Five Negative Search Engine Ranking Factors: BAM!

 

ARE YOUR CLIENT SITES GETTING THROUGH TO SEARCH ENGINES?

Webmaster and hosting blogs are jam-packed with hunches, guesses and opinions on Google’s ranking factors. The most powerful search engine in the world has been dissected, desiccated and analyzed by hundreds of experts and still controversy reigns.

 

Some of the more contentious issues include: server accessibility (get a good web host), quality of site content, domain extensions of sites linking in and outbound links to lower ranking sites. The experts can’t seem to agree on what counts in these areas.

SEOmoz is a great site for information from the ecommerce digi-sphere. Here, you’ll find some of the best information written by some of the most knowledgeable SEO professionals. Sure, there’s bound to be bias and debate, controversy and even the occasional name calling, but it’s all good.

In compiling its lists of positive, controversial and “known” negative ranking factors within the Google search algorithm, SEOmoz.org queried 31 well-known experts on their opinions and one thing is certain: no one individual has it all figured out. The ranking factors employed by the Googlistas change as Google’s math geeks and coders build ever-more sophisticated algos designed to provide more raw data and more pertinent data from spiders.

The Top Five Negative Ranking Factors
So what do the cyber-pros identify as the most negative ranking factors within Google’s current algorithm? They’re listed below but note, take these Google negatives with a grain of salt.

It could all change tonight while you sleep.

Negative Ranking Factor #1: Googlebots can’t access your server.
If the site is down for more than 48 hours, which is often the case with low-rent web hosts located half-way around the world, a site’s Google ranking drops like a stone.

If your host server is down a lot, search engines don’t want to recommend the site to visitors who will see a 404 error message that the site is unavailable and can’t be accessed.

The solution? Find a host that delivers not only a 99.9% uptime but also has local tech support, backup emergency generators and multiple layers of server side security. You’ll spend about $7.00 a month for quality shared hosting. Double that amount for quality dedicated service if cross-server attacks are a concern. Don’t let a few bucks a month keep your site from higher rankings. It’s just not cost effective.

Note: Server availability as a ranking factor is one of the most contended topics among SEO professionals who spend much of their time trying to out-think Googlebots, so even the experts can’t agree on this one.

Negative Ranking Factor #2: Duplicate or Similar Content.
Most experts do agree on this one.

Repetitious content is a stone-cold killer. Now, that doesn’t mean that you can’t pick up a useful piece of syndicated content of interest to your readers. The warning, here, has to do with site text. A programmer can always upload a syndicated article. However, body text should change from page to page, providing a more useful visitor experience.

Of course, duplicate content can be tagged with a designation, but too many of these “do not enter” signs is also a negative ranking factor. Bots want to be able to crawl pages and when you keep them off of critical content pages, it’ll have a negative impact on your SERPs ranking on Google.

Negative Ranking Factor #3: Links to low-quality sites.
SEO survey contributor, Lucas Ng, sums it up nicely: “Linking out to a low quality neighborhood flags you as a resident of the same neighborhood.”

It’s not just about links and plenty of them. It’s more about the quality of the links on a site. So, link up to sites in nice neighborhoods. On the web, Googlebots know you by the company you keep.

Negative Ranking Factor #4: Links Schemes and Links Selling.
Google’s algorithm employs probability modeling in determining bought-and-paid-for links, which doesn’t always equate to an accurate view of a site’s actual linking activity. Even so, Googlebots make assumptions programmed into the algorithm.

A site with a broad menu of links to diverse sites won’t fare well come spidering time. These links farms are easy for bots to spot. The key to avoiding being mis-indexed by Googlebots is to avoid too many links, try to link to higher-quality-more-visited sites and never buy or sell links. It could mean another web site fatality.

Negative Ranking Factor #5: Duplicate Title/Meta Tags.
Search engine algorithms employ numerous filters to identify everything from questionable links to duplicate content that appears on numerous site pages. The same thing is true of a site’s HTML code. Too many duplicate title tags and duplicate meta data can hurt you.

Survey participant, Aaron Wall, stated, “If a site does not have much content and has excessive duplication, it not only suppresses rankings, but it may also get many pages thrown in the supplemental results.”

