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_ my guess is that this traffic converts well_ Would not be wiser to segment the traffic from those keywords and verify if the really convert well? Just after that proven data verification I would start to think in creating some content that focuses on those keywords. A comparison page can be a valid solution.

_ Is it better to keep things status quo and not give Google the data or potentially introduce a new signal to Google that might be negative if CTR is not high enough?_ If you don't add it, the signal could look as a 0 to Google (no social sign of life)... that could be finally worst than having few +1. I think that we have to forget SEO has it was since few months ago, and start thinking SEO-Socially. SEO and SM are getting closer, and surely Social Signals are playing a big part in the rankings, directly or not. What is sure, is that if you have a great site, with great contents that answer to users needs, has all to gain with the social sharing. So, yes, start play the social game. But don't fall in the opposite risk: to forget traditional SEO tactics, because they still count a lot. The philosophy is that Search Marketing has become a wider playfield, with more tactics and web marketing disciplines that influence it. The real secret is to create a coordinated internet marketing strategy and stop thinking one tactic at the time.

Thanks for the help!

What do you mean by two levels?

Footer links are discounted because, as Egol wrote, footer is a classical place where to put spammy "credits" links. If I was you i would make better that internal pages, for instance giving a short but needed description to the sites of your "newtwork". In fact, surely because of my ignorance about the topic, I cannot see the difference existing between many of those sites, giving to me the sensation they were created simply because you try to dominate the SERPs with exact matching domain names. More over, if you put your network links in the footer of a the sites... that can be dangerous for real, because you are practically declaring the existence of a web ring/link wheel, something that can make you sites go directly to the hell of ban.

There are countless little resource/ppc/affiliate websites out there trying to earn a few bucks. Most of them are pretty thin, but every now and then you will run into a good one. I would start by targeting each country and finding those quality forex sites to cross-promote with. If you provide data/information a widget/graph/tool might be an ideal way to earn links.

Hi Diane, I'm following up on older questions that are still marked unanswered. Have you been able to improve traffic to this site, or have you put it on the back burner? I still see the IN2TOWN CHEAP FLIGHTS header and Yemeni security checks article when I look at the site now.

Wes, I had a similar problem with getting a fresh ranking report and was told there was a server crash. Some data was lost. I suspect you fell victim as well. I just received an updated report so I'm assuming you will too. HTH.

I have been directly involved in assisting sites recover from manual and algorithmic penalties. I believe most providers of SEO services have this experience as well. Penalties are a common driver or business for our industry. I did not intend to upset you in any way. My only thoughts regarding your reply were: if you have knowledge about an SEO topic, please share it. If you feel you have discovered a solution, it would be helpful to let others know about it in the Q&A section. You can even write a YouMoz article if you desire which can yield positive credit and attention. generally speaking, taking months to recover from a penalty would be crippling to most businesses. I always strive to work with clients to balance their traffic, but when I first receive clients they often show 85%+ of their traffic comes from Google. If they were to lose that traffic for 60+ days many would go out of business. I am glad to hear you were able to resolve the issues on your site. Best Regards, -Ryan

Sorry for the delay in reply but thanks a lot for the info. This site is hosted on godaddy can all the above be done via their website management tools?

If the local hospitals are to have their own sites then I believe that an important part of those websites is the profiles of important physicians who serve there and the services that they deliver.  These physicians and service staffs are the intellectual assets of  each hospital.  Their personalities and expertise these professