Industry News & Trends

BMW in Germany certainly got in a bit of hot water over its doorway pages. Initially banned by Google, BMW quickly cleaned up its act and got back in the search engine index.

Doorway pages are supposed to be old school - so old that any web marketer worth his or her paycheck routinely avoids them.

OK, so maybe prestigious BMW didn't know any better.

In the case of BMW, real pages existed - not just boring doorway paged overstuffed with repetitive keywords. They were simply using a JavaScript to load up nicer versions of each page. Technically, you could call that practice "hanging your cloak in the doorway." Cloaking, by the way, is a term for different web site techniques that allow you to provide the search engines one version of a web page and another version for the public.

So how do we really feel about doorway pages?

We avoid them.

The only thing we share in common with the makers of doorways is the notion of extra content. Google loves content, so we reward it through our clients' web sites. Sometimes we add content (visible text) to pages. Sometimes we make new pages.

Doorway pages come in different shapes and sizes. Historically, these pages sat alone in the directory of a web site. Menacing webmaster made them or used software to crank them out. Then they submitted them to search engines. The public never saw them unless they scored well in the rankings. If someone came across the doorway page - often a logo and giant copy block - they would click on a link to the home page and be on their way.

We feel any content on a web site should be valuable, easy to read or scan, and reflect the overall look and feel of the web site, including the main navigational guides.

We keep that policy in mind if we're adding additional content within a web site or adding some special features that are linked directly off the home page.

Sometimes these extra pages - all within the design and navigational framework - actually rank higher than the original pages on the web site.

Regardless of rankings, we ensure that the information provided within these new pages offers useful information, insights or directions for the web site visitor.

Doorway pages deceive. Reasonable content enlightens.

Questions? Call us at 866-RANK-YOU (726-5968), or email us at info@fathomseo.com.