Legitimate Hidden Text

[MHenscheid]

I am think about using a div tags to create hidden layers on product pages. I am afraid that SEs might consider this spamming.

when the page first appears the product "description" is visible to the user. I use an onClick command to change the visibility of the layers to show "specs" or "links". All the hidden layers are available to the end user.

So, are SEs going to consider this spamming?
Will the SEs even see the text in the hidden layers?

Here is the site:
http://www.nrsweb.com/shop/product3....04&deptid=1172

[Mel]

IMO if all the content is available to the viewer you should have no problems with the search engines considering it as spam.

The search engines will see and index the additional layers even if the visibility is initially set to hidden.

[EcommerceDealers]

Hi,

I have used < style> technique to hide text at the bottom of my 'cat training' page. The size of < H1> and < H2> tags can be reduced using < style> tag. The font, size and color of text can also be specified.

Have a look at the codes in between < style> and < /style> tags in my 'cat training' page.

http://www.ecommercedealers.com/cat-...t-training.htm

Are SEs going to consider these techniques as spamming?

Thanks.

Ali.
New SEO Technique Revealed !!!
http://www.ecommercedealers.com/google.htm

[Mel]

Yes IMO the search engines are going to consider the use of invisible text which can never be seen by the viewers as spam if it is reported to them, as they are the enclosing of three paragraphs of text inside <h6> tags.

[cthathem]

Mh, somehow I'm wondering about the algorythms and validation... Will the algorythm really understand which use is ok? Mh, I'm not that sure about that ... I'm not into parsing html ;)

In the first case, we have a genuine application of hidden divs, that are made available to the user, once he does something. Take heed though, that not everyone has JavaScript enabled, so you might miss some customers. They will never get to see the product descriptions, save you provide the swapping via server side means (via asp, jsp or php for example).

In the second case, there is definitely SEO at work, and it's arguable if you get yourself banned for that practice... I wouldn't recommend it, but I'm no professional SEO whatsoever, .. yet I'm focused on delivering maximum usability for the human user. Read through google's infos on SEOs ;) they're quite interesting to read...

So if you cease using those non-userfriendly SEO practices, you may not be maximizing/optimizing to the best degree for the robots, but you can be rather sure, you will never get banned and the google updates would never have an alltogether bad impact on your site. Since you're not using any bad practices, that is...

just my two cents,
Georg

(Remember, I'm no SEO, so I probably can't be taken too seriously I guess) :)

[Mel]

The search engines will never find that hidden text themselves,IMO but if you start ranking well, you can bet that at least one of you competitors will go over you code with a fine tooth comb and turn in a detailed spam report when he finds that batch of hidden text and word stuffed H tags.

[cthathem]

Ah, thanks.. could have thought about that too. ;)

[coder]

What about commented out text, I use it all the time with sites that I update frequently. And have never had any problems with it.

[rlrouse]

IMO using hidden anything on your web pages is playing with fire, even if it has a legitimate purpose. I wouldn't do it because you never know what a Google employee doing a hand-check would consider to be legitimate.

[MHenscheid]

Thanks for your tips.

Does someone have to report the page as "spam", or do the SE algos catch it?

As for my customers without JavaScript, I will be using a <noscript> tag with the final version.

[MHenscheid]

Just had an idea...Though I am not sure whether or not the search engine would consider this worse...

Since SEs don't process javascript (let me know if this is an incorrect assumption) could I start all layers as visible and then use an onLoad event to hide them?

I could then change the positioning of the text to accomidate real users who don't have javascript...

[Mel]

The visible and invisible properties of layers are display properties and are ingnored by search engines.

The spider will see and record all text on layers both visible and invisible.

But why on earth try to hide text? Surely you have enough skill to put it on the visible page?

[MHenscheid]

I see now that the spider would search the layers regardless, however I am still worried about the "appearance" of spamming.

As for displaying all the information, I don't want to become Amazon.com...I prefer a cleaner appearance.