Search Engines Policies towards Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

Search engine operators are somewhat wary of Search Engine Optimization because of the potential for SEO to skew the search results.

Search engine optimization specialists believe that SEO is a necessary requirement to enable quality web sites to achieve good search engine rankings.

The compromise seems to be that search engine operators define some SEO activities as "good SEO" and other SEO activities as "bad SEO".

Search engine operators attempt to manually or automatically penalize "bad SEO" when they find it or when it is reported to them.

That said, here are some official statements from search engine operators regarding search engine optimization:

• Google's Webmaster Guidelines
• MSN Search Guidelines for Webmasters and Microsoft bCentral Search Engine Optimization Tips
• Yahoo's How do I improve the ranking of my web site in the search results? and Yahoo's Guidelines on spam
• AskJeeves / Teoma Site Submit Service Terms and Conditions