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AllTheWeb and META refresh tags
Webmasters use the META Refresh tag on their Web pages to
redirect users to another Web page. They often use it on so-called
"bridge pages". Users access this page first and
then they're automatically redirected to another Web page.
For example, the following HTML tag redirects to "www.domain.com/second-page.htm"
after 5 seconds:
<META HTTP-EQUIV="Refresh" CONTENT="5;URL=http://www.domain.com/second-page.htm">
Many search engines don't like the META Refresh tag. Webmasters
can abuse it to spam search engines with similar pages which
all redirect to the same page.
Four months ago, we finished the biggest search engine ranking
study ever conducted: We analyzed 103,260 top 10 Web pages
on six search engines to find out why they are well ranked
in the search engines.
Of course, we also examined which role META Refresh tags
play on search engines.
We found out that 5,1% of the #1 Web pages on AllTheWeb used
the META Refresh tag.
In addition, we discovered that nearly 50% of those #1 Web
pages used no delay (0 seconds) in their META Refresh tag
to redirect to another Web page.
Most search engines utilize filter algorithms that will detect
the META Refresh tag and they'll ignore or even ban Web pages
using it. However, it seems that AllTheWeb is still vulnerable
to this kind of search engine spamming and that bridge pages
or doorway pages are still able to obtain #1 rankings.
Nevertheless, we advise you not to use bridge pages to obtain
high rankings. Sooner or later, all search engines will detect
this kind of search engine spamming.
There's a simple reason for it: Web pages that use the META
Refresh tag make search engine databases cluttered with multiple
versions of irrelevant Web pages.
Source:
Search
Engine Ranking Study 2002
If you want to know what other factors are taken into account
by AllTheWeb, Google, AltaVista and others, read the full
search
engine ranking study .
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