Re: ONLINE-ADS>> Why it is a *HUGE* mistake to try and trick search engines...

Tom Cunniff (tcunniff_at_the-cia.com)
Mon, 21 Oct 1996 19:24:16 -0400

• Messages sorted by: [ date ][ thread ][ subject ][ author ]
• Archive Home Page
• Search
• Next message: Brady Chatfield: "Re: ONLINE-ADS>> web tracking"
• Previous message: Juan Camacho: "ONLINE-ADS>> "What's cool" awards"
• Maybe in reply to: Eric R. Ward /NetPOST & NetWIRE/: "ONLINE-ADS>> Why it is a *HUGE* mistake to try and trick search engines..."
• Next in thread: Eric R. Ward /NetPOST & NetWIRE/: "Re: ONLINE-ADS>> Why it is a *HUGE* mistake to try and trick search engines..."

Eric Ward wrote:

> Keyword loading, title packing, meta-stacking, and other techniques are
>NOT ethical. They hurt everyone, especially the end-users of the search
>engines.

Peter Hartley replied:

>>this is about as wrong and a bad a piece of advice as I have seen in the
>>last 20 years. If your job is to get a page seen - then it is your job
>>to (do) that, by fair means or foul.

I must agree wholeheartedly with Eric Ward.

Our jobs as marketers is emphatically *not* to get our pages seen by as
many eyeballs as possible.

Our job is to get our pages seen by as many *relevant* eyeballs as possible.

If we all fight "by fair means or foul" to get listed first for every
possible keyword then searches will become absolutely USELESS and people
will stop doing them.

The Net has a wonderful way of routing around greed. Once people get too
greedy, someone will invent a new search engine which automatically
eliminates sites which employ unfair means in an attempt to get listed
first. And when people find a new way to get greedy, the Net will route
around it again.

Success on the Web is not about title packing and keyword loading or about
the latest, whizziest plug-ins and technologies.

Success happens when you create web sites that get talked about. When you
create web sites that truly add value to people's lives. When you provide
people with an experience that they want to come to again and again.

It's hard work. You can't automate it. You can't trick it. You either have
the goods, or you don't.

There are no shortcuts.

Never have been. Never will be.

Best regards,
Tom Cunniff
President, CIA
Cunniff Interactive Advertising

Visit our clients' Web sites:
American Movie Classics: http://www.amctv.com
Ragu: http://www.eat.com
Texas Monthly: http://www.texasmonthly.com

• Archive Home Page
• Search
• Next message: Brady Chatfield: "Re: ONLINE-ADS>> web tracking"
• Previous message: Juan Camacho: "ONLINE-ADS>> "What's cool" awards"
• Maybe in reply to: Eric R. Ward /NetPOST & NetWIRE/: "ONLINE-ADS>> Why it is a *HUGE* mistake to try and trick search engines..."
• Next in thread: Eric R. Ward /NetPOST & NetWIRE/: "Re: ONLINE-ADS>> Why it is a *HUGE* mistake to try and trick search engines..."

With an archive of more than 14,000 postings, since 1996 the Online Advertising Discussion List has been the Internet's leading forum focused on professional discussion of online advertising and online media buying and selling strategies, results, studies, tools, and media coverage. If you wish to join the discussion list, please use this link to sign up on the home page of the Online Advertising Discussion List.