Cloud stacking SEO is an old technique that used to work quite well in the early days of search engines and services like Google Sites, Google Drive, and other public-facing cloud-base web building services. Cloud stacking SEO is when you create a ton of off-line resources. You can create a Google Site with a lot of content, with links that point back to your website. You can make a Google Sheet with a list of resources for potential users and then use that to build links to your website, finishing it off by publishing it as a public web file. Another interesting way of cloud stacking is to use a resource on a .edu domain to build off-page SEO resources with links that point back to your website. Let’s take a look at how cloud stacking SEO works and whether or not it is something that you should use for your SEO.
Using Google Sites for Cloud Stacking SEO
Seemingly enough, Google Sites can provide you with all the resources that you need to get started for cloud stacking SEO. Let’s use the search term “does Google cloud stacking work for SEO” as an example. One of the websites that shows up in the featured snippets section is this website: https://sites.google.com/view/entity-stacking/domov.
This website, upon further examination, is a little bit spammy. The content is not all that well written, there are links that reference the targeted website for SEO, and the design is not all that great. Because this is a long-tail keyword, the site appears in the featured snippets section.
Another Example of Cloud Stacking SEO
Google Drive Cloud Stacking SEO can work well for long tail, easy-to-rank keywords. For example, a search query for “affordable San Jose” will often trigger a first-page result for a local SEO agency. If you scroll down to the bottom of the website, you will see that the Google Site links back to a website for an SEO agency and the agency’s Google Map listing.
Why Did SEOs Start Doing Google Cloud Stacking SEO?
Google started penalizing websites for spammy backlinks in the early 2010s. SEOs would try to get around this by using cloud-based services like Google Sites as a buffer for the PBNs that were building their links and their website. If you build enough PBN websites and direct them towards your Google Site, you can then link back to your URL without creating spam. Google started cracking down on this and other Web 2.0s, like Google’s blogging service and drive assets. At the end of the day, Google and other search engines have devalued the ancient technique of Google Cloud Stacking SEO.
How Much Cloud Stacking SEO Would You Have To Do For It To Be Effective?
Google Cloud SEO stacking might be effective on longer tail, lower volume keywords. No one is ever going to click on a cloud stacked SERP, the user experience on the website will be poor because it’s done in a hurry, and no one will click through to your website from the cloud-stacked URL. If you wanted to push down a competitor for a particular keyword, but you would have to push down your competitors for every keyword where they outranked you. For each search term, you would need to create a cloud resource for the SEO cloud stacking effort, design pages on the website with a lot of content (likely 3,000 to 5,000 words), and then actually get Google to crawl the site. Only the oldest of cloud stacking SEO websites can be found in the SERPs. (Many of the examples used in this blog post are over five years old and have long since been forgotten).
Should You Do Cloud Stacking SEO?
The short answer is no, you should not do cloud stacking SEO. Essentially you are wasting your time building a ton of resources for a website that is likely to never rank. Here are some of the cons of cloud stacking SEO:
- It’s super spammy.
- You never develop any web authority since search engines are most likely to devalue the rank.
- You are better off spending your time developing great content for your own website or for guest blog posts.
- You will forget about managing the stacked site over the years and it may become an unwanted eyesore if customers find it.
Here are some tips for making sure that your website works well in search engines with white-hat SEO instead:
- Focus on creating high-quality, unique content that provides value to your audience. This includes optimizing your content for relevant keywords and ensuring it is well-written, informative, and engaging.
- Use on-page optimization techniques such as optimizing your page titles, meta descriptions, and header tags to improve your website's relevance and usability.
- Build high-quality backlinks to your website from reputable and relevant sources. This can be achieved by creating valuable content that others want to link to, participating in industry-specific forums and communities, and reaching out to other websites for link opportunities.
- Ensure your website is mobile-friendly, fast-loading, and easy to navigate. This includes optimizing your website's design and structure, minimizing page load times, and ensuring that it is accessible to all users.
- Engage with your audience and build a strong online presence by participating in social media, creating valuable and shareable content, and engaging with your audience through comments, reviews, and other forms of communication.