Bots read code and if the same title tags show up on page after page, if title tags don’t match page text, or if meta data is cut and pasted into every site page, these crawlers take offense according to some experts.

However, there’s another whole school of thought, here. Many SEO pros and site designers believe just the opposite is true – that title tags on each page create numerous entry points to a site, and because each page is indexed separately, the site maintains a larger presence on SERPs.

The key appears to be in the duplication of inserting repetitive title and meta tags. If the content doesn’t change on a particular page, that page doesn’t call for yet another title tag. However, when topics and functions do change from page to page within a site, title tags do help spiders identify the page’s purpose and do provide greater site access to potential visitors.

What NOT To Do With This Information
The wheels are spinning, aren’t they?

You and a million other site owners are weighing negative ranking factors and the impact these factors have on their SERPs position on Google.

Forget it. Let it go. The time you spend trying to reverse engineer your site to appeal to the perceptions of a collection of 31 SEO professionals would be better spent on search engine marketing – promoting to humans.

Oh, sure, you can migrate your site to a host with a much improved uptime and, in this case, you should regardless of what Googlebots like and dislike. You should migrate, not because bots will like you better, but because your customers will like you better when you’re there when they need you.

Same with cheesy links. Disconnect from garbage sites, links farms and any site that ranks lower than your site in page rank (PR). That’ll take five minutes of your time and it’s something you should do, again, forget the bots, do it for your site visitors seeking to further their web searches through links on your site. Help out site visitors because it’s just good business.

But, if you’ve got duplicate content on site, perhaps as RSS feeds, content syndication or hosted content, it seems counter-productive to remove this useful information from the site. Bots recognize these ephemeral links and their time-saving value to visitors by providing good content all in one place, even if it does appear on a few other sites.

There are a couple of lessons to be learned here. Lesson #1: Even really smart people who study the activities of Googlebots under controlled conditions can not agree, ultimately, what negative ranking factors are programmed into that passing Googlebot.

Lesson #2: (And the most important lesson du jour) Don’t try to outwit a Googlebot. Don’t rebuild your site to mitigate negative ranking factors. Take the obvious steps by going with a reliable host, cutting links to unattractive sites and so on, but don’t spend time reverse engineering your site based on the opinions of SEO pros.

Spend your time promoting your site to humans. Do it ethically. And over time, your site will receive an improved rank on Google’s SERPs – guaranteed.

Guaranteed? You betcha. “Length of time a site has been up” is one of the positive ranking factors. The longer you remain hooked into the web, the higher your Google ranking.

It’s just a matter of time.

 

Need some juice for your site? Squeeze me at my website and let’s get some traffic on your website. It’s always a Webwordslinger gig.

Remote Site Syndication (RSS): Use It Or Lose It

 

Use RSS to Get Out The Word

Really Simple Syndication (or Remote Site Syndication, your choice) has been around for quite a few years, though web site owners are just beginning to recognize the potential RSS has to increase site traffic and to spread their site news from one end of the web to the other.

 

RSS feeds are simply the means of getting out the content to sites with visitors interested in what you have to say. And vice-versa: it’s a great way to deliver daily, fresh content to your visitors, increasing your site’s “stickiness” or ability to keep visitors returning regularly. Right now, all the big news outlets deploy RSS feeds to any site that wants to pick them up. Disney, CNN, Forbes, the BBC and other information outlets are distributing their content across the web via RSS feeds. Why? It’s easy, it spreads the costs of content development, and it works. It’s an effective marketing tool that can draw traffic from sites a far distance from your own.

Why Add RSS to Your Site?
Okay, first, it keeps your customer base up to date on sales, special promos and other news from your site. That’s how your site becomes sticky. You broadcast to your customers and, because they’ve had a good experience with you previously, they check out the new merchandise. It’s a great way to keep in touch with previous buyers – the best buyers any retailer could ask for.

In addition, RSS feeds are based on a streamlined XML. This enables your RSS broadcast to be picked up by just about anything digital – cell phones, PDAs, voicemail, e-mail accounts and so on. (No, not the microwave.)

