5 replies to this topic

[Maria83]

I work as a writer and currently have a client who is planning on having me write an article around a certain topic, upon which he is then going to place a slightly different keyword in many variations of that exact same article. The keywords will be location based keywords - so '(city) keyword'.

He's then going to place this article with the different keyword variations across a number of different blogs of individuals who are obviously located in the city they are trying to rank for.

I'm just wondering, will he still be able to rank for each of these articles? Or will they be too similar in nature with just that slight location change to be able to rank on each person's site?

[Jill]

It's an old tactic that had been working ok until some of the latest google updates. Right now it's a pretty dumb idea unless he can show you examples of it working well.

[Maria83]

It's an old tactic that had been working ok until some of the latest google updates. Right now it's a pretty dumb idea unless he can show you examples of it working well.

Thanks very much for the response - I really appreciate it. I think this is the first time he's implemented this but it's essentially the foundation of this business idea so no proof of it working yet. When you say 'dumb idea' is that because only one article will stand a chance of ranking well? I don't mean to be a nuisance and trust your advice 100%; when I go back to him and let him know that it may not be the best business plan I'd just like to have a few more details why not.

Thanks again.

[Jill]

Dumb idea because it's something he's trying to do solely for the search engines without any real value to people (from the sounds of it).

It's nothing new, and is for the most part considered to be web spam that just clutters the internet with a whole lot of crap. (IMO)

[Maria83]

Thanks again for the response and I can definitely see your point. I think his thinking is mostly from a cost effective point of view. Rather than paying me to write 15 articles on a very similar topic and post them on each of these individual sites, he'll just replace the target keyword.

So one article would for example be 'How To Find A Good Family Doctor In Florida' and the other might be 'How To Find A Good Family Doctor In Seattle' and each article would go up on the corresponding doctor's website.

[Jill]

AKA mad lib spam.