SEO Tools - Search Engine Optimization Tools Free Keyword Research Tool   
 SEO Tools   15 Minute SEO   SEO Tutorial   SEO Articles   How To Google Adwords   SEO Comics   SEO Glossary   SEO Puzzle   Web Tools 

 Why Using Captchas on Your Site Is a Bad Idea





Top SEO Web Hosting Companies
 SEO Services
 White Label SEO
 Backlinks
 Blog Writing Service
 Website Monitoring
 TheHOTH Reviews
 Local SEO Services
 Attracta Reviews
 Guest Posting Service
 Logo Maker
 How to Start a Blog
 Popular SEO Articles
 5 Restaurant Digital Marketing Strategies That Work
 WordPress vs Drupal vs Joomla! – Which Content Management System Is Best for Your Business Website
 5 Reasons You Should Hire Expert SEO Services to Help Your Website Rank
 How Important is SEO for Lead Generation?
 7 SEO KPIs You Should Focus On
 Recent SEO Articles
 The Role of SEO in Effective Online Presence Management
 How to Tailor Your Business Lead Strategy for Success
 Breaking Down the Top B2B SEO Tools: How to Choose the Right One for Your Business
 Custom WordPress Development: 4 Essential Tips for Building Your Dream Website
 5 Tips for Running a Successful Heating and Cooling Company
 3 Essential Skills Every Website Manager Should Have
 Why a Local SEO Audit is Essential for Small Businesses
 SEO Tools
 Free Keyword Research Tool
 Free SEO Audit Tool
 Similar Page Checker
 Search Engine Spider Simulator
 Free Alternative to Google Keyword Planner
 Backlink Anchor Text Analysis
 Backlink Builder
 Backlink Summary
 Keyword Density Cloud
 Search Engine Friendly Redirect Check
 Htaccess Redirect Generator
 Link Price Calculator
 Reciprocal Link Checker
 Domain Age Tool
 Keyword Playground
 Website Keyword Suggestions
 URL Rewriting Tool
 Keyword-Rich Domain Suggestions
 Alexa Rank Checker
 301 Redirects
 
 Web Tools
 HTTP / HTTPS Header Check
 Whois Lookup
 Domain Age Tool
 Online MD5 Generator
 Online URL Encoder
 Online URL Decoder
 Google Malware Check Tool
 File Search Engine
 SEO Bookmarklets
 
 SEO Articles
 Iphone App Store Optimization
 2016 SEO Strategy Template
 SEO Plugins for WordPress
 How to Get Whitehat Links
 Advertising on Facebook
 Website Speed and Search Rankings
 How & Why to Use a Press Release Service
 Keyword Volume Tools
 Why Using Captchas Is a Bad Idea?
 Improve SEO Rankings with Google Plus
 How to Get Traffic from Tumblr
 How to Perform a SEO Audit
 How to Acquire SEO Customers
 How to convince your SEO client
 35 lessons a decade in SEO has taught me
 Using Google Webmaster Tools for SEO
 How to Protect Your Content
 How to Get Traffic From Slideshare
 Free SEO vs Paid SEM
 How to Choose a SEM Company
 Top Paying Adsense Keywords List
 Best Affiliate Programs
 How to Use Guest Posts for Backlinks
 Check Site Rank
 Google Adwords Alternatives
 How to Get Traffic From Pinterest
 How to Make Money with Google Adsense
 How to Get Free Press Coverage
 Promoting your book on amazon
 Google Adsense Alternatives
 The Google Panda Update
 How to Analyze Your SEO Competitors
 How to Optimize for Baidu
 SEO for Local Businesses
 Mobile search engine optimization
 SEO Friendly Designers
 Boost SEO with Google Adwords
 YouTube Traffic
 Make money website
 Top 10 Costly Link Building Mistakes
 How to get traffic
 How to get traffic from Facebook
 How to get traffic from Twitter
 HTML 5 and SEO
 SEO Careers during a Recession
 Bing Optimization
 SEO Mistakes
 SEO as a Career
 Traffic from Social Bookmarking sites
 Choosing a SEO Company
 Keyword Difficulty
 Optimizing for MSN
 Web Directories and SEO
 Importance of Sitemaps
 How to Build Backlinks
 Reinclusion in Google
 Optimizing Flash Sites
 Bad Neighborhood
 What is Robots.txt
 Google Sandbox
 Optimizing for Yahoo
 The Spider View of your Website
 Avoid SEO over-optimization
 Country Specific Search Engines
 The Age of a Domain Name
 Importance of Backlinks
 Dynamic URLs vs. Static URLs
 Duplicate Content Filter
 What Is SEO
 SEO Friendly Hosting
 More SEO Articles >>
 
 Seo Tips
 301 Redirects
 SEO Hosting
 Page Layout Ideas
 Stop Words
 
 Contact Us


Managed SEO

Captchas are probably the second most irritating thing on the Web after popups. However, even if you don't care if your visitors leave your site mad or not, captchas have one other side effect that can really hurt you - they kill conversions. And this is more than you can take because it hits you straight in the pocket.

