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Category: Web Design

Talk through the latest in web design and development trends.


  • thanks Dmitrii - It always seems to make things simpler if devs sticks to my guidance on JS - ensuring all links (inc menus) and all static text is visible whether JS is switched on or off - sadly, the often miss this bit!

    | McTaggart
    0

  • Hi there, This looks to be something to do with a URL generator that is dynamically creating URLs based on certain categories being present. The downside being that those categories look to have been removed, hence the 'null' values being passed through. I would push this back to your developers as a serious issue, there could be a large amount of duplication occurring if you're not careful. All the best, Sean

    | seanginnaw
    0

  • Hi Jeff, So long as you compile the list of 301 redirects and add them into your htaccess file (or plugin) before making the Shopify site live you shouldn't have a problem. Google announced some time ago that they preferred https as opposed to http and it was hinted that https was a ranking factor (or would soon become one), so you're making the right decision in that respect. Lastly, Moz actually has a pretty good site migration guide which I would suggest reading: https://moz.com/blog/website-migration-guide

    | moon-boots
    0

  • Well I will say that Wordfence is just a minimal requirement on the other hands Sucuri offers a good level of security. So I think Wordpress+Sucuri  will give you a good mix.

    | Roman-Delcarmen
    0

  • Hi David, The Fetch and Render looked blank, but I know Google can still read the code since it picked up on the schema we added less than a week after we added it. I sent the javascript guides over to our developers, but I would still really appreciate you looking at the URL if possible. I can't find a way to DM you on here, so I've sent you a LinkedIn request. Feel free to ignore it if there's a better way to communicate JW

    | DigitalMarketingSEO
    1

  • Thanks for the input! We actually reached out to google and they admitted it's a bug on their end.

    | AliMac26
    0

  • Hi Boodreaux! Have you migrated to https? If you havent migrated to https, then you should have that in your immidiate backlog. Did you know that last week there was a massive algorithm update? Your site could have been hit. Here four of the best articles about that. Grab a cup of coffe and read them so as to understand whether you were hit. Analysis and Findings From The August 1, 2018 Google Algorithm Update – A Massive Core Ranking Update - GSQi Google's August 1st Core Update: Week 1 - Moz Blog Google’s August algorithm update strengthens as roll-out continues - Sistrix The August 1, 2018 Google Update strongly affected YMYL sites - Marie Haynes Hope it helps. Best luck. GR

    | GastonRiera
    1

  • Hello James, I would advise you to make the new pages as close to the old ones as you can, meaning that you would use the same content and try to keep a similar file structure, including product names. Then make sure every one of your old product URLs has a 301 redirect to the new one on the new site. Also redirect the home page, category pages, and other indexed pages of the old site to their corresponding pages on the new site. Follow that up with some sort of catch-all redirect that ensures every other possible URL someone might end up on from the old site goes to the new site. How to do a successful domain migration is beyond the scope of this Q&A format. You should read the following, which will give you a better understanding of the process and things to look out for. And yes, despite what Kevin said, you can move rankings from one domain to another. I've done it many times. There will be a lag of a few weeks to a month, even if you do it right, but eventually Google figures out what has happened. https://moz.com/blog/website-migration-guide https://searchengineland.com/site-migration-seo-checklist-dont-lose-traffic-286880 http://www.seerinteractive.com/blog/website-migration-seo-checklist/

    | Everett
    1

  • Thanks for the helpful tips Donna. We recently moved over to Wordpress from another platform with a subdomain on http, so we have quite a bit of content to transfer over to the new blog and redirect it from the old. Available time and resources are definitely a huge challenge right now. I'm just trying to make sure I am going forward doing the best I can of categorizing the information (specific tags) and making them visibly available because our staff uses it regularly to direct clients to show what they will get for certain locations and shoot types etc. Wordpress is our blogging back end and our front-end site isn't as easy to work with from a categorization standpoint, but works extremely well from a design standpoint so I am trying to make the most of what I have to work with. I guess I am really looking at some good design ideas of how to organize the tags from a visibility and usability standpoint. I'm definitely in the house cleaning stage of the whole process.

