In an online Q&A session, Google's Matt Cutts answered the questions of webmasters who want to get higher rankings on Google for their websites. This article summarizes the most important SEO relevant statements of this session.
The effect of +1 clicks on your organic rankings and ads
Google is still testing the effect of +1 clicks on the search results. It seems that only clicks from trustworthy people will influence the position of a web page. In other words, it won't help to buy +1 clicks.
In addition, the +1 clicks on ads will show others who have +1′d it but that is all at this time.
You cannot exclude keywords from your website
It's not possible to ensure that your website does not appear in the search results for a particular keyword. The reason for that is because that could be a way you could silence critics or not show up for negative reviews.
The age of a website is important but only one of many factors
The age of link anchors and domains can influence the position of a website in the search results. However, Matt Cutts says that you still need fresh information because old information can get stale.
Google decides per keyword if the search results show websites with newer or older content. Old websites often tend to have more links and that the links are often the reason why older domains have higher rankings.
Google will rewrite your meta description tag
Google will only use the meta description of a web page if they find it appropriate to the searched keyword. Google will also write its own description to show the searcher why the page was ranked for the query.
What to do if other websites steal your content
You should do a DMCA complain and a spam report, especially if the other website is a spammer who is scraping content completely.
Double 301 redirects are okay
A web page shouldn't redirect to more than 4 URLs. Chained 301 redirects should be only 301 redirects and they should not be mixed with 302 redirects.
Google also detects JavaScript redirects. Matt Cutts says that Russian spammers tried to fool Google with JavaScript redirects but Google could detect it.
Google uses many different factors to determine the position of a web page in the search results. Analyze your web pages with IBP's Top 10 Optimizer to find out how to adjust your web pages so that they get listed on Google's first result page for your keywords.
Article courtesy of Axandra.com
Showing posts with label seo. Show all posts
Showing posts with label seo. Show all posts
Tuesday, October 25, 2011
Tuesday, December 14, 2010
Has your website the right reading level for Google?
This week, Google introduced a new advanced search feature that enables you to filter search results by reading level. Which reading level is required to read your web pages and does this influence the position of your site in Google's search results?
What exactly did Google do?
Here's the official text about the new feature:
"We made it easier for to you pinpoint exactly the information you need with a new advanced search feature that categorizes results by reading level.
For example, if you're writing a college paper on [herbivores] you can refine to see only advanced material, or if you're a grade school teacher preparing for a class on [herbivores] you can refine to see only basic material.
To try it out, click ?advanced search? to the right of the search box and click in the new reading level section. You can filter to see only results that are basic, intermediate or advanced, and annotate results with reading levels."
What is a reading level?
The reading level refers to the readability of a document. Readability is defined as reading ease, especially as it results from a writing style. Extensive research has shown that easy-reading text improves comprehension, retention, reading speed, and reading persistence.
The better the readability of your web pages, the more people will understand your marketing message. The average web surfer has a very short attention span.
How to calculate the readability of your web pages
To analyze the readability of your web pages, check your web pages with IBP's Top 10 Optimizer. The Top 10 Optimizer will tell you the Flesch Kincaid readability level of your web pages.
In addition to the readability of your web pages, the optimizer will also tell you which elements on your web pages you have to change so that Google will give your website high rankings.
Although the readability has only a minor influence on the rankings of your web pages, a high score can mean that your web pages are too difficult to understand for many people. If your website is too difficult, you won't get many conversions. Download IBP and check the readability of your web pages now.
Article courtesy of Axandra.com
What exactly did Google do?
Here's the official text about the new feature:
"We made it easier for to you pinpoint exactly the information you need with a new advanced search feature that categorizes results by reading level.
For example, if you're writing a college paper on [herbivores] you can refine to see only advanced material, or if you're a grade school teacher preparing for a class on [herbivores] you can refine to see only basic material.
To try it out, click ?advanced search? to the right of the search box and click in the new reading level section. You can filter to see only results that are basic, intermediate or advanced, and annotate results with reading levels."
What is a reading level?
The reading level refers to the readability of a document. Readability is defined as reading ease, especially as it results from a writing style. Extensive research has shown that easy-reading text improves comprehension, retention, reading speed, and reading persistence.
The better the readability of your web pages, the more people will understand your marketing message. The average web surfer has a very short attention span.
How to calculate the readability of your web pages
To analyze the readability of your web pages, check your web pages with IBP's Top 10 Optimizer. The Top 10 Optimizer will tell you the Flesch Kincaid readability level of your web pages.
In addition to the readability of your web pages, the optimizer will also tell you which elements on your web pages you have to change so that Google will give your website high rankings.
Although the readability has only a minor influence on the rankings of your web pages, a high score can mean that your web pages are too difficult to understand for many people. If your website is too difficult, you won't get many conversions. Download IBP and check the readability of your web pages now.
Article courtesy of Axandra.com
Wednesday, April 21, 2010
Google uses page speed as a ranking factor
"As part of that effort, today we're including a new signal in our search ranking algorithms: site speed. Site speed reflects how quickly a website responds to web requests. [...]
We've decided to take site speed into account in our search rankings. We use a variety of sources to determine the speed of a site relative to other sites."
Will your website rankings drop?
Google's Matt Cutts says that the change will affect only some websites:
"Fewer than 1% of search queries will change as a result of incorporating site speed into our ranking. That means that even fewer search results are affected, since the average search query is returning 10 or so search results on each page.
So please don?t worry that the effect of this change will be huge. In fact, I believe the official blog post mentioned that 'We launched this change a few weeks back after rigorous testing.'
The fact that not too many people noticed the change is another reason not to stress out disproportionately over this change."While 1% does not sound much, it can be a problem if your website belongs to the pages whose rankings will drop.
At this time, Google's new site speed signal only applies to visitors searching in English on Google.com.
How to keep your web pages listed in Google search results
There are several things that you can do to improve the speed of your web pages:
1. Choose a fast and reliable web host with a good connection to the Internet. A "cheap" web host could cause problems.
2. Combine external JavaScript code files into one file. The fewer files the server has to request, the faster your web pages will load.
3. Compress your JavaScript code to make the JavaScript file smaller.
4. Combine external CSS files into one file and compress your CSS files.
5. If your web server supports it, enable gZip compression (your web host can do that for you).
6. Use as few images as possible on your website and compress your images. Most graphic tools enable you to choose the compression rate when saving an image for the web.
7. Put tracking codes and other JavaScript snippets at the end of your web pages.
The faster your web pages load, the more visitors of your website will be able to see the contents of your pages. Web surfers are impatient people. The average web surfer wants immediate results.
Page speed is not Google's most important ranking signal. The end of Google's page speed announcement contains a very important sentence: "While site speed is a new signal, it doesn't carry as much weight as the relevance of a page."
It is important to optimize the speed of your web pages but it's also important to optimize all other elements of your web pages if you want to be listed on Google's first result page. IBP's Top 10 Optimizer analyzes all important ranking elements/signals that lead to high rankings on Google, including page speed and many other factors.
Article originally from http://www.axandra.com/
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