While search sites may be thought of as a sort of public resource,
in fact they are for-profit services, and fiercely competitive with
one another. Thus, the goal of every search site is to have the very
best database of sites that they can. This means two things: including
as many legitimate entries as possible, and excluding as many of the
spurious kind as possible. By this I don't mean that they pass
judgement on the quality of the actual sites submitted (although
some directories do to a certain extent), but rather on the
appropriateness of a submission of a particular site for a particular
category. If a directory accepted every entry that is submitted to
them, then every category would soon become filled with listings for
get-rich-quick schemes, weight-loss products and pornography, which
would crowd out the more appropriate listings and make the directory
useless. Of course, on the less reputable search sites, including
those entities known as "free for all link pages", this is exactly
what happens, which is why it's a waste of time submitting to such
sites. But reputable directories expend a great deal of effort making
sure that sites do not get listed in inappropriate categories.
Likewise, search engines try to make sure that all their listings
include only appropriate keywords.
Of course, a search site dares not be too strict about accepting
submissions, because they want to get as many legitimate submissions
as they can. Make no mistake, search engines value your submissions,
and the better ones make it as easy as possible for you to submit.
But they have to walk a fine line between welcoming valid submissions
and keeping the bad apples out. And bad apples there are in plenty.
The same hordes of sleazy characters and snake-oil salesmen that fill
our e-mail inboxes with spam constantly attempt to do the same to
the search sites, and like the evil bulk e-mailers, they have a
large repertoire of tricks with which they attempt to deceive the
gatekeepers.
So, you certainly don't want to offend the search engine gods, but
at the same time, you want to get as much coverage as you can, in
order to drive as much traffic as possible to your site. Getting
multiple listings, and trying to make your pages appear as high in
search results as possible, are quite desirable. They are also
perfectly allowable, as long as you do things the right way.
A lot of people spend a lot of time trying to devise dishonest ways
to increase their coverage in search engines and directories. The
majority of these outlaws are of course purveyors of fraudulent
products, or operators of one dishonest scam or another. However,
sometimes perfectly legitimate businesspeople can, either
inadvertently or through a misguided excess of zeal, fall foul of
the search engines, and be branded spamdexers, especially if they
have employed an unscrupulous or incompetent paid submitter. The
irony of the situation is that these attempts at deception are
almost always unsuccessful. The search sites' livelihood depends
on foiling such attempts, and they usually manage to stay one step
ahead of the scamsters.
Search-related fraud falls into the following categories:
Spamdexing: Submitting the same Web page again and again to
the same search sites, submitting to directories in inappropriate
categories, or submitting a bunch of different URLs that all point
to the same page.
Keyword Stuffing: Loading Web pages with an excessive number
of keywords, hidden keywords, or keywords that are inappropriate
for the site's subject matter.
Bait and Switch: Creating a Web page specially designed to
rank high in search engines, which redirects the user to another
unrelated page.
