Hacking has become cool. Actually hacking has already made the transition from cool to mainstream.
We’re bombarded with articles and blog posts on hacking your working methods, schedules, sleep cycles, coffee brewing, education, thinking process and more.
It isn’t, therefore, a huge leap for many businesses to assume that hacking SEO is a logical extension of the same idea. And the “no risk no reward” mentality seems to fit well with the fearlessness of an increasing number of startups and established businesses.
I’ve sat aghast in too many meetings listening to a company’s self-proclaimed SEO Guru explain that “playing it safe means lost revenue”. This is so incredibly wrong on so many different levels.
I’ve consulted for too many companies hit by Panda (62 million results on Google) or hit by Penguin (44 million results).
I’ve seen the results of too many company’s websites being slapped by Google. They’re usually devastating.
We no longer take on companies who belatedly wish to fix the errors of their ways after suffering a Google-inflicted penalty. Not on moral grounds, but because it’s soul destroying.
If you follow or continue to follow the path of black hat SEO, your day of reckoning will come. It could be tomorrow, it could be in six months, or it could even be years from now.
Yet when it happens, you will undoubtedly wish that you’d taken my advice.
Two important points for you to mull over later tonight when you can’t sleep:
(1) Good content doesn’t need dodgy techniques. It just needs to be written correctly and presented to Google in the right way.
(2) The risks of dodgy SEO are greater than you may realise. Last year we worked with a company who were hit by an early Panda release. Within 24 hours of being slapped their sales were down by 85%. Two months after being hit they had to lay-off two of their staff. Not because of what they’d done but because they could no longer afford to pay them.
And for the anti-Google brigade, I understand your feelings towards Google, but don’t let them get in the way of your business.
Google’s rules aren’t laws – but the effects of breaking them may be every bit as serious.
[UPDATE]: Matt Cutts from Google has spoken of interesting times ahead. Google are stamping down that little bit harder.
Note: This article was written in May 2013, but the points made are equally relevant today.
