User Generated Content and SEO (Part 5)

No good deed goes unpunished.

If it looks too good to be true, it probably is.

There’s no such thing as a free lunch.

Okay, you get the idea.  

UGC is a great SEO device, but it does have a dark side.  That dark side is pretty scary, too.  It’s always scary when you relinquish some control, after all.  That’s what happens when you create space for user generated content.  You don’t own those visitors and you can’t control their behavior.  You can, and must, monitor them.  But if you get too draconian in your enforcement of “your way”, it’s going to choke off users from bothering to supply input.

What kind of risks are we talking about?  Spam is the obvious example.  You can expect to get loads and loads of spam dropped off on your doorstep every morning.  You’re going to need to find a way to keep it away (good filtering, etc.) or you’re going to need to be prepared to clean it up.

Don’t underestimate this problem, either.  It’s not just a matter of having some unattractive “free cialis” post in the middle of your great discussion about “how to retrofit the 2009 widget with a tumbler bar from the 2003 widget”.  Those spammy distractions discourage other users from participating.  They’re a huge turnoff.  They also put your whole site at risk.

We all know that Google is not a fan of sites that go around linking out to what it considers “bad neighborhoods”.  Well, that’s just what those spammers will do.  If you give them the chance, they’ll link out to every bad neighborhood you can imagine.  If you’re not on your toes and you get bowled over with spam, it could (quite literally) kill things off for you.  Welcome to the blacklist, lazy webmaster whose site features 1,000s of outbound links to malaware, porn and gambling sites!

That isn’t doomsday exaggeration, either.  It happens.

And that means that you’re going to need to make sure that you have the right security in place.  You’re going to want to validate accounts.  You’ll need to do some kind of spam catching ala Askimet.  You’ll need to actually moderate what’s going on in forums and discussion areas.  

On balance, UGC is a winner.  However, it must be handled effectively.  Failure to enact adequate safeguards can make the great idea of encouraging participation turn into a nightmare.