Site content and use of web catalogues

Friday, March 16, 2007

Sites with more content can have more opportunities to rank well in Google. It makes sense that
having more pages of good content represent more chances to rank in search engine result pages
(SERPs). Some SEOs however, do not focus on the user’s needs, but instead create pages solely for
search engines. This approach is based on the false assumption that increasing the volume of web
pages with random, irrelevant content is a good long-term strategy for a site. These techniques
are usually accomplished by abusing qlweb style catalogues or by scraping content from sources
known for good, valid content, like Wikipedia or the Open Directory Project.

These methods violate
Google’s webmaster guidelines.
Purely scraped content, even from high quality sources, does not provide any added value to your
users. It’s worthwhile to take the time to create original content that sets your site apart.
This will keep your visitors coming back and will provide useful search results.

In order to provide best results possible to our Polish and non-Polish users, Google continues to
improve its algorithms for validating web content.

Google is willing to take action against domains that try to rank more highly by just showing
scraped or other autogenerated pages that don’t add any value to users. Companies, webmasters, and
domain owners who consider SEO consultation should take care not to spend time on methods which
will not have worthwhile long-term results. Choosing the right SEO consultant requires in-depth
background research, and their reputation and past work should be important factors in your
decision.

PS: Head on over to our
Polish discussion forum,
where we’re monitoring the posts and chiming in when we can!

Posted by Kaspar Szymanski, Search Quality