    | photoseo1
    3

  • Hello Dan, Playing with URl structure is considered as a risky business. It’s highly rewarding or disappointing. I personally do not want to change URL structure but as you said, No recent hits & ranking so its worth a try as there is nothing to lose. There are many things to consider before you implement the changes which cannot be explained here (you can read on internet, which we SEO mostly do). As far as your questions are concerned: **What do I need to keep in mind when deleting posts, categories, and tags - besides 410, Google URL removal? ** When you make a link 404,410 make sure, every internal anchor (pointed to 404) should be replaced with suitable link or removed.  There should be no reference of 404 link on website including sitemap, old navigation or images. **What do I do with all the old posts that I am going to re-direct? Each post has between 10-15 internal links. I've started manually removing each link in old posts before 301'ing them. ** There is no need to replace the internal links of article which need to be redirected as they will be null and void (uncrawlable/ inaccessible) after redirection. But make sure every instance of internal link pointed to old url should point to new redirected Url (to keep things less messy and quick). Best of luck

    | Asif.Dilshad
    1

  • The great thing about Themes is pretty much over 90 something percent of them are under 100 bucks. In all honesty, there's like maybe a handful that is just simply amazing! I personally love Divi. I've tried many themes, the only one I really need outside of Divi is my retro tube for an adult niche. The problem with a platform like WordPress is that there are a LOT of themes. Which means naturally a LOT of themes will most likely SUCK. If it becomes even slightly a hassle, in the beginning, I would get out dodge and get a better one quick. Take it from me and my poor experiences trying desperately to make my theme not suck for the first website I ever made. I did eventually but thinking back on it, that was such a torturously miserable painful process. A few traits of themes to avoid: Top heavy visual builders Ridiculously large amounts of mandatory plugins. (install as few as possible is a great practice to follow) Some sites I have like literally just use Yoast and do quite well. Not having some form of responsiveness. With so many optional frameworks easily attached, there is no excuse. 431 premade page layouts, Email popup software Bloom/social share software called Monarch. I would go with either Either that one or just ridiculously godly fast like Generate Press which utilizes varnish. And in reference to optimizing before or after the process of configuring a theme for your site, it's actually both. Any well optimized site, will involve modifying content frequently and I would definitely suggest optimizing everything you have right away or as quickly as possible

    | TucsonAZWebDesign
    0

  • Hi Dan-Louis – all depends on what content these modals are serving, and how your modals are being served. Have you checked to make sure that some resource your modals rely on isn't blocked in /robots.txt (you can also plug a URL with a modal into Search Console's robots.txt checker)? What about meta robots noindex? On mobile, do you have pop ups that are obscuring content on the page? Have you checked any pages with these pop ups/modals in Search Console's fetch and render tool? What resources, if any, are blocked? TBH I don't like relying on SEMRush (or any singular SEO tool for that matter) for ID'ing technical SEO problems. When was the last time you performed a tech audit? Keep me posted on what you uncover...

    | zeehj
    0

  • Hi Vtmoz It's probable that you have a new plugin which is conflicting with this one. A simple solution is to disable the newer plugins one by one and keet testing the 301 redirect plugin, clearing the cache after each disable before you do. If nothing works and updating the plugin doesn't work, copy all of the redirects in two columns into a spreadsheet. Then add 'Redirect 301' in the first column and then add them to the htaccess file manually (The best way anyway) like this. You will need ftp access or server side file access to see the htaccess in some cases. Redirect 301 /old-url https://yourdomain.com/new-url Note the source URL has no http and the destination one does! So try the first solution and if it doesn't work do the second. It should be quite straightforward to copy and paste them. Regards Nigel

    | Nigel_Carr
    0

  • Suggestions: Check Webmaster tools and make sure all pages are indexing correctly. Also, watch out for "no follow" tags in the meta data of each page. "><me< span="">ta id="MetaGenerator" name="GENERATOR" content="example keyword "></me<> and of course, utilize MOZ SEO tools for ranking reports and optimization errors.

