Why Do I Still See Keyword Stuffing?

Some things never go away.

[Updated June, 2020]

It’s been more than 20 years since I began doing SEO under the company name of Treloar Associates.  One of the frowned-upon SEO techniques I advised against back then was keyword stuffing.  People back then would often cram their web pages full of many repeated iterations of their target keywords. It didn’t work particularly well, and when Google noticed it, the offending web site suffered a Google slap-down.

I thought it was a thing of the past. Good riddance.

Well, no, not quite. I still run into websites with offensive keyword stuffing. They’re painful to read, which may be why most people don’t  — they get a couple of sentences in and leave in disgust. But they’re still out there.

Why??? Perhaps those sites simply haven’t been updated in 15 years? Maybe someone read just enough about SEO to be dangerous and doesn’t know any better?

Well, thinking about keyword stuffing and a sort-of birthday for my involvement in SEO reminded me of this great comic from the folks at Ranked Hard. (Sadly this cartoon is outliving the website it first appeared on.)

Think keyword stuffing, whether accidental or on purpose, may be hurting your online visibility? Let us know in the comments below.

If you’re unsure of how to fix things, Rank Magic can help.