29 Aug05

MetaTags why bother?

You'll hear conflicting opinions on the importance of Meta tags - hidden text contained in the heading of an HTML page. While meta tags aren't the answer to why your site isn't being listed, they are an essential part of a well-designed web site promotion programme. Many search engines ignore Meta Tags, but some do still give relevance to their content by comparing the tags to the visible page content.
Remember that search engine operators are trying to offer relevant hits. It's easy to insert hidden text in Meta Tags that has no relevance to the actual page content, and thus attempt to fool the search engine. But how does the spider know what's important on the page? One significant clue would be to read the Meta Tags and then look for corresponding visible text on the page; if the same words occur in both then there's a very good chance that the tag is for real and worthy of a high relevancy score.
The key is to use a carefully judged mix of the Meta tags and title. Most search engines give additional weight to words found in the Title tag if those words are also found in the body text. In many cases, the Meta description is the text that is presented by the search engine following the site's listing. It describes your site to the people reading the search results. It's your opportunity to persuade them that the search is relevant and that they should click on your site - not the one above or below. Read more in our free SEO tutorials.

18 Aug05

Sandbox or no Sandbox?

What a damn stupid question.....! The fact is that despite Googles lack of comment on the subject, the fact remains that new sites (i.e. new to Google) are placed regardless of stature, in a holding area. This is possibly to allow time for Google to determine how users react to it, what the content is, is the site stable, who links to it and if the links are solid and reliable.
There is a theory that the whole concept of the "sandbox" is a ploy just to get the spend up on Adwords, I don't think I'd wish to comment one way or the other, but the fact remains that in Google newly recognised sites are taking longer to get good listings in the SERPs (search engine results pages).

12 Aug05

Lockergnome fall out.

Chris Pirillo of Lockergnome and TechTV fame (and a fellow MSN Search Champ) is reported to have had a small altercation with Jupitermedia staff at SES San Jose 2005's press table. Jupitermedia staff demanded he supply a sample of his work to prove that he did indeed qualify as a member of the online media. I bet they wished they hadn't, eh Chis?

12 Aug05

Basic Accessibility is good for all,
including search engines.

Yet again I find myself having a heated debate with a customer regarding site design. Not only for search engines, which is obviously my bread and butter. But when a site is so far off the beaten track, that a search engine spider would shrug the content as not being there, it reinforces the question of Accessibility. It's fine for the more creative web designers to disregard search engines, so what if the site doesn't get any traffic because the developer was a brainless nerd (keeps me in a job).
I for one have given the issue of accessibility much thought. Other than the usual problems caused by designers with technology at their fingertips and an over excited imagination, the problems really start to come with the use of tables. Because "site readers" read the html code in the order that it appears in the source code. The use of tables therefore can disrupt the order of the text, making it difficult to read and understand effectively. However without tables all the nice layout and graphical structure falls apart (hell I'm sounding like a designer). One alternative is to reproduce the entire site as a pure text version. This can get messy, not only does this mean that you have two sites to maintain but you also need to be extremely careful with the robots text to ensure you don't get picked up by the search engines as having identical / duplicate content.
The Accessibility issue is huge and one that needs closer scrutiny. David Miller of North-Square has written a very good article on the subject, highlighting the use of Cascading Style Sheets instead of tables.

11 Aug05

Search Engines on Links, at SES.

Search Engine Strategies is in full swing in San Jose. Yesterday Tim Mayer of Yahoo, Matt Cutts of Google and Kaushal Kurapti from Ask Jeeves sat on a link building panel. The massages were clear the engines are looking for natural linking patterns, different domains, different IP addresses, mixed anchor text, no Link farms, no cloaked pages, avoid hidden links and image links. Become an authority on the subject, make a site that, because of it's content, doesn't have to ask for links.
Nothing new there then, but in the real world how will a nowhere web site ever grow at a sufficient rate naturally to become important enough to compete against those sites already in the top slots? As usual SES is being used to peddle the corporate line, and whilst true "white hat" SEO does work it takes years of hard work. Whilst I'd never advocate the use of "black hat" (not unless you can afford to get your URL banned) there are a lot of things you can do in the "pale grey hat" areas that will accelerate a sites listings safely and positively.

JupiterMedia sold.

Jupitermedia Corporation, have sold the SearchEngine Strategies Show, SearchEngineWatch.com and ClickZ.com to London based Incisive Media PLC for $43 million. All this just as the long awaited Search Engine Strategies Conference gets under way in San Jose, California on the 8th Aug.

PageRank, finally settled down.

It's been a long process but PR has, it would appear, finally settled down. It would appear that yet again the update is about a month old, in that pages from the beginning of July have not been allocated PageRank but pages created in June have. PageRank Updates

RelevancyRank a backwards step?

For some time the search engines have been trying to overcome the antics of the search engine spammers. Claria have just released a product which they think may just overcome the link spammer.
According to their press release "RelevancyRank is a revolutionary search capability that ranks Web pages based on consumer surfing behavior. The technology incorporates basic metrics such as click rates, as well as critical post-click metrics of consumer behavior - such as time spent viewing a site, number of pages viewed at a site, number of return visits to a destination Web site, historical interests based on Web-wide surfing habits, and conversion behavior."
Microsoft have expressed a reluctance to adopt the technology, however we have seen indications that suggest that Google may already be implementing something like it. Whilst some have applauded the technology and at first glance using visitor metrics would appear to be a good idea, it may have serious implications to search and resurrect an old largely forgotten spam technique. Read more

Googles PageRank, update revoked

Over the last few days the PageRank update that was taking place at the end of last week was revoked!!! This is the second time in six weeks that a revised PageRank has been available for view only to removed a couple of days later. PageRank Updates

Googles PageRank, how important is it?

With a PageRank update looming as we speak, whilst the SEO community might be trembling in anticipation, to the man in the street the fuss appears to be about nothing.
In fact that's true, PageRank has become a bit of a red herring. This is because most of the information available about search engine optimisation is nothing more than folk law. Often the first thing a site owner will come across when they finally wake up to the idea of optimisation, is usually PageRank. This mystery number that Google awards to important sites, so an entire industry has evolved in the process of PageRank chasing. But before you embark on the same blind leap Read more

So you think you should be Number One!

With ever increasing regularity these days, we get email's and telephone calls from web site owners who think, with the waive of a magic wand, overnight they can overcoming all rivals and be number one in the generic search listings for their chosen search phrase.
It may come as a shock but there are only 10 top places, to be one of them you first have to catch up with the sites already there and unseat them. Depending on the search term and the competition typically this can take a lot of work, and a lot of time. So how do you get to the top? Read more.