Google SEO
Overthrow Wikipedia Results
As most of you may have noticed, WIKIPEDIA is ranked on the first page for almost every term. In most cases, they provide a fairly thorough explanation about a topic. In other cases, it provides a terrible user experience. For example, if someone is search for “accounting sofware,” it is very likely that they are [...]
As most of you may have noticed, WIKIPEDIA is ranked on the first page for almost every term. In most cases, they provide a fairly thorough explanation about a topic. In other cases, it provides a terrible user experience. For example, if someone is search for “accounting sofware,” it is very likely that they are actually looking for accounting software and not a 10 page description about it. Well Blue Hat SEO has created an excellent blog post about overthrowing WIKIPEDIA results
Related Blogs
Missing Data in Google Webmaster Tools
I came across an article on Search Engine Land and thought I would talk about the same issue since it’s happened to me (I thought I was the only one!). When you add a domain to your Google Webmaster Tools account, you can sign up using the “www” or non “www” version of your domain. [...]
I came across an article on Search Engine Land and thought I would talk about the same issue since it’s happened to me (I thought I was the only one!). When you add a domain to your Google Webmaster Tools account, you can sign up using the “www” or non “www” version of your domain. I just happened to sign up with the non “www” version of the domain and noticed no stats in my account. I then registered the www version and voila, things started appearing. I later found that Google considers these as two separate domains.
Here’s what Google says about this:
What can I do to make sure I’m seeing all my data?
- If you feel like you’re missing some data, add both the www and the non-www version of your domain to your Webmaster Tools account. Take a look at the data for both sites.
- Do a site: search for your domain without the www (e.g. [site:example.com]). This should return pages from your domain and any of your indexed subdomains (www.example.com, rollergirl.example.com, etc.). You should be able to tell from the results whether your site is mainly indexed with or without the www subdomain. The version that’s indexed is likely to be the version that shows the most data in your Webmaster Tools account.
- Tell us whether you prefer for your site to be indexed with or without the www by setting your preferred domain.
- Let everyone else know which version you prefer by doing a site-wide 301 redirect.
Are Your Images Labeled?
Lee Ogden wrote an excellent article regarding Organic SEO - specifically keywords within articles. He makes some excellent points.
Here’s one:
Using keyword research to flavor the content, whether it’s verbal, in print, in video or audio can all influence how the outcome of the PR action is available through search. Using keywords during an interview [...]
Lee Ogden wrote an excellent article regarding Organic SEO - specifically keywords within articles. He makes some excellent points.
Here’s one:
Using keyword research to flavor the content, whether it’s verbal, in print, in video or audio can all influence how the outcome of the PR action is available through search. Using keywords during an interview for example, can influence how the print version of that interview is discovered on site search or general search engines.
The thing to keep in mind is that if a digital asset (text, image, video, audio) can be searched on, then it can be optimized.
He brings up an EXCELLENT point regarding digital assets. Google images has been sending me a crapload of traffic for an images site. It is extremely important to optimize the ALT tag keywords of your images and also named the images according to the picture. For example, if you have a picture of a dog jumping, name it “dog_jumping.jpg” and create a descriptive alt tag. Read Google’s article about Using Alt Attributes Smartly for more information.
Here is a quote from the above link:
Update: Some of you have asked about the difference between the “alt” and “title” attributes. According to the W3C recommendations, the “alt” attribute specifies an alternate text for user agents that cannot display images, forms or applets. The “title” attribute is a bit different: it “offers advisory information about the element for which it is set.” As the Googlebot does not see the images directly, we generally concentrate on the information provided in the “alt” attribute. Feel free to supplement the “alt” attribute with “title” and other attributes if they provide value to your users!
Here is another great article about Optimizing Your Site For Google Search. Here’s a snippet of the article:
Most importantly enable enhanced image search in google sitemasters tools. Find it under Diagnostics / Tools / Enhanced Image Search
. I’ve JUST started using this a month ago so I can’t comment on it yet but I’ll keep everyone posted.
Google has also released an image labeler (a while ago). It works like this:
1) You click “Start Labeling” and you are automatically paired up with someone
2) Google shows you an image. If you see a picture of a house, Google will give you exclude words that you can’t label the images with.
3) You start entering words that describe the picture you see.
4) Once you and your partner enter a tag that matches, you move onto the next image. The purpose is to get as many points as
possible. The REAL purpose is to help Google identify what the images are.
Visit Google Image Labeler
This is all pretty old news but I’m sure someone out there will learn something from this.
Buying Links - Is It Worth It?
Today we’re going to talk about a very sensitive subject - buying links. Google has made it crystal clear that they are NOT into paid links. They’re so much against it that they’ve created an easy-to-use form so that you can report any offenders. You can check it out here. Google dislikes paid links for [...]
