In the vast majority of cases the problem arises when well-meaning developers implement functionality on a site that should in theory assist users with their goals by making the process of searching or navigating a site more efficient, but in reality cause problems due to the way in which the tools are constructed and their acting as a block to search engines. If the information architecture of a site isn’t perfect or doesn’t provide a browse-able route to all of a site’s content, then content can be blocked or hidden away in the bowels of a site, never to be seen again.

An Example

Take, for example, the Association of British Insurers, the body charged with representing insurers in the UK. Given the high winds we’re currently experiencing in Scotland and the troublesome ash cloud drifting over from Iceland, they probably have their work cut out for them at the moment and are probably experiencing more than their usual levels of attention, so they make a good example for a brief case study.

Supposing we’re interested in looking for Scottish insurance companies, so we might type ‘Scottish Friendly’ into the search box. We would see this page here:

http://www.abi.org.uk/MemberSearchResults.aspx?searchQuery=SCOTTISH%20FRIENDLY

That’s a normal search results page and not one you’d usually expect to be published to the web, unless search engines have gone to the trouble of using the search tool on the site.

However, if we look a little more closely at the main members’ database, we see a few interesting ‘features’:

• Filter results by: allows you to filter the results down by the first letter of the name of the company, but it does so in an entirely search engine-unfriendly manner (it uses a script) that means the content can’t be indexed.
• Next >> allows you to move to the next page of search results but again the subsequent pages are accessed via a script that can’t be indexed.

Neither of these are a particular problem if we are looking solely at links off a rarely used search results page, but given the main members database relies on exactly the same filtering technology, in effect it means almost none of the content is visible to search engines. Whilst we’re on the subject, here’s another example.

This problem could be solved with some technical changes but as always, it’s better for the problem never to arise in the first place, and that comes from thorough SEO planning and strategy from the outset.

Whilst at the time of writing the update has not been rolled out in the UK, from our perspective, the ‘new’ advice is very much in line with the advice we’ve always given to clients, namely offer good products or services, write good content, offer something unique and useful to users, market your site in the right places and keep on developing it. We thought it would be useful to share some data from a recent project that might go some way to showing just how effective good quality, unique content can be at gaining ranking positions and beating down the competition.

The Essential Background

• The site is brand new
• It operates in a highly competitive sector
• A focus was placed on writing a large amount of totally unique content

The Results

The graph below shows the rise in organic search traffic during the weeks after the launch of the site, denoted by the arrow towards the left hand side. Whilst we can’t share exact figures what we can say is:

• Over 15,000 different keywords brought traffic to the site
• The maximum recorded increase in traffic is over 1,000%
• Google brought most traffic by a factor of >200

What Can We Conclude?

This clearly isn’t a particularly scientific study, but what it does show is that good quality, unique content, well target and well-optimised can bring in significant amounts of traffic in a relatively short period of time. It shows that unique content is rewarded with high ranking and it shows that once ‘accepted’ as being of high-quality, the site’s traffic can grow substantially. The positive impact of good quality content is clear.

What remains to be seen is whether the relatively young age of the site and its limited backlink profile will count against it once the Farmer update hits the UK, or whether it will continue to attract traffic in similar volumes. The answer will of course be to keep developing the content and keep marketing it to develop good quality links, both of which are happening.

What Do You Think?

What have you experienced like this? Good? Bad? Indifferent? Let us know in the comments below!

Google has been using site speed as a ranking factor in its AdWords model for some time, but speed is now one of the 200 or so factors taken into account when ranking a page in organic listings, marking a fairly fundamental change and making it ever more challenging for web developers, web masters and search engine optimisers to achieve strong, high ranking positions. The knock-on effects will also be felt at hosting companies (particularly those who rely on the high-volume, low-service model) as more pressure is put on them to deliver web pages quickly, which itself can be largely dependent on the quality of code produced by programmers but also on the hardware provided, internal infrastructure, bandwidth available and connections. Suffice to say, those who invest in high-quality infrastructure and fast connections will feel the benefit as clients migrate towards them, as will developers who take the time to produce efficient, clean code that doesn’t get in the way of the user experience.

The team at Google are keen to stress that the impact is likely to be minimal, saying:

While site speed is a new signal, it doesn’t carry as much weight as the relevance of a page. Currently, fewer than 1% of search queries are affected by the site speed signal in our implementation and the signal for site speed only applies for visitors searching in English on Google.com at this point. We launched this change a few weeks back after rigorous testing. If you haven’t seen much change to your site rankings, then this site speed change possibly did not impact your site.

Speed has long been of interest to Google as they have carried out extensive testing on the impact of speed on how users interact with their search tools. In short, a speedier site means better click-through rates, higher levels of engagement and a generally higher degree of satisfaction.

The course is designed for attendees who are new to SEO and will give them a grounding in a variety of principles and techniques that can be used to improve and optimise a web site. Some of the topics being covered are:

• Semantic HTML
• Web Development Techniques for SEO
• Researching & Planning SEO
• Writing effective, optimised content
• Building Links
• Techniques to Avoid

The course takes place on Thursday the 3rd of December, runs from 10am to 4pm, includes lunch and costs £300 + VAT per person. Note that the course is ILA approved.

For more details on the day and to book a place, head over to the Netresources site or call them on 0131 477 7127.

There are just 8 places available so if you’re interested you’d best book your place as soon as you can.

Hope to see you there!

- Nick

The announcement was made in a post on the Google Webmaster blog the other day and has triggered the usual speculation and discussion that surrounds Google’s regular dissemination of information, most of which involves the usual picking apart of the statement looking for hidden meaning. Perhaps Dan Brown’s latest book is stirring up the SEO industry in its week of release?

Our View on Meta-Keywords

Our view on keywords has always been simple and straightforward: don’t bother. We have seen no difference in ranking ability of two pages that possess and lack keywords respectively, none whatsoever. Likewise, we have never seen any impact on ranking come about as a result of meta-keyword tweaking.

Meta-Descriptions Make Sense

The post also mentions that Google has not used the Meta-Description field for ranking purposes for a number of years, however, our experience is that the description field can actually aid matters as it plays a crucial role in determining the click-through rate of a listing on a search engine ranking page (SERP). Our view is that the higher the CTR on a link, the likelier the associated page is to rank more highly. Furthermore, the higher the click-through rate of a page, the more traffic you’re likely to attract, so a well optimised and written description can really make a difference.

If you don’t include a meta-description then Google will select a snippet of text from your site, which might not work as well as a bespoke one. We use the meta-description field to display the Mackerel Media phone number on the SERPs page, as you’ll be able to see here. Neat eh?

Looking to the future, we can only hope that now Google has cleared keywords up, they’ll move swiftly on to link spam blogs, dubious paid link vendors and all the other fun issues that keep us busy. Hmm…perhaps we’re a little too optimistic.

The search giant is showing a handy summary of today’s tennis at Wimbledon, but as the screengrab below shows, they haven’t quite spelt “Quarterfinals” correctly, rather it says “Quaterfinals.”

Oops.

In one case we suspected sabotage, and in another it was probably something that was forgotten about when the site went live (the developer using robots.txt to restrict search access instead of having a separate development environment most likely, still no excuse), but whatever the case the impact is severe and perhaps even catastrophic for a site or business.

The robots file can be used to some effect to aid search engine optimisation efforts, or to aid the transfer from an old site with its outdated architecture and navigation to a new site with its new structure, for example:

URL Removal via Webmaster

You can request the removal of old URLs or directories from Google’s index by adding them to the robots file, then submitting a request via the webmaster console. This is particularly useful when whole directories become redundant and need to be removed from search engine indexes.

Sculpting Link Juice

This is one of those SEO techniques that seems to attract an equal mixture of praise and criticism, but it is one way of controlling how internal links flow around your web site, and from there how much ‘equity’ or ‘link juice’ you pass from one page to another. The theory says that you can focus link juice from – say – your home page on to a select few sub-pages and in doing so raise their ranking.

The recent announcement from Google on the canonical tag does (to a certain degree) render this redundant, but until we see conclusive proof it works, we’ll remain on the slightly sceptical side of the fence.

The company caters for a wide range of the market, from the occasional hill-walker looking for something to ward off the dastardly Highland Midge, to the rescue team making their way carefully through a remote rain forest whilst being pestered by mosquitoes.

Our work will take in Search Engine Optimisation, PPC Advertising and Link Building, all aimed at attracting hordes of visitors to the site.

You can see the site at www.healthy-travel.co.uk

We’ve been working on a couple of campaigns for different clients, playing the game, patiently waiting for new links to be established. Out of the blue, we found we had two fantastic links on our hands – from two of the most visible sites on the web, let alone in the UK. Both The Guardian Newspaper and The Sun are sending traffic to sites we manage. Needless to say we were very pleased, as it was somewhat unexpected.

What was the secret to this? Content, pure and simple. It just goes to show that for all the talk of enticing links through quality content, it’s quite true. And whilst these not might be the Holy Grail of links, (we’re still holding out for that elusive front-page-of -Google link – we might be waiting a while!) it shows that with a little effort, directed cleverly, you can achieve great results.

Charles and Dee McGowan at Southlands Farm have three beautiful self catering Northumberland Cottages available for rental the year round. They began converting the cottages in 2006, welcomed their first guests in 2007 and hopefully will take things from strength to strength in 2009 with the help of the new site.

The challenge they faced was common – accurately portraying the very high standard of their accommodation, without sacrificing the personality that makes them unique and the values that make them admirable. So, our job was to build a site that does showcase the cottages in the right light, captures their unique brand of hospitality and encourages people to come and stay.

In our approach to the project we placed one foot in the aesthetic camp and the other in the business camp – after all, without guests there would be no business.

To that end we’ve developed a site that first and foremost captures the unique green, ‘country life’ that the cottages offer and, secondly, is designed and built to attract a serious volume of enquiries by being both highly attractive to search engines and (as one would expect from an seo company) highly capable of converting visitors into enquiries.

Now that the site is live, we’ll be carrying out a comprehensive search engine optimisation exercise to ensure the site is as visible as can be.

The excellent design work comes courtesy of Andrew Pendrick, with whom this project is a first-time collaboration. I would say only that I hope this is the first of many collaborations between Andrew and Mackerel Media.

The development was carried out by Alan White, of Alan White Web Development. Alan coded the templates, integrated the modX CMS framework and deployed the site to the hosting environment.

You can see the site at www.southlandsfarmcottages.co.uk