Is this considered blackhat SEO ?

[penaxr]

The theme I currently use as no H1 tag on the index because I'm using latest posts as default homepage right now because I dont have that much content.

I was thinking about adding an H1 tag in the code and with CSS making it invisible/not show because it would not look good with the theme. So would google penalize me over this ? I want to make this project the most legit I can so before doing this I'll be sure I won't be in trouble for doing this.

thank you

 

[TomTheCat]

Yes. Not advisable.

 

[BentMo]

It's a bit like cloaking, it's blackhat but if all blackhat stuffs were dangerous, there would be no blackhat...

The only thing that guessing if it is or not, makes it blackhat

 

[693840]

I don't think Google spots invisible things with their crawler. (can anyone confirm?)

 

[BentMo]

I don't think Google spots invisible things with their crawler. (can anyone confirm?)

Google doesn't care baout visible or invisible, it's a bot chich reads the code...
Mostly, If it's on the code, Google will read it

 

[TomTheCat]

I don't think Google spots invisible things with their crawler. (can anyone confirm?)

Why wouldn't it? The bot should be based on the latest Chromium version, which can understand very well JavaScript and CSS.

 

[693840]

Thanks @TomTheCat @BentMo

 

[penaxr]

Decided to not try on this project but will try on a other project and see if I see something happening.

thanks all for the feedback

 

[Starblazer]

H1 is a header tag. If you don't need a heading, don't use it. Many top websites don't use it and several forum software like Xenforo (the one BHW uses) don't use H1 tag on home page. It's fine to have no H1 tag or multiple H1 tags (which wasn't my personal opinion but according to John Mueller & Moz). So, leave it if you don't need it. I can understand that several SEO tools and analyzers show it as an error, but ignore them.

On the other hand, hiding your H1 tag could create problems. Google's algo identifies several issues like hidden text & links to combat blackhat tactics like keyword stuffing, spam backlinks, cloaking etc. Even if they don't penalize your site, they may mark your site as not reliable which effects your trust score without having any manual actions or notifications. So, I'd suggest you not to do it. However, you can do more research if you want.

 

[SocialEyez]

This was actually a thing in the earlier days of google and SEO, it was actually one of the most viable black hat tactics this invisible text.

But as you would imagine, it is also one of the easiest for them to fix, i think its no longer working for over 10 years

 

[SirLouen]

Google doesn't care baout visible or invisible, it's a bot chich reads the code...
Mostly, If it's on the code, Google will read it

This is false. Google renders the site and even renders deferred Javascript

If the H1 is not visible it is useless.
But you can modify, via JS the first H2 to be an H1 and fix this. The problem is that all H2 are title tags for your posts it will be changing frequently which is not adviceable.
Don't get too stucked on this. H1 is just useful for giving certaing keyword a slight extra bit of power, but nothing outstanding.