Today we’re going to talk about a very sensitive subject - buying links. Google has made it crystal clear that they are NOT into paid links. They’re so much against it that they’ve created an easy-to-use form so that you can report any offenders. You can check it out here. Google dislikes paid links for the following reason (taken from their site):
Google and most other search engines use links to determine reputation. A site’s ranking in Google search results is partly based on analysis of those sites that link to it. Link-based analysis is an extremely useful way of measuring a site’s value, and has greatly improved the quality of web search. Both the quantity and, more importantly, the quality of links count towards this rating.
However, some SEOs and webmasters engage in the practice of buying and selling links that pass PageRank, disregarding the quality of the links, the sources, and the long-term impact it will have on their sites. Buying or selling links that pass PageRank is in violation of Google’s webmaster guidelines and can negatively impact a site’s ranking in search results.
Not all paid links violate our guidelines. Buying and selling links is a normal part of the economy of the web when done for advertising purposes, and not for manipulation of search results. Links purchased for advertising should be designated as such. This can be done in several ways, such as:
* Adding a rel=”nofollow” attribute to the a tag
* Redirecting the links to an intermediate page that is blocked from search engines with a robots.txt fileGoogle works hard to ensure that it fully discounts links intended to manipulate search engine results, such excessive link exchanges and purchased links that pass PageRank. If you see a site that is buying or selling links that pass PageRank, let us know. We’ll use your information to improve our algorithmic detection of such links.
You can read the full post here
Here are some thoughts.
1) What prevents a competitor from buying links on five different sites and reporting me to Google?
2) Instead of forcing millions of webmasters to do it their way, why don’t they modify their algorithm. Google should penalize bad links. If you are buying advertising on a website and it is providing a GOOD user experience, who really gives a rats a**. Isn’t that what Google’s all about? A good user experience?
3) What if I purchase a link on a PR1 or PR2 website? There is no PR to pass. Well there is but its pretty darn low. Sometimes I will buy advertising because its targeted towards my audience, not because of the PR.
I honestly could care less about my PR. I look at the traffic, demographics and other valuable information to grow and retain the customer base.
Saying that, I WILL be implementing a no-follow where I have posted advertisers links because I don’t want to get my ass banned. I will probably lose the advertisers but what can I do. BIG BROTHER is watching.
October 25th - Google PR Update
Pagerank has been affected for many sites. Some have been positively affected but many have been negatively affected. We are having many reports from both ends of the spectrum.
Again, we have always advised our clients to not use Pagerank as the measure for exchanging links. Use high quality content as a measure instead. Looks for [...]
Pagerank has been affected for many sites. Some have been positively affected but many have been negatively affected. We are having many reports from both ends of the spectrum.
Again, we have always advised our clients to not use Pagerank as the measure for exchanging links. Use high quality content as a measure instead. Looks for long term results!
Google Webmaster Central
This posting is about Google Wembaster Central. Every serious webmaster SHOULD BE signed up with Webmaster Central. Google Webmaster Central shows you the following information:
1. When Googlebot last crawled your pages
2. If your pages are in the Google index or not.
3. All web crawl errors. For example:
- HTTP Errors
- URL’s not [...]
This posting is about Google Wembaster Central. Every serious webmaster SHOULD BE signed up with Webmaster Central. Google Webmaster Central shows you the following information:
1. When Googlebot last crawled your pages
2. If your pages are in the Google index or not.
3. All web crawl errors. For example:
- HTTP Errors
- URL’s not found
- URL’s not followed
- Whats restricted by robots.txt
- etc
4. Crawl Rate
- This measures how many pages are crawled per day
- Number of KB downloaded a day
- You can select how fast you would like Googlebot to crawl your site
5. Query Stats
This is HUGE. Query stats state what terms people are linking to you with. For example, if an external site is linking to you with keywords “Online shopping,” it will state what keyword they are linking to you with. It also states the top search queries that people type into Google to find your site.
6. Links
Shows you how many links are on the web to specific pages of your site.
As you can see, Google Webmaster Central gives you tremendous value, all for free. If you’re in the sandbox, you can try to figure out why you’re in the sandbox, when you were put there, and possibly find out the reasons.
Google Webmaster Central - Backlinks Increased
Its been reported that Google Webmaster Central is showing an increase in backlinks. Most webmasters have seen a significant increase in backlinks for some reason, not quite sure why. Google might correct this but it is positively affecting webmasters right now.
Its been reported that Google Webmaster Central is showing an increase in backlinks. Most webmasters have seen a significant increase in backlinks for some reason, not quite sure why. Google might correct this but it is positively affecting webmasters right now.