Outgoing RSS
By syndicating (broadcasting) content from your site, you disperse your web presence to sites many times removed from your own. In fact, it may be picked up by site owners you would never have considered and read by a readership you hadn’t even thought about. An on-line store selling horse tack and other equestrian gear found one of its RSS feeds on a site for Therapeutic Horseback Riding – a whole new market for the source of that RSS feed.

Your RSS feed broadcast can be picked up by any site with visitors who might be interested in the latest news in your area of expertise or commerce.

Let’s just say that broadcasting information from your site, and allowing it to be picked up by any site owner, can only help generate more revenue because some readers of your contain, regardless of where they found your latest article, will visit your site to learn more about you, your opinions, services and products.

Incoming RSS
It’s not a one way street. Using an RSS aggregator, which collects feeds from other sites, is a great service you can deliver to increase site stickiness. Let’s say you publish a financial advice newsletter each day. You can collect (aggregate) RSS feeds from other investment sites, large and small, and deliver all of the financial news in one place for your now-daily visitors. So, the web user who once had to visit 10 sites can now get all the news of the day in one place – yours. It’s a time saver for visitors and it keeps them coming back for more.

What Do You Need to Start RSS?
There are three elements in the process, all available as OSS – open source software, as in free. It doesn’t cost you anything except some time.

The RSS Aggregator
This software is used to collect appropriate RSS feeds from other sites and it’s as easy as a mouse click to add a feed. Start by visiting competitor sites and look for the RSS logo (a small red box) or look for the site’s RSS hook up page.

When you find information that you believe your readers would enjoy, just click the “add” button and that feed is now hooked directly into your site. Simply move from site to site locating information that you think your visitors would enjoy.

A note of caution: when gathering RSS feeds for your site visitors, you’re, in fact, the editor. You decide which feeds to add and which to skip. Don’t add every feed just because you can. Be selective. Look for quality writing, solid research and topics that will really be of interest to your visitors. If you throw anything and everything at visitors, they’ll have a tougher time sorting out what’s useful and what isn’t, so collect the best and leave the rest.

The RSS Syndicator
Your web broadcasting antenna. The syndicator (also OSS) makes your feeds easily available for other site owners to grab and display on their sites. Keep your broadcasts short and use a lot of headlines to grab attention. Remember, your feed may be going to someone’s cell phone at a place where reading a 1000-word treatise on the importance of adjusting foot-pounds in running shoes won’t be possible. Broadcasts should be headline rich and employ lots of short paragraphs.

Keep the most important information in headers and in the first few paragraphs. If you haven’t captured their attention by then, you never will.

The RSS Reader
Another piece of OSS. This is the software site visitors need to sort through and read RSS broadcasts. Google offers a pretty spiffy RSS reader. All you have to do is download it and you’re ready to start enjoying the convenience that RSS delivers to visitors looking for a lot of information (good info) from many sources and on the same topic.

If you’re sending out feeds, offer an RSS reader free to your visitors to ensure they get the message.

Use it or lose it.

 

Looking to boost site performance? It ain’t rocket surgery. Drop by Webwordslinger’s place and give me a call. Let’s get some traffic moving on your site.

Google Gadgets: Learn From The 800-Lb. Gorilla

GOOGLE: THE 800-LB. GORILLA

You want Google to love your website. This search engine alone accounts for 46% of all searches so when you consider that there are virtually thousands of search engines (granted, many topic specific), controlling a 46% share of all search engine users makes you “the cat that everybody’s rapping ‘bout.” And they are.

The webmaster community and Google don’t always get along and that’s understandable. For most webmasters, Google is a prime source of site traffic but if there are too many obstacles to Google success, of course there’s going to be feuding between search engine and those professionals who rely on search engines for their livelihoods. Every time Google tweaks an algorithm, some sites gain, some lose ground – and the reasons are rarely clear.

So, Google put together Webmaster Central, a blog for site owners to post gripes, offer suggestions, identify glitches and otherwise interact with the people behind the search engine. (We can only assume there are people behind Google. Verifiable proof is slow in coming. The entire company could be bot-run for all we know.)

