How the Latest Google Algorithm Penguin Update will Affect You
On April 24th 2012 Matt Cutts, the head of the webspam team at Google announced that there will be another algorithm change to the Google search engine. This latest update has been named “Penguin” and the main objective of the change is to specifically target webspam. To quote Matt’s words: “The change will decrease rankings for sites that we believe are violating Google’s existing quality guidelines. We’ve always targeted webspam in our rankings, and this algorithm represents another improvement in our efforts to reduce webspam and promote high quality content.” If your... Read The Rest →
Meta Keywords: Why I don’t use them
There is one question about SEO which seems to be coming up time and time again, so let me answer it now and be done with it. Meta Keywords are useless. No search engine uses them for any real rankings. That is why by default, there is no meta keywords input field in my WordPress SEO plugin and why I never use them. The fact that “other SEO plugins do have them” isn’t a good reason for me to enable them in my plugin by default. Let me give you the full... Read The Rest →
GOOGLE’S SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION-Optimizing your Images
Image-related information can be provided for by using the “alt” attribute Images may seem like a straightforward component of your site, but you can optimize your use of them. All images can have a distinct filename and “alt” attribute, both of which you should take advantage of. The “alt” attribute allows you to specify alternative text for the image if it cannot be displayed for some reason (1). Why use this attribute? If a user is viewing your site on a browser that doesn’t support images, or is using alternative... Read The Rest →
GOOGLE’S SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION-Anchor Text
Suitable anchor text makes it easy to convey the contents linked Anchor text is the clickable text that users will see as a result of a link, and is placed within the anchor tag <a href=”…”></a>. This text tells users and Google something about the page you’re linking to. Links on your page maybe internal—pointing to other pages on your site—or external—leading to content on other sites. In either of these cases, the better your anchor text is, the easier it is for users to navigate and for Google... Read The Rest →
GOOGLE’S SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION-Improving Content
Improving content and services should be a priority, regardless of the type of website! Write easy-to-read text Users enjoy content that is well written and easy to follow. Avoid: writing sloppy text with many spelling and grammatical mistakes embedding text in images for textual content - users may want to copy and paste the text and search engines can’t read it Stay organized around the topic It’s always beneficial to organize your content so that visitors have a good sense of where one content topic begins and another... Read The Rest →
GOOGLE’S SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION-Offer quality content and services
Interesting sites will increase their recognition on their own Creating compelling and useful content will likely influence your website more than any of the other factors discussed here (1). Users know good content when they see it and will likely want to direct other users to it. This could be through blog posts, social media services, email, forums, or other means. Organic or word-of-mouth buzz is what helps build your site’s reputation with both users and Google, and it rarely comes without quality content. Anticipate differences in users’... Read The Rest →
GOOGLE’S SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION-Sitemap and 404 Info
Put an HTML site map page on your site, and use an XML Sitemap file A simple site map page with links to all of the pages or the most important pages (if you have hundreds or thousands) on your site can be useful. Creating an XML Sitemap file for your site helps ensure that search engines discover the pages on your site. Avoid: letting your HTML site map page become out of date with broken links creating an HTML site map that simply lists pages without organizing them,... Read The Rest →
GOOGLE’S SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION – URL Structure
Simple-to-understand URLs will convey content information easily Creating descriptive categories and filenames for the documents on your website can not only help you keep your site better organized, but it could also lead to better crawling of your documents by search engines. Also, it can create easier, “friendlier” URLs for those that want to link to your content. Visitors may be intimidated by extremely long and cryptic URLs that contain few recognizable words. URLs like (1) can be confusing and unfriendly. Users would have a hard time reciting the... Read The Rest →
GOOGLE’S SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION – Description Meta Tag
Make use of the “description” meta tag Summaries can be defined for each page A page’s description meta tag gives Google and other search engines a summary of what the page is about (1). Whereas a page’s title may be a few words or a phrase, a page’s description meta tag might be a sentence or two or a short paragraph. Google Webmaster Tools provides a handy content analysis section that’ll tell you about any description meta tags that are either too short, long, or duplicated too many times (the... Read The Rest →
GOOGLE’S SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION – Page Content
Accurately describe the page’s content Choose a title that effectively communicates the topic of the page’s content. Avoid: choosing a title that has no relation to the content on the page using default or vague titles like “Untitled” or “New Page 1″ Create unique title tags for each page Each of your pages should ideally have a unique title tag, which helps Google know how the page is distinct from the others on your site. Avoid: using a single title tag across all of your site’s pages or a... Read The Rest →