How to Interpret results in OSE?

[singingtelegramsuk]

I have been comparing my results with my main competitor

It seems as if I have the green check marks for everything except internal links.

Page authority, domain authority, rank, trust and external links are all better for my website

The competing website has only 6 external links compared to my 130

The on page grader gives me an A grade for all my keywords, and gives anything from an F to a B to my competitors site.

The only thing that is different is internal links,

Their page has 438 internal links and  39,000 - 41000 internal links in the other sections

and of course the total number of links is 41000+

They are number one and I am number 5

Analysing their top pages, I discover that they only have a limited number of actual content pages on their website. over 400 of the 438 internal links, are formed from some sort of internal search engine, that produces pages that say "No results found" for hundreds of almost related keywords but there is no content pages relating to those keywords.

So my questions are:

1. Is that a legitimate SEO strategy, that Google approves of. I'm guessing not. If it is I have found out how he does it, and would consider it, If I thought Google would not penalise me for it.

2. What other strategy, can I take to combat it, my answers are slowly creating content pages and manually building links until I eventually overtake them.

3. If it is a dodgy strategy, why isn't Google on top of this?

and finally 4) Are page authority, domain authority, rank, trust, and external links really not as important as internal links or total links.

Sorry for the long question but I would really appreciate any input on this

Thank you

Mike Collins

[RyanPurkey]

Hi Mike. Regarding your questions...

1. No, having Google index your site's search results pages is contrary to their guidelines, specifically, "Use robots.txt to prevent crawling of search results pages or other auto-generated pages that don't add much value for users coming from search engines." From: https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/35769. If you did it, you'd run the risk of having your site reported as webspam here: http://www.google.com/webmasters/tools/spamreport.
2. Plenty of other strategies could help your site. You might also find ways to increase your links internally by a healthy amount; you can link out to highly reputable sites pertaining to your pages; you can get social signals referencing your pages; and on and on. Lots you can do!
3. The Internet is kind of big.  This specific site, and these specific results are like a few blips in the trillions of other signals Google handles.

It sounds like you're working on your site the right way. Focus on being a better user experience like you are and even if you're getting a few less visits by ranking a little lower than your competitor currently you're still going to have much better results.  Cheers!

[singingtelegramsuk]

Thanks for the great answer

but I just need to clarify something

I did find a custom search box within Google webmaster tools and placed it on the home page

I am assuming that this is not the same thing, mainly because it comes from Google and there are not four hundred actual pages created that say no results found. Also I have suggested search terms to help users find the content they are interested in, (and to help them find the content I want them to find. so I think it will help users to navigate the site.

I don't think that you are referring to this but I guess I should check, in case I need to take it down

Also I would ask if you left the reporting link as a hint, as to something i should act on myself?

Thanks your your help

[RyanPurkey]

You're in the clear using a Google custom search box because Google is the one delivering the results so they know not to double up on those.  You're right that the pages that are getting indexed in Google on the other site are from a different process and an attempt to trick the engine with sparse, dynamically generated content.

Hint?  Huh?  I'm not nearly that clever.  Cheers!