Spam Is Bad but Captchas Aren't Better Either

When the Web began to develop at rocket speed at the end of the last century, so did spam. Spam quickly turned into a nightmare for many sites and webmasters desperately sought a solution to the spam problem. Such a solution was offered quickly and it was called CAPTCHA (Completely Automated Public Turing test to tell Computers and Humans Apart). The function of captchas was to stop spambots from doing their jobs.

As it turned out pretty soon, spambots (and their creators) aren't that stupid and they quickly figured out ways to outfox captchas. Nevertheless, captchas still manage to filter at least a portion of the spam a site is getting and this is why they are still in business.

However, this comes at a price. Captchas stop not only spambots but they are an obstacle to legit human visitors as well. What is worse, captchas stop only humans but search engine bots as well. If you have content that is accessible only after a captcha is entered correctly, it's quite obvious this content is out of reach for search engine spiders who even if they could, wouldn't bother with filling in captchas �?? they just move to the next site that is more welcoming.

In the worst case, the most annoying thing about captchas is that when they are not implemented properly, there is data loss. Consider the case when your captcha is next to illegible and/or when after the captchas is filled incorrectly, all the data on the form is wiped out and the mad user has to start from scratch. What do you think - how many of the users will bother to refill the form just to buy something from you, for example?

Captchas Hurt Conversions

Captchas are bad from usability point of view and as already mentioned, if they stop search engine spiders from indexing pages behind the captcha, they are bad for SEO as well. However, the real damage is done when you consider conversions. Captchas simply kill conversions and probably this is their worst disadvantage in terms of SEO.

Lost conversions matter more than spam. Spam might be irritating but it doesn't kill your business the way lack of conversions does. While the results vary from site to site, when captchas are on, this could decrease conversions big time. For instance, if you have a captcha on a newsletter signup form, this could cut your subscribers in half because many users won't even bother to try their luck with the captcha. If you have a captcha on a shopping site, this might spare you some fake orders but the number of frustrated customers will be times higher than this.

Basically, the more difficult and illegible the captcha, the higher the drop in conversions. If you don't believe it, experiment on your site with captchas with varying difficulty and take notes of the results.

Standard captchas that require the user to fill in letters and numbers are the most acceptable of all but they still are quite of a hurdle. Audio and video captchas are a real kill because they might require up to a minute of your users' time to listen to or watch and fill in. This is why it's hardly surprising that audio and video captchas are the ones with the highest give up rates.

Captcha Alternatives

Unfortunately, no matter how much technology advances, the real captcha alternatives are yet to be seen. This doesn't mean you are completely helpless against spam. Here are 3 captcha alternatives you might want to try:

  • Use a less annoying captcha variation. Out of the numerous captcha variations, there are some that are more acceptable to users, for instance the variation where a user has to solve a simple math problem (like 3+4) and enter the result. This captcha variety eliminates the illegible letters that piss users most and if you use simple math problems all your users can solve, this might solve the captcha problem for you.

  • Get Akismet, or other third-party anti-spam solutions. The next alternative you have is to use a dedicated anti-spam solution. The choice here is overwhelming and your options vary depending on what you need the spam filter for. One of the universal spam filters that is available for multiple platforms is Akismet, so if you haven't tried it so far, now is the time to do it.

  • Apply the honeypot technique. The honeypot technique includes a field that is to be left empty by the user. This way it is supposed that humans won't fill the field, only robots who don't understand the instructions will. However, the honeypot technique is everything but fool-proof. Absent-minded or visually impaired users could fill the field and smarter robots could avoid it. These are the reasons why the honeypot technique is not that popular in practice.

Time to Get Rid of the Captcha?

As you see, captchas are bad but their alternatives aren't much of a solution either. Therefore, the only option you might have is to get rid of the captcha. In many cases this could be your best move?? i.e. if you don't get huge volumes of spam but captchas kill your conversions, then you'd better part with it. On the other hand, if you do get huge volumes of spam and the captcha isn't that much of a problem for your users, the answer is obvious -? leave the captcha. You just need to analyze your situation in particular and decide what works in your case and what doesn't.



 
Copyright 2018 webconfs.com