types "buy widgets online" into a search engine and gets 24 pages of results. Most internet users will browse the first one or two pages of results only, meaning the sites appearing on the remaining 22 pages will have very little traffic from search engine queries. SEO is simply a collection of techniques for moving your site up higher on the list for that target search phrase.

Let's take a moment to look at what SEO is NOT, by dispelling some myths about SEO.

- SEO costs thousands of dollars and can only be performed by trained experts. FALSE. Making your pages and sites "friendly" to the search engines is relatively easy. Once you learn the basics by modifying existing pages, it will be easy to make optimized pages in the future. There are many free or inexpensive tools to help with your SEO tasks.

- SEO will ensure my site is successful. FALSE. SEO is just one way of increasing traffic to you site. You should never neglect other forms of site promotion.

- Since SEO is "manipulating" the system, it is unethical or even illegal. FALSE. SEO would only be illegal if it involves clearly illegal acts, such as credit fraud. Major search engines such as Yahoo and Google have set out guidelines for webmasters. SEO techniques that comply with these guideline are called "white hat" strategies, while those that do not are called "black hat" strategies. A recent term, "grey hat," refers to tricks that fall somewhere in the middle. A common black hat trick is using hidden text. For example, black text on a black background will give the target keyword and variations dozens of times. Since human visitors do not see the text, much search engines "read" it, this will boost search engine rankings. Black hat strategies are not illegal, but they do conflict with search engine rules. Sites that use black hat tricks may enjoy good rankings for a few weeks or even months. However, when the search engines discover this, the site will be removed from their index. If a site is removed from a major index like Google or Yahoo, people will still be able to visit that site, but the chances of receiving traffic through search engine queries falls to zero. White hat SEO is not only ethical, it is imperative.