Keyword Spam and Keyword Scammers

Did you ever stop to consider how the latest trends in internet scams will affect your website’s traffic? Not many website owners are aware of the issues involved in this area. It does not even occur to them that this is problem area for their website’s traffic. Whether they assess the risk or not, it still exists and can become quite problematic if overlooked.

It isn’t just the webmasters and SEO professionals that are carefully observing the latest web searching trends to optimize their websites, it is also the scammers and hackers that are keeping a close watch on the latest search trends. This is the manner they operate – and they do it well. Their goal is to try to reach the largest audience, though for wrong reasons. So if you think that a particular keyword gets the largest number of hits or that a particular keyword is searched for the highest number of times, then spammers and hackers too optimize their websites and web pages for those keywords. If you do not remain vigilant against this, you can fall victim to it along with your customers. If that happens, everyone loses – aside from the scammers.

As more people continue to become victims they will learn to be careful about what they search for and opening links associated with those keywords. For example, lately it has been noted that most spammers attack the keyword screensavers and keywords that are associated with “free”. That makes perfect sense because they are highly searched words and people tend to not associate risk to them.

Keep this in mind, because when you are choosing  keywords, the last thing you want to do is go overboard on a keyword like  “free” with the hopes of obtaining loads of traffic. When you look for alternative keywords if there is fallout, you will lose a considerable amount of time in regaining the traffic and reputation that has been lost. If you are an SEO professional, it is important that you educate your customers of this changing trend so they can understand why some keywords are not as advantageous as they seem. Some customers may not see the point immediately and it would take a bit of time to convince them to opt for safer keyword choices, but in the end nearly all come around on this point.

Finding alternatives for these keywords to compensate for the traffic that will be temporarily lost is a huge challenge. Remember that scammers and hackers  never rest – they are always looking for a way in. All our approaches and efforts should be futuristic, looking into the future. Just by repeating the same old SEO procedures, we will remain stagnant and vulnerable. We should be able to break through that barrier and look beyond today’s trends. This however, requires experience and good analytical skills. Don’t fret, you can do it, or hire an SEO to do it for you. Either way, you need to remain vigilant.