Bolded text?

My friend was just going through my site - and he told me that some of my text that was bolded using the <B> method was black hat SEO - is this true?

 

If it made sense to emphasize the bolded words to the reader then no problem. That's what <b> is for.

 

What if it was just to use it as optimization? Like <b>Webmaster site</b> or something.

 

Pretend the SEs don't exist and just write stuff for your visitors is my advice.

Also, think about the negative consequences of overdoing the bolding. Your visitors won't want to stay around if your site looks spammy.

 

Thanks man - I only had one piece of text on my footer bolded and the guy goes 'that's black hat SEO, I read about'.

 

I'll burn in hell before I let some SE tell me how to write my copy.

 

It's important to bolden things especially if what you are writing is long.

It makes the main points stick out.

Skinny

 

on a related note, what is the difference between <b> and <strong>?

 

- from: http://www.macromedia.com/cfusion/knowledgebase/index.cfm?id=tn_16798 - Macromedia - it might not be the most best source...

But if you google for "bold and strong difference" you'll find other sources and the conclusion is the same.

 

I have read some where <strong> should be used in place of <B> for SEs.

I agree with the difference in <strong> and <B> you told.

Still, issue left is -- "Is use of <B> means spam for SEs"?

I say...no. It can not be....untill you over do it. If overdone than it will call keyword spamming.

Better idea is use <h2> or <h3> and customize the size with CSS.

 

I agree and prefer to use the h2, h3, h4, h5, and h6 tags..Although as far as using <b> and <strong> I highly doubt any of the SE's see either as spam..

 

Ya, same here - I just use the <b> tag when I'm being lazy.