What is White Hat SEO?

What is White Hat SEO?

When it comes to search engine optimization, white hat SEO refers to the right way to go about SEO. By this I mean that the SEO methods involved center around keeping in line with the guidelines set forth by search engines. When you employ white hat search engine optimization methods, you stand a much better chance of ranking your website on search engines in competitive areas.

White Hat SEO methods will force a webmaster into thinking long term for their search engine ranking success. In other words, the methods employed in White Hat SEO are such that those looking for a quick turnaround will lose interest. White Hat SEO involves a lot of relationship building and link building as well. We all know already that those methods take time and should be spread out over the long haul.

At it’s core, White Hat SEO will force you, the webmaster, to take the human element of websites more seriously. This is one of the best things about those who follow the ethical ways of search engine optimization. White Hat SEO only takes past proven SEO methods into account and doesn’t focus on tactics that can “de-rank” your website on crawler based search engines like Google. White Hat SEO will always enhance the user experience on your website. Many Black Hat SEO methods will not take the actual website visitor into account, but rather will only focus on attempts to trick search engine bots.

Let’s go over the more important facets of ethical, White Hat SEO methods that all webmasters should consider when building their websites or improving it’s SEO…

1. Internal linking of the pages on your website with one another.

White Hat SEO websites are written in clear and clean coding for search engines. It is that simple. By not linking your internal website pages together, you are not giving your audience (as well as search engine bots) the chance to see the internal workings of your website. In other words, you don’t give access to all that your website has to offer.

Internal linking is extremely important to your search engine visibility. Search engine bots rely completely on links to get from page to page within your website as well as from one website to another. Without links as a whole, search engine bots would be useless. Same goes for your website. Without an internal link structure, your website is virtually invisible to search engine bots.

2. Again, you must have great content.

I know, I pretty much go over the fact that you need great content on your website in all of the posts that I write. I can’t stress it enough! If we are staying on the White Hat SEO path, then creating interesting content on your website is a must. This content too must be updated often.

Remember to link between content updates on your website as well. This will help search engine bots not only find new information, but it increases the rate in which they crawl your entire website as a whole.

3. Don’t rely too much on meta data

Meta data will not help you be found by a search engine, but will help you promote your website on search engines. Too many believe that meta data keywords and descriptions are a tool used to get more searches. Instead of focusing on your meta data in that fashion, look at it as copy that needs to sell your website’s message in a limited spaced area.