Integrity Defined

Dictionary.com defines "Integrity" as:

• Steadfast adherence to a strict moral or ethical code.
• The state of being unimpaired; soundness.
• The quality or condition of being whole or undivided; completeness.

Commentary on Integrity

You may be asking yourself:

Why include a page on "Integrity" on Web Development and Marketing Company's website?

Earlier this year we were reminded of the power of "Integrity" and in some cases the perceived "Lack of Integrity" when Google "banned" the "TrafficPower" website along with most of their customer's Sites. If you are not familiar with the story then a simple Google Search for "TrafficPower" will help you get updated.

Many Site owners had their Sites suddenly banned and delisted from Google due to unscrupulous practices outside the guidelines presented to webmasters on their webmaster guidelines pages.

Yahoo also publishes similar webmaster guidelines.

MSN's content guidelines can be found here.

The Search Engines provide a free service to the public while competing for an estimated $9Billion ad revenue market. They have the right to determine what the "most relevant" results are according to the millions of dollars they pour into proprietary algorithms.

Search Engine Optimization Integrity

In the past many SEO (Search Engine Optimizers) tested different points in the algorithms and found loopholes revealing methods to beat the Search Engines, gaining unfair and undeserved temporary advantages for themselves monetarily and their clients in the Search Engine Results Pages (SERPs). When a Site gets banned, it gets delisted and doesn't show up in potential customer Internet searches.

The reason the Search Engines penalize these practices so severely is that these unfair advantages cause irrelevant search results and threatens their loyal usership and subsequent ad revenue by diminishing relevancy.

In fact a search for "TrafficPower" in just about any search engine still reveals links to many "gateway" pages and other trash, including abandoned Sites.

It is extremely difficult to bring a Site back after being banned, and permanent "bannings" do occur.

Many have lost their livelihoods and businesses due to unscrupulous practices. Many of the Site owners who have been banned were unsuspecting victims that didn't know they were subscribing to prohibited practices.

We frequently receive e-mails telling us that we can have top Search Engine Results if we become their client. That should be your first "red flag". No one can promise top search engine results, especially those that claim it is also permanent. That is laughable at best.

The second "red flag" should be when you check to see what their website PageRank is and find a PR0. They can make all kinds of promises but can't help their own rankings? You can download the Google Toolbar and check PageRank on any Site here. The download is free.

The third "red flag" should be that they don't have solid references or at best advertise non-competitive client key phrase examples.

Make sure you know enough about these issues to avoid these pitfalls. The old adage applies; "If it sounds too good to be true, it probably is."

If approached by anyone offering these unreal promises, we recommend not taking the risk.

Read what Google has to say about SEOs.

Design Integrity

As we have already alluded to, Knowledge and Integrity are inextricably tied together. When it comes to Design Integrity it is noteworthy to mention that most web designers do not write clean code based on accepted proposed standards by the W3C (World Wide Web Consortium). You can access their HTML validation service page and check any Site including your own for errors and warnings.

There are many reasons to write and validate clean code. Read more about the intrinsic value associated with validation on our Executive Express Page.

There are many languages that can be used in web design and many have some advantages over others for different purposes. Although, some of the Search Engines parse several languages the SERPs seem to indicate that HTML 4.01 (XHTML) is favored for better Search Engine Results.

We do not recommend all "Flash" Sites for our clients at this time. If "movies" are desired for a Site then we suggest a combination of content depth in HTML with "Flash" as we have done on the Tubel Technologies website.

Knowledge and Integrity

Integrity with a lack of knowledge can diminish a website's value just as severely as knowledge with a lack of integrity can. We hope the information provided here will help our visitors avoid these problematic issues.