Hreflang spam + subdomains = $$ (DO THIS NOW)

Quick Overview

The speaker confirms that the strategy involving Hreflang spam combined with subdomains, which previously yielded fast indexing and revenue for casino sites, is now largely ineffective because Google has taken action against it, resulting in zero indexing for six tested subdomains and the site owner being blocked from receiving partnership requests due to perceived spammy behavior.

Key Points: Six tested casino subdomains using the Hreflang spam technique failed to rank within 2-3 days, indicating the tactic is currently ineffective. The speaker explicitly states they will not be citing the specific ranking casino page they analyzed, but confirmed it was a single-page site with no other ranking content. The analyzed EU domain uses Hreflang tags to point to en-US and en-CA versions, while the main page is likely the en-EU version, showing an attempt at international targeting. A commenter noted that Google penalizes duplicate content, and that subdomains do not pass full SEO value to the root domain, suggesting risks like domain splitting, traffic loss, and wasted crawl budget. The speaker received feedback that their aggressive promotion of this method resulted in being perceived as 'dodge' and led to being blocked from partnership requests. The speaker tested the Hreflang strategy on one of the sites using a canonical trick and found that even this approach failed to yield results. The speaker promotes IndexChex, an indexing solution, offering 150 free credits upon signup, suggesting it as a tool for verifying indexing status.

Context: The video addresses a controversial Search Engine Optimization (SEO) technique involving the manipulation of Hreflang tags combined with the use of subdomains, often employed in competitive niches like online casinos, to achieve rapid indexing and ranking. The speaker, Jacky Chou (wearing a LocalRank hat), previously discussed how this method worked, but now presents updated findings based on recent tests and community feedback, particularly concerning whether Google has penalized or stopped recognizing this approach.