The Google Webmaster Blog and You
Google knows it must keep site owners happy and who or whatever is running the company recognizes the need to interact with professional SEOs, SEMs, coders, designers, graphic artists and every new technology that takes a giant leap forward such as remote site syndication (RSS) that changed the way information was distributed over a weekend.

So, this is where you go to ask questions and get answers from other site owners. Google answers. From regular users like you – the owner of a small, once active site that has mysteriously disappeared from Google SERPs overnight. What happened? And how are you going to pay the rent if your e-store has disappeared from Google’s ever-expanding index?

Posting to the Webmaster Central Blog is a good place to go for quick answers from real people. And that usually means you’ll get an answer you can actually understand rather than an earful of techno-babble from some chip head.

This is also the place where Google introduces new features for webmasters. Just a while back. Google let loose improvements to iGoogle Gadgets for Webmaster Tools.

Here’s how the Googlistas explain it: “After our initial release, we saw clear interest in the gadgets, and plenty of suggestions for improvement. So we’ve spent the past several weeks working on various areas. The biggest improvements are probably for those of you with more than one site: when you add a new tab of gadgets, your gadgets will now default to the site you were viewing when you added them to your iGoogle page. Additionally, gadgets now retain settings as a group, so if you change the site for any gadget in a group, the next time you refresh that page, all the gadgets will show data for that site. And gadgets now resize dynamically, so they take up less room.”

Functionality has also been improved with the addition of Top Search Queries for your site, very helpful in refining a keyword list. “The data from the Top Search Queries allows you to quickly pinpoint what searches your site appears for and which of those searches are resulting in clicks,” according to Google.

Other new features that improve site performance analysis include a smart, geo-targeting function. This enables you to create several site skins for regions around the world if you choose. This geo-targeting gadget also produces a map overlay of where your visitors are coming from – right down to street level if you’re only seeking local business or referrals. Your site may be hot in Australia but bombing in the UK. There’s got to be a reason. This Google gadget helps isolate what’s working where, by region, with incredible specificity.

And if you’d like Google’s opinion of your numbers and your conclusions, click on Analytics Help Center for a ton of Google-centric info. All good in determining what Google likes and dislikes about your site.

Another tool from Google is the URL Remover. You log on to your administrator’s console over coffee and scan through your stats for the overnight, and you discover that your “Content by Title” section – a back office only function – has been inadvertently Googled, indexed and displayed on Google SERPs, giving anyone (including competitors) more than a quick peek at your business. They can read everything because it’s been spidered and indexed.

Using the new URL Removal Tool, you can quickly remove those private pages from Google’s index and tell spiders that this information is off limits as in DO NOT SPIDER.

Google Webmaster Help
This is one very cool tool. One that is certainly bookmark-worthy.

Google Webmaster Help provides tips and suggestions for improving your site in the eyes of what Google calls “benevolent Googlebots.” Hey Boys, those bots ain’t so benevolent if they mis-index my site because of your messed up classification taxonomy. Even so, when you have as much influence over online success as Google does, you get to call your bots “benevolent” even if they are mindless snippets of programs that chew through letter strings.

Don’t get me wrong, there’s plenty of good, useful information here from the people who make the algos. So, it’s worth a visit just to see what’s new, what’s working and what you should do about your precipitous loss of PR when you changed the home page text. Something Happened. And this is the place to find out what.

The Google Webmaster Help section also has a very robust, informed community able to answer FAQs from other site owners. You don’t have to wait for Google to get back to you. Ask an SEO or other web professional using the Webmaster blog for fast facts fast.

Today, there are 107,738 messages, questions and answers on crawling, indexing and ranking; 14,019 posts on the new Google gadgets listed above, so you see that these help pages see a lot of activity and should be a part of your daily web scan.

Go To the Source
Google sets the rules and no matter how strongly these rules are debated among site designers, SEOs and other web professionals, the rules are the rules. One way to stay current is by joining the regular online discussions that Google offers. You can check the schedule of upcoming discussions and mark them so you don’t forget. It’s a great way to meet the Googlistas and your counterparts who are trying to figure out how to perform better in the search engine sweepstakes.

Visit webmaster blogs like the one you’re reading now, especially targeted at those just venturing into ecommerce. Some webmaster blogs are highly technical (more for coders than site owners, actually) while other webmaster blogs provide information on everything from digital selling to site design tips.

