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Definition of the term, "doorway pages"

doorway pages

Also known as: "algo", "algorithm"

Doorway pages are a form of SEO that are generally considered to be unethical. The reason for this is that a doorway page is a pure SEO page generated, either manually or automatically without any thought put into design, marketing, look or feel.

The purpose of doorway pages is to rank a pure text page in search engine results pages (SERPs) and then redirect any resulting traffic to the "real" page of the website - this means that the SEO doesn't need to alter any copy or other elements on the real page. Doorway pages can be placed on the same domain as the target site or on an external domain.

The reason that this technique is considered to be unethical is that it can be used by SEO agencies to "sell" services. In reality, the SEO agency is operating and maintaining the doorway page themselves and selling the traffic to the client. The problem with this (compared to organic SEO) is that as soon as the client stops the SEO service, the traffic stops, whereas organic SEO should continue (to a certain extent) without paying the SEO agency each month.

We would advise clients to stay away from doorway pages simply because they offer a short gap solution, which could easily be provided by a legitimate service such as PPC marketing. Plus, the use of doorway pages can usually lead to a ban from search engines.

Related terms and definitions

• Adwords (aka Google Adwords)
• ban (from search engine index)
• black hat SEO
• ethical SEO

eflaunt is a UK Internet Marketing and Search Engine Optimisation agency based in Edinburgh, Scotland. For industry news, please refer to the eflaunt SEO blog.