Category Archives: SEO

Best marketing practices for Cyber Monday & Black Friday pages

black-friday-cyber-mondayThe end of the year holiday period is a top time for many retailers with special deals events such as Cyber Monday & Black Friday.

As a business, you can help Google highlight your sales events by offering landing web pages with applicable content and HQ imagery.

Best Practices

The following are the recommended best tactics for your landing web pages:

Produce the content ahead of time. Ensure you produce content well before the event so Googlebot has time to detect and index the new content. Ensure you are not blocking Google from indexing the URL (the Google URL Inspection Tool should be considered to verify this). Continue reading

HTTPS SSL is a Ranking Signal – HTTPS Migration

On 08/06/14 Google announces a new major change that will force the entire industry to switch to SSL / HTTPS across the board. I don’t think anyone was taken by surprise, but HTTPS https-seo-sslbecame a new ranking signal in Google’s algorithm.  HTTPS was a consistent trend in Google in the past couple of years and it’s going to continue growing, because Google believes that security is their top priority. Forcing SSL means that Google Search and Google products users will automatically have a secure connection. Continue reading

SEO Redirects

301 Redirect SEOWhat is a URL Redirect?

In simple terms a Redirect is a process of forwarding one URL to another URL. It redirects users as well as search bots. In other words, when someone is trying to access URL www.abc.com , server will redirect user to the new URL. www.xyz.org

Types of Redirects

There are three types of redirects:

  1. 301 Permanent Redirect is the most common one, and is used in 97% of all cases and it’s the most SEO friendly way of redirecting pages. 301 redirects refers to the HTTP server response code which means “Moved Permanently”. 301 redirect is used.
  2. 302 Temporary Redirect  – The requested URL resides temporarily under a different URL. It’s only used if you want to move content temporarily for a short period of time.
  3. META refresh is a page level redirect, meaning that the page instructs the browser to refresh using a different URL. It may look like a redirect, but in reality it’s just a browser refresh. It’s not SEO friendly and it’s not recommended in 99.9% all redirect cases.

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URL Parameters In Google Webmaster Tools

Google tech lead Maile Ohye posted a comprehensive video instructions on Google Webmaster Tools URL parameters usage.This is a fairly advanced feature and she recommends it for advanced users only. Incorrect usage of URL Parameters feature can result in page/site being dropped from Google’s index. Be careful!

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You&A with Matt Cutts and Danny Sullivan SMX Advanced 2012 Seattle, WA

Matt Cutts Danny Sullivan SMX Advanced Seattle

You&A with Matt Cutts and Danny Sullivan at SMX Advanced in Seattle, WA

 

 

During the You&A session with Matt Cutts and Danny Sullivan at SMX Advanced 2012 in Seattle, WA, Matt Cutts told everyone that a notification or a message  in Google Webmastertools account means that a manual action took place and you were penalized by Google. Continue reading

Google Knowledge Graph

Starting 05/16/2012 and rolling out to all data centers this week, Google has released search result update that is a change from Google being an “information agent” to a “knowledge agent”.

Basically if you type in a query like “Rangers” (which could mean a solder, a New York based hockey team or a park keeper), and a new information window will appear on the right side of your search results asking you which entity you meant. Select one of the options and your results will be updated based on your selection. Continue reading

Search Engine Over-Optimization Penalty

Matt Cutts Over-Optimization PenaltyDuring a panel Search Engine Land’s Editor-In-Chief, Danny Sullivan and Microsoft’s Senior Product Marketing Manager of Bing at SXSW named Dear Google & Bing: Help Me Rank Better! Matt Cutts announced that “in the next months or few weeks” Google is planning to release a penalty for over-optimized sites. Continue reading

Better Page Titles in Google Search Results

Google Page Title Algorithm UpdatePage titles have always been a very important part of Google’s search results, because they are not only a part of  Google’s ranking algorithm, but they are also visible in search engine results and they’re the actual clickable links Google searchers click to reach sites. Many webmasters are curious about why Google sometimes show alternative titles in it’s search results. A lot of SEO specialists are pissed about this, but generally everyone will benefit from this update. Continue reading