But if you want the skinny – the unvarnished truth – go to the source. Go to Google and become a member of the Google webmaster community. Download the free Google analytics and join in with companion site owners to let Google know when a problem arises.

With Google controlling almost half of all searches, it’s good business practice to learn what Google wants.

INCREASE YOUR COVERSION RATE BY 1000%

Hey, now that’s a headline that got your attention, didn’t it? You’re still reading so it did get your attention – and that’s what a good headline on your homepage does. It gets attention.

There are plenty of high-priced, Fortune 500 company sites that have ignored this basic marketing axiom – headlines grab attention. Don’t believe it? Okay, imagine the next issue if your favorite magazine arrives with no contents page, no headlines or subheads – just big globs of text and pictures without any captions. How long are you going to wade through all of that content to find the stuff you really want to read?

Same idea with your website. A grabber headline will lower your bounce rate because more visitors stick around, pulled in by a great headline.

Okay, what’s a great headline?
A good headline is one that keeps the visitor on site. So what are we talking about, here? What’s going to keep a visitor from bouncing?

Self-interest headlines identify the benefits of the product or service to the reader. The objective of these headlines is to be as specific as you can about the benefit(s). For example:

Double Your Portfolio Return Without Risk

Backache? Let Acme Pregnancy Pillows Make You Comfortable

Lose 30 Pounds in 60 Days: FREE Recipe Book

Notice that each headline defines specific benefits: double returns, get comfortable, lose weight easily. Self-interest headlines describe the key benefits of whatever it is you’re selling.

A note worth noting here: web users are NOT idiots. Headlines like:

EARN $5000 a DAY FROM HOME

DOUBLE YOUR MONEY IN 60 SECONDS

BUY RENTAL PROPERTY IN FRANCE:
EARN $10,000 A MONTH WITH NO MONEY DOWN

STAY YOUNG FOREVER WITH ACME ALGAE DRINK
(May not be legal in all states.)

You still see this ridiculous bombast all over the web. Look, all you site owners who are doing this. Web users are smart so treat them with respect and don’t insult their intelligence with this kind of hype. Self-interest headlines work but screw the top back on the hype jar. People aren’t idiots.

News Headlines present information without any sales spin, though spin is usually the point.

HERBENOUGH EARNS SEAL of APPROVAL

XZY ENERGY BRINGS OIL TO THE PIPELINE

DOCTORS AGREE ON GLAUCOMA TREATMENT

Now, the news headline should be void of any type of sales or promo. Think of it as a press release or newspaper headline. These headlines work well for NFPs, service organizations, pharmas, micro-cap companies (penny stocks) and other agencies projecting a non-commercial, online persona.

Even though these headlines should be void of sizzle, they should still draw the attention of the reader. Boring doesn’t sell. The sites that use this type of headline are usually sites that attract the needs-driven buyer – the guy facing foreclosure or the gal who just lost her health insurance. Needs-driven buyers want information. They don’t want (or need) a lot of sales hype. The sale is already made.

Intrigue Headlines appeal to the curiosity of the reader – evoking a need to learn more.

DO YOU HAVE ANY OF THESE SYMPTOMS?

IS THAT A UFO IN YOUR LOCKER?

WAIT’LL YOU GET A LOAD OF THIS!!!!

Hmm, do I have any of these symptoms? Hey, I better do something. These headlines tease the reader into digging in and reading the rest of the piece, which can include some sizzle, but please remember the hype quotient (HQ). Keep it to a minimum.

Designing the Perfect Headline
Check out that sub-head: perfect headline above. So, if you’re a site owner and you’ve read this far, you’re going to want to learn some tips for developing the “perfect headline.” Get it?

So, okay, the headline should fall into one of the three categories described above. The headline should be the largest design element above the fold on the homepage. Bigger than your business logo, company name, contact information – the perfect headline demands attention.

Turn the spotlight on the reader. Don’t talk about “me” and “my.” Who cares? Talk to “You.”

WOULD YOU LIKE TO EARN EXTRA INCOME?

