Don't create multiple pages, subdomains, or domains with substantially duplicate content.
Avoid "doorway" pages created just for search engines, or other "cookie cutter" approaches such as affiliate programs with little or no original content.
Any reputable SEO would warn anyone to avoid unnecessarily invoking the ire of Google, and would certainly warn that rank-checking is both pointless and very very out of date.
The idea that high rankings are the main objective of all SEO is one of the myths of SEO by the uninitiated or unwise. It made number 18 on a list of classic myths regarding SEO recently at the Cre8asite Forums (where both Rand Fishkin and myself are among the roster of moderators).
In the discussion of SEO Myths I explained at length my own reasons for saying that anyone who thinks SEO is all about rankings, the higher the better, has absolutley no real clue as to the real art of SEO in relation to business.
Firstly, the O in SEO stands for optimization. Making optimal. The correct position to be in any SERP is the tested position at which you made the most total profit.
I have personally increased profits for several clients by helping them to drop down a position or two to a more optimal position for their offering.
Why does having a lower position sometimes work better? Lets discuss the two most obvious...
This is not the first time I have heard such a criticism, by any means, during the 10 years that I have been practicing SEO (as it became known in the mid-Nineties). Danny Sullivan proposed that we (those of us in the industry) should attempt to change the name to Search Engine Marketing (SEM) around the turn of the millennium, but the rise in Paid Listings (such as Overture and Google's Adwords) meant that optimizing those kinds of search use for maximum ROI (using day-parting, smarter bidding, better keyword selection, and landing page strategies) tended to be known as SEM, while attaining high rankings in the 'organic' results continues to be known as SEO.
History aside, here's the answer to your issue, which is simply a case of you failing to see perspective:
Typical Root of Argument:
* optimizer - noun
one who makes (something) as perfect, effective, or functional as possible
* search engine - noun
computer software used to search data for specified information
A Search Engine Optimizer is one who makes (a computer program used to (thoroughly look into (something) in an effort to find (something else))) as perfect, effective, or functional as possible.
The Answer to the False Dilemma
A search engine optimizer employed by the search engine company might seek to improve the engine for its owners. He would seek to make it more usable, more successful, and of course, more profitable.
A search engine optimizer employed by a third party seeks to make that same search engine more usable (in finding the products of the company he works for), more successful (in driving custom to the company he works for) and more profitable (to the company he works for).
Optimal is not an absolute. Optimal is a balance. The balance point where the results you wish to achieve are maximised overall. The cattle-breeder wants more meat from each animal. He may call himself a cattle optimizer if he wishes. His optimal aim might seem to be to make bigger better cattle, but 'better for whom? The cattle? No, he is balancing his aims of more profitable cattle against the harm done to the cattle in terms of health, creating a species that needs support to survive, the lifespan of the cattle, ability to breed, etc.
Search engineers themselves learn a lot from SEOs. That rather proves that the term SEO is rather more apt than ever.
Slashdot Mirror
Now there's where you become a black-hat yourself.
Your 'product', if we can call it that, does automated queries to determine ranking. Or as you phrase it on your own site there:
Yet Google is very clear on how they feel about automated queries, especially those done for 'rank checking':
Any reputable SEO would warn anyone to avoid unnecessarily invoking the ire of Google, and would certainly warn that rank-checking is both pointless and very very out of date.
The idea that high rankings are the main objective of all SEO is one of the myths of SEO by the uninitiated or unwise. It made number 18 on a list of classic myths regarding SEO recently at the Cre8asite Forums (where both Rand Fishkin and myself are among the roster of moderators).
In the discussion of SEO Myths I explained at length my own reasons for saying that anyone who thinks SEO is all about rankings, the higher the better, has absolutley no real clue as to the real art of SEO in relation to business.