18 replies to this topic

[Nathan Malone]

I recently checked out Yahoo's search engine and I noticed that they have more low-level spam then Google does. I won't post any url's but I checked out a few sites in particular and I found that Yahoo put a site with hidden keywords and a bunch of other bad stuff on the first page for a very competitive keyword and Google didn't even list it in the first 1,000 results for that keyword. Has anyone else noticed things like this? It seems that Yahoo is doing a great job of weeding out the really offensive sites but they seem to be more spam-friendly with low-level spam and pay less attention to link popularity. Any thoughts?

[SearchRank]

I am currently bidding on a project for a company whose competitor is a domain and link farm spammer. I did a particular regional search and this competitor's various sites dominated nearly all 20 results on the first page.

I didn't see that occur with Google when I conducted the same search so yes it seems that Yahoo has not done as good of a job with low-level spam as you suggested.

[Grumpus]

Y! seems to put a lot more weight on onpage elements - including the fact that it seems to like a somewhat higher keyword density than Google.

Frankly, I'm at odds as to whether or not I believe they will put much effort into tweaking this down or not. On the one hand, they don't want spammy results. On the other hand, they want a means of optimization that a site that pays to get into the index can suss out and implement so that there is an ROI for the paid subscribers.

This week it seems that it's easier to spam Yahoo. I wouldn't count on it being so next week, but maybe it will be.

G.

[Nathan Malone]

Yes, their search engine is still relatively new and they are probably going to be tweaking with it trying to get everything right during the next few weeks/months.

Searchrank: Trust me, I know how it feels and it doesn't feel very good. Especially when some Dmoz editor puts said competitors into Dmoz but won't put your site in there... I actually do fairly well with Google but I'm simply not willing to spam up my site to get a high ranking on Yahoo. Since joining this forum, I have been enlightened...

[MakeMeTop]

>have more low-level spam then Google does..

All depends on how many areas you look at. For every spammy hidden text page you can find on Yahoo, I'll show you ten on Google. For every link-farmer on Yahoo, I'll find you ten on Google.

You could probably do the same in reverse. It is a subjective issue. No search engine is very good at detecting spam.

In fact, Yahoo is much tougher to spam long-term than Google.

Anyway, I'd rather have relevant spam served up than irrelevant "authority" sites any day

[bkernst]

To get a bit more of an advantage, don't forget to submit your site to the DMOZ and the Yahoo! Directory as well as others, that has helped me over years for client sites.

Bernhard

[Jill]

Anyway, I'd rather have relevant spam served up than irrelevant "authority" sites any day

Real good point, Barry.

Getting awfully tired of seeing sites do well in Google simply because they belong to link farms. Especially when they are so easy to spot. Makes Google look really stupid, imo.

Jill

[Nathan Malone]

Or even worse, they have another domain with hundreds of spam pages, all of whom are linked together for the maximum benefit and all of whom have links to the main site... Ugh... The least they can do is put "noindex, follow" in their meta robots tag, lol.

I personally think that if Google dumped half of the sites in their database, that the results would be much better. Bigger is not always better, especially with a se like Google that places a lot of emphasis on inbound links.

Also, I think that search engines would provide a much better user experience if they displayed the webmaster's meta description instead of pulling together their own. A lot of G's descriptions don't make sense (although on the other hand, a lot of them do). Of course, this method would also open up a whole new way for people to spam pages but that's GOogles problem. (grin)

Yes, both Google and Yahoo have their strengths and weaknesses. Oh well, such is the way of life...

[cline]

Another factor to consider is their reaction to spam reports. In the past month I've reported 2 spam sites to Yahoo and seen the spammers removed from the index (and from MSN, too). I made the same reports to Google, but Google has taken no action.

[wholland]

On the KW's I follow 8 of the top 23 are the same site reconfigured or added as part of another site. Also most of these sites are in the Yahoo directory even though they all have the same content, with a changed look.

Where can I report spam to Yahoo?

[Nathan Malone]

Another factor to consider is their reaction to spam reports. In the past month I've reported 2 spam sites to Yahoo and seen the spammers removed from the index (and from MSN, too). I made the same reports to Google, but Google has taken no action.

Well, off I go to take care of a few competitors.

[wholland]

It seems that Yahoo puts a very heavy weight on words being in the domain name. I have two domains that point to the same site one that I use and the other I don't really do anything with. Since they point to the same place both sites have the exact same content. The domain I use has 106 backlinks, the other has 3, 2 from itself and 1 from the other domain.

Yahoo ranks the domain with only 3 backlinks at #10, while the one with 100+ backlins is at 25. The search term I am using has all the words in the 3 link domain, but only 1 in the 100+ link domain.

Based on that I conclude that having the search term in your domain name is very important. By simply getting a domain with each of your search terms, a couple backlinks, and some optimized text it seems that one could get good rankings.

I am surprised that yahoo even ranks both sites, I would have though they could tell that one is just a pointer to the same site.

I guess that is why the top couple pages have multiple copies of the same site. They really need to fix that.

PS. Where can I report spam to yahoo? should I use the link at the bottom of the search page, or is there a better place?

[bkernst]

On my own site I can set up 60 subdomains out of which only 3 are currently used. There is a chance that Google goes to some extend also after the domain name, since one of my sites ranks well for a 2 word phrase out of which only one word is in the page title of the home page, but both words are in the subdomain name. The site also ranks quite well on Yahoo and MSN.

Bernhard

[Jill]

Based on that I conclude that having the search term in your domain name is very important.

I disagree.

I have tons of sites in Google without keywords in the domain name that rank very highly for their keyword phrases (some fairly competitive).

It's really important to remember that those who use keyword rich domains are doing other things to optimize their sites also. Just because you see keyworded domains ranking highly, doesn't mean that the keyworded domain is the cause. It might be, or it might not be, or it might be one small factor. Or it might be one big factor.

Until someone shows me some conclusive tests that can prove it beyond a shadow of a doubt with no other things effecting the rankings, then I won't believe it.

Jill

[wholland]

I have tons of sites in Google without keywords in the domain name that rank very highly for their keyword phrases (some fairly competitive).

It's really important to remember that those who use keyword rich domains are doing other things to optimize their sites also. Just because you see keyworded domains ranking highly, doesn't mean that the keyworded domain is the cause. It might be, or it might not be, or it might be one small factor. Or it might be one big factor.

Until someone shows me some conclusive tests that can prove it beyond a shadow of a doubt with no other things effecting the rankings, then I won't believe it.

Jill

I was referring to my own site, so I know that both sites are exactly the same. The only difference between the 2 is backlinks and domain name. and the site with fewer backlinks, only 3, and more keywords in the domain ranks much better than the one with 100+ backlinks and only one KW in the domain.

Also I was talking about Yahoo, not google. Google is smart enough to figure out that they are the same site and only lists one.

where is the best place to report spam to Yahoo?