The SEO ethics debate may be pointless, but it does spur a lot of activity. I noted a thread at SEOChat on the subject, where some disagreement between Fathom and I, along with a stereotypical quote from Mick has me reading:
Rand: Never take on two clients for the same terms without letting both of them know you're working with someone else in the sector.
Fathom: I actually disagree here. As far a "code of conduct goes". While there are certainly conflict of interest issues... "the term" and the "sector" have no greater impact on "results" than your "time" or "workload" when taking on "any new client" and working on any other "term" or "sector". Also a service in the US, another in Canada, and one in UK where none ship or service outside of their geo-physical boundaries isn't harmful to anyone - in fact it is even an asset...
IMHO not a "black & white" clause.
Mick: I dont understand this entire thread. Whats a code of conduct? if i think it is what you are on about. My rule is dog eat dog and every man/woman for him or herself. Seo without restrictions and do what is needed to get to where you need to be.
Lie, cheat, steal, decieve, work, con and huslte for survival.
Later, GBR&D points to a code of conduct that is quite lengthy, and includes some interesting elements.
The SEM will actively practice, support and promote the SEM code of ethics. (Seems a bit extreme)
Needless regular re-submission of a client website to search engines and directories. This common technique is no longer beneficial to campaign progress and may actually result in the activation of spam penalty. (As we've pointed out in the past, if this could hurt rankings, we'd all just do it to our competitors).
The use of cloaking or IP delivery techniques for the purpose of providing differing content to different users/user agents. (NYTimes, Salon, WashingtonPost are all guilty of this)
The use of invalid or non-compliant HTML in an effort to enhance relevancy for targeted search phrases. For example multiple instances of TITLE or META tags, or using TITLE tag that incorrectly describes the document content. (Non-compliant HTML is unethical?)
The creation of, participation in or interaction with link farms or pages featuring user added link systems. (No guestbooks, comments or webrings?)
There's a whole host of others, but I want to get to something even more fun.
For the last 6 weeks, I've been proud to note that SEOmoz's ranking factors article was listed on the Wikipedia page for SEO (under external links). However, as of a couple days ago, it was dropped when one of the editors cleared out virtually ALL the external links. He notes his reasons in the discussion thread:
(in reference to SEOmoz and another site) The above references go to non-noteworthy sources that display ads. My objection is that these links are a form of stealth advertising. The SEO page is subject to constant linkspam attacks (every SEO on the planet thinks they deserve a link here), so we have gotten very defensive about external links.
And from an opposing point of view (in reference to the removed links and other content):
The Long Term SEO section did arm the general public with information that was previously privy only to SEOs. As someone who does SEO for a living - and are therefore in a position to directly benefit from public ignorance of SEO - you were not best placed to delete large sections of the article. This is particularly inappropriate as you haven't declared your conflict of interest here.
There's quite a fight over this page, and one I don't believe I'll involve myself in. If the editors eventually decide to put back the ranking factors article, I'd be thrilled, but if they choose to leave it out since we do have ads (and are non-noteworthy), that's their perogative.
Natasha - Just FYI, you forg0t the https:// in your profile and hence, we can't click your link!
Also, we regurgitate this argument every 2 weeks, so yearly is an overstatement. :)
And last - I'm not sure how you can ethically work for two clients targeting the exact same terms. If you're an "Internet Marketer", that may be fine, but in SEO, the job description is to get to #1, and two sites can't be #1 for the same term...
BTW - Mick; "namby pamby" - genius. Haven't heard that one since I was 12.
"And last - I'm not sure how you can ethically work for two clients targeting the exact same terms. If you're an "Internet Marketer", that may be fine, but in SEO, the job description is to get to #1, and two sites can't be #1 for the same term..."
Interesting twist to the discussion of ethics... as for the above Rand this isn't actually the "implied job description". If it were... dump all commercial aspects of the website being developed and make it purely "informative"! That'll get any client to "#1".
Unfortunately for the client you negatively affected their sales potential [for whatever they were peddling"].
