What is gray hat SEO ?
As you know, site SEO is classified into 3 categories: white hat SEO, black hat SEO, and gray hat SEO.
SEOs who use white hat SEO strategies, that is, follow the path according to the specified rules. Therefore, they move forward safely and are confident in their rank and position.
In contrast, there are SEOs who are reluctant to enforce the rules and are looking for ways to circumvent standard guidelines. These people follow black hat SEO and are always anxious to lose their position.
But in the meantime, there are SEOs who both support white hat SEO and follow black hat SEO techniques. In fact, these people have chosen the gray hat SEO for their site strategies.
If you are one of the viewers who are looking for different ways to increase site traffic, try the gray hat SEO techniques mentioned in this post. In this article, we intend to examine the following:
- What is Gray Hat SEO?
- Why is a gray hat SEO important?
- What Gray Hat SEO techniques should we do to help increase site traffic?
Please stay with us until the end of the article to learn more about the strategies of this category of SEO. In the meantime, in this article, we have dealt with the types of SEO methods that you can read.
What is Gray Hat SEO?
Sometimes you may feel that when you get good results with white hat SEO, you want to try some black hat techniques to increase your SEO results quickly. This is where the gray hat’s head is found.
Gray hat SEO focuses on dubious tactics, some of which could one day turn into black hats. You can consider it somewhat dangerous. But if you do their techniques correctly, they will also give you amazing results.
So there is nothing wrong with trying them, especially when you are looking for worse ways to increase search engine traffic.
Before we get into the most important gray hat SEO strategies, let’s talk about the importance of using them. To see the role of the way to learn SEO, we suggest you read the SEO training page.
Why is gray hat SEO important?
Understanding the performance of Gray Hat SEO is very important because, in addition to improving your site ranking without negative consequences, it can also cost you a lot of money by losing site users.
Remember to pay attention to Google algorithms when using SEO. Because of the updates that Google provides for its algorithms, as well as the changes that it periodically makes to Gray Hat SEO, it may consider some of the Gray Hat techniques in its new update other than Black Hat and result in a penalty for your site.
12 of the best gray hat SEO techniques
The important gray hat techniques for implementing SEO guidelines are as follows:
Use expired domains
This is one of the most common strategies for SEO. In this technique, you can help improve the status of your site backlinks by purchasing expired domains. But make sure that the expired domain is not penalized by search engines and also does not have malicious links.
The gray hat SEO method with expired domains can be done in two ways:
- Using a 301 redirect to transfer the power of links from the expired domain to the current domain.
- Use a tool like the Wayback Machine site to find an archive of old content and republish it on the site until the domain expires. This way you can get a website with targeted traffic.
Using Private Blogging Networks ( PBNs )
A private blog network or PBN is a group of sites that you control yourself. And you use it to link to a single main site to help you rank higher on Google. PBNs are actually a black hat SEO strategy, but if you manage it wisely and leave no trace of yourself. Until Google realizes it, this technique falls into the realm of gray hat SEO.
Content rewrite
Another gray hat SEO technique is content rewriting, which can be useful for ranking in Google. However, long-term and continuous use of it is a completely immoral act. In this method, you take the content from another site and then rewrite it sentence by sentence so that it is not recognizable by the tools.
Link building with the help of web 2.0
Web 2.0 is one of the gray hat SEO methods. In this way you can present your content to improve the quality. The comma, medium, blogfa, and pages where you can modify and edit content are examples of web 2.0. In this way, you have the opportunity to connect with users in a more specialized way in your field. As a result, user engagement will have a positive impact on your site SEO.
Creating and using multiple accounts on social networks
Having a social media account is a white hat SEO method. However, if you create multiple accounts on different social media, you are actually following one of the gray hat SEO methods. These accounts can help you increase your followers, share and get more traffic.
Pay to get positive feedback
Google rewards higher ranking websites with positive reviews. This is especially true for local SEO. So one way to trick Google’s algorithm that works in your favor is to give people money to give your brand a positive feedback.
You can use positive feedback sites or encourage your current customers to use your site for a discount or gift you have announced.
Submit your site to a web directory
One of the most commonly used gray hat SEO techniques is web directory submission. You can get relevant and valuable backlinks by submitting your site to a web directory. Of course, in this space, you should list your website in a specific category so as not to get involved with malicious backlinks, because not all web directories are the same.
Use the right keyword density
Filling content with keywords is a mistake in SEO and will have bad consequences for your site. But if you can maintain your keyword density well, you can get the best results from your keyword SEO. For example, try to put your keyword for a content of 1000 words in the following sections:
- Post title
- Tag alt images
- Heading tags h2 and h3
- URL
- The beginning and the end of the content
Excessive use of markup sites to send website links (links to new posts, old posts, other blog pages, etc.) can definitely affect your site SEO. So it is best to share your links only once or twice on these sites.
Link Exchange
Basically, most people think that link exchange is one of the black hat SEO techniques, while this method is one of the gray hat SEO strategies. In fact, if the link exchange is done automatically, the black hat is classified, and if it happens manually, it is classified as a gray hat tactic.
Update old site content
By updating the old content on the site, you are doing one of the gray hat techniques for your SEO.
Content updates are not just about lengthening them, you need to add additional information as needed, such as adding a video or podcast, and at the same time paying attention to the length of the words.
Buy a social signal
In this technique of gray hat SEO, you can attract Google’s attention by buying signals from social networks such as likes, comments and post sharing. It is enough after several months of activity in social networks such as Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn. And…, go to sites that sell social signals such as WordPress tools, Free Agency, and و and buy social media signals from them. Eventually, a lot of signals will be sent to your posts on these social networks, and Google will get a better view of your brand because of these comments and likes. However, you should be aware that excessive use of this technique can seriously damage your site.
Conclusion
There is no specific rule on how to rank a site in Google. And you can use black hat, white hat, gray hat SEO techniques to try to get higher rankings in Google.
But it is always better to focus on strategies and tactics that do not lead to penalties by Google algorithms. This is the only way you can achieve better rankings in the long run.
What do you think about the gray hat SEO techniques mentioned in this article? Do you use other SEO techniques, tips or tricks? Please share your comments with us.
