Are Stop Words Worth Worrying About?

Are you familiar with “stop words”?  This is a hot topic among freelance web writers right now.

Essentially “stop words” are words or phrases that are supposed to be so “offensive” to the big ad networks that just having one of those words in your article can prevent advertisements from showing on your web page.  And if the ads do show, often they’re public service announcements instead of actual revenue-generating ads.

None of the big ad networks has ever confirmed the existence of stop words and there’s much speculation about which words and phrases would make the list, assuming such a list actually exists.  But generally, anything having to do with weapons, certain parts of the anatomy or any word you can’t hear on late-night television is considered a candidate for the stop word list.

So is this really something you should worry about?  In my opinion, no.  My 9-to-5 job sees me writing and editing dozens of medical articles a week.  I’ve read (and written) more articles detailing human anatomy than I care to admit.  Never once have I ever had a web page that didn’t show ads, no matter how explicit my content was.

Is my experience unique?  Maybe.  Perhaps context is important.  There’s a big difference between using correct anatomical terms in a medical article and using low-brow versions of those words to call someone names.  But until I actually see proof that stop words exist I’m going to keep on writing.