The "implied value" of SEO is enhanced exposure for the purpose of inducing more sales conversions. Regardless of whether you consider that your job description or not... I guarantee that is why your clients actually hired you.
Being #1 is no guarantee of sales [it helps] but having clients ranked #1 thru #6 for the same term and not much difference in sales conversions simply because a single term is a flawed startegy... thus while they all "compete for the generic terms" it is in fact the specific niche terms that they each gain more sales on individually... based on their individual and "unique selling propositions".
IMHO anyone can rank #1 for anything, few can rank #1 on everything, and any client that wishes 100% CAVEAT on every single term under the sun in their chosen field can start by paying a retainer of $1 million.
Show one other media or medium that defines ethics as this: newspapers, catalogs, radio, TV, Amazon.com?
It's truly bad business and even a disservice for clients for 100% exclusivity... why?
Margin of Error!
You can learn so much more that helps "all" when you can compare ranked results, visitations, and sales conversions for each against their individual design, layout, and informational dialog and provide "each" a better appreciation of all the nuances involved that you certainly "don't" appreciate by a single website.
Exclusivity "wastes clients' opportunities"... and they nor you understand this until they and you experience it.
In the end "they will compete [regardless] for #1 thru to whatever with whatever sites are also there... thus better insight is what the SEO is getting paid for. My two or more clients "compete" with your singular client... and the marketing research I get from a greater sampling will beat your client everytime. So ethically... did you help them or actually hinder them?
"The KEYWORD isn't the issue!"... better sales conversions are.
In regards to ethics, just some clarifications on the GBRD code of ethics that was referenced: The elements listed in the GreenBUILT R&D code of ethics are designed to address not only ethics (in the strict sense of meta-ethics, or as a branch of philosophy proper.), the code also presents what we consider to be best practices.
For example the use of invalid or non-compliant HTML is of course not an ethics issue. However it may be in the future best interest of the client to use well formed markup and accordingly comes down to an issue of best practices. Specifically the item was describing the use of HTML elements that are injurious to the document architecture in an attempt to influence relevancy. For example the use of multiple title tags, etc.
Secondly, our internal research findings as well as empirical evidence clearly supports the idea that multiple submissions to search engines can attract the wrong kind of search engine attention.
Lastly in regards to user added link systems; I would say yes, absolutely; webrings and guestbooks are a bad idea. Comments can be moderated and serve a useful purpose (this comment being a case in point). I don't so much feel that webrings or guestbooks are an ethics issue (from the web master perspective), however incorporating them into one's website is providing another resource for spammers to exploit.
You know its November when... The SEO community regurgitates the yearly ethical argument and the yearly black hat/white hat argument...
To say that you only take on one client in the same industry means that you haven't done your client research well enough to figure out how to market your client's unique value proposition because you boil marketing your client down to marketing keywords and not clients…. And I guess that is where the problem is: marketing keywords and not marketing clients…
Someone needs to write that article: "Are You Marketing Keywords or Are You Marketing Clients?"
I am loyal to my existing clients and that's it. When I run out of possible clients then I will flip burgers.
Not sure if clients need to be informed that you are already working with another client in the same sector or not...but definitely think a client needs to be informed if you have a site yourself within the same sector. In most cases, you won't give preferential treatment to one client's site over another's, but the temptation to give your own site preferential treatment over a client's would be hard to resist.
As for the wiki thing...they are just being scrooges. bah humbug.
I am sure you know where i stand on this one. You can be all namby pamby going by these false standards of conduct. But; When you end up flipping burgers in McDonalds make sure mine is well done.
I give all my customer a 12 month advantage before I sign in a new customers with similar business/keywords. It makes my work more interesting and conflict free. About wiki... IMO it was to be expected. People are always biased one way or the other.
As far as SEO ethics go, I would say that taking on 2 businesses in the same industry is just a bad business practice, unless you disclose to them beforehand. I have to agree with your side of that debate Rand.
On the wik comment, it reminds me of DMOZ editors who remove good sites or prevent new ones from being listed that compete with their own sites in the directory.