YOU DON’T KNOW WHAT YOUR WATER IS DOING TO YOU

YOUR FUTURE BEGINS TODAY WITH US

People are motivated to read content that applies to them. It may sound callous, but it’s the old “What’s in it for me?” mentality. So tell the reader what’s in it for her – in the homepage headline.

Avoid any kind of negativity. It’s okay to say “We’re the best.” That’s positive. It’s not okay to say “Our competition stinks.” Way too negative so keep the focus on your positives, not the competition’s negatives.

Tests indicate that long headlines, as long as no scrolling is involved, work as well as short headlines. So, go for it:

EARN MORE MONEY THAN YOU EVER THOUGHT POSSIBLE
WITH ABSOLUTELY NO RISK TO YOU AND NO COST TO YOU
A BUSINESS OPPORTUNITY THAT HAS UNLIMITED UPSIDE
WITH VIRTUALLY NO DOWNSIDE WHATSOEVER

You get the idea. Visitors will read the long headline as long as it continues to point out benefits to the reader. So go short or go long. Just keep it focused on the reader.

Avoid headlines designed to show just how clever or witty you are. Again, the site headline is designed for one purpose – to grab and hold the visitor’s attention, not to “wow” the visitor with your rapier wit.

Don’t use industry insider jargon, either. You can’t be sure who will be reading the headline and if it’s a clerk in ‘Purchasing’ he may not understand the headline.

Finally, test different headlines to determine which is stickiest. You might think it’s the greatest headline ever written but if it isn’t pulling, move on and try something else that focuses on the benefits of the product or service to the reader.

editor@webwordslinger.com

Getting Slammed By Google: It’s Easy

It doesn’t take much to make a Googlebot angry. And it certainly doesn’t take much to confuse one of these script-bits that swarm the web like those killer ants. And while there is no absolute consensus on the negative ranking factors employed by Google, there is general agreement on how to avoid getting slammed by the search engine that controls 46% of ALL web searches – the proverbial 800-pound gorilla. 

So here are some common, agreed-upon slams Google can give you.

1. Lack of site access. If your host server is down, your site is down and if your site is down, visitors can’t reach you. Google won’t send its users to an inaccessible site. To avoid trouble: (1) go with a reputable host and (2) avoid launching until the site is complete.

2. All text appears in a graphics format like gif, jpg or bmp. Spiders are as dumb as a box of rocks. They can’t read anything in a graphics format. To avoid the problem, keep critical information in HTML format and provide description tags for all graphics.

3. You’re living in a bad neighborhood. You’re known by the company you keep on the web – in two ways. First, by your inbound and outbound links. Too many low-quality links gives you a bad name.

Further, though contestable, if you’re using a shared hosting account, your site is on the same server as 1,264 other client sites. A server that’s stuffed with porn and overseas drug company sites doesn’t exactly make your site shine, does it?

4. Keyword stuffing is bad for site health. You can overstuff an HTML keyword tag, you can overstuff on-site text (keep keyword density at no more than 3%), HTML meta data, headers and headlines. Any overuse of keywords is a bad sign to spiders.

5. Redirects raise suspicions. Not all redirects are bad. Some serve useful purposes. For example, when you submit an information form online, you might immediately be redirected to a confirmation page with a short note stating that “If this page doesn’t redirect you click here” message.

That’s fine. This isn’t: a site page is designed for one purpose only, to appeal to spiders. It’s a perfectly optimized, single site page buried deep within the site. Because the page is hyper-optimized for crawling, there are no graphics, there is no useful information – it’s simply a highly-optimized page of site code.

Because the page is highly optimized, it ranks highly on Google SERPs. That means it pulls in a great deal of organic traffic. However, as soon as a visitor clicks on the SERP link, s/he is immediately redirected to a page designed for humans. It happens so fast, you won’t even notice. This kind of redirect is bad form to spiders. It’s not nice to fool with Google.

There are lots of other missteps Googlebots look for: invisible text, too much cross-linking within one site, dynamic pages – the list goes on and on. The fact is, it’s easy to get slammed – and not even know why!

To learn more, visit Google’s Webmaster Central and get the information straight from the source.

editor@webwordslinger.com