    | WebMarkets
    0

  • I would agree with the above. I would add along similar lines: tends to be better for custom, higher end websites. Craft CMS does not come with themes so you will need a developer who can build a theme from scratch. The pro of that is that it rules out a lot of less skilled developers when you post Craft jobs on sites such as Upwork. It does not require constant updating of versions and plugins. It is maintained by the parent company Pixel & Tonic. Although the plugins are limited they tend to be of better quality then wordpress plugins. You don't really have to worry about them going out of date and if you are working with a good developer they can probably build what you need anyway. As a content editor, the backend is quite user friendly.

    | coco121
    2

  • Hi sl_pa, I don't know how Alexa calculates its bounce rate data, but I have found this: https://www.quora.com/How-does-Alexa-define-bounce-rate Maybe that helps. In any case, you can't trust much this stats from Alexa, but as you said, it can give a general figure. The perfect tool to see bounce rate is Analytics, but you can't see your competitors stats with this tool... Greetings!

    | paupastorlopez
    0

  • Hi Robert, Just want to be clear: you're going from having the website lovelytraining.com and the blog lovelyblog.lovelytraining.com to having the website lovely.training and the blog lovelyblog.lovelytraining.com. Right? If so - yup, you're going to lose that subdomain connection. There's no formal way you can tell Google that lovelyblog.lovelytraining.com is essentially part of the lovely.training site, but you can link to the blog in your header or footer so they're clearly partners. Have you thought about migrating your blog to lovely.training/blog/? That's the best way to consolidate link equity. Best, Kristina

    | KristinaKledzik
    0

  • Yeah pricing customised things is difficult.  I tell my patients getting a smile makeover is like buying a car.  And they say 'what sort of car' and I say - 'well you've just answered the price question - it's up to you not me' Remember manuals and technical content will be duplicated from the manufacturers sites so will harm not help. Also can you get links from the manufacturers like in their 'find a supplier' pages. Also find everyone in the office with a degree and get them to join their university alumni and write a piece about your company and how they've done well in their careers.  Universities will publish these in their blogs and blast your DA into outer space.

    | Smileworks_Liverpool
    0

  • Apple is doing what is doing because it decided to go the subfolders way for their main website, but they obviously own also the ccTlds for brand protection and redirect them. Once, though, it was using subdomains for its ecommerce part (now they are subfolders under each country section. Actually, it is not correct to say that one solution (subfolders, ccTld or subdomains) is better than another. It all depends on the specific business needs and, secondly, on technological needs. However, it is true that when a company is starting an internationalization of its business, a better option is going with subfolders, so to give them some strength via internal linking, while not forgetting to improve the popularity and authority of the country targeting subfolders with localized link building and digital PR campaigns. On a middle/long term, though, and traffic and conversion metrics justify it, it may be better to move the subfolder to a unique domain name geotargeted to the marketed country. The reason of this choice can also be found out of the SEO world (i.e.: in the UK the marketing strategy is different than in the USA because of nuances of the same UK market or different seasonality). Regarding hosting... having a site hosted in the country the site itself is targeting is not anymore a ranking factor in International SEO since when cloud hosting became mainstream. However, it still remains a (tiny) geotargeting signal for Google, as they repeated sometimes on Twitter and Google Hangouts.

    | gfiorelli1
    0

  • I've had some great people from <a>Upwork</a>.  This could be a job for them.  Super easy to use and you can vet them with questions and interview. I did an HTTPS migration - went off without a hitch Some linkbuilding that was great too

    | Smileworks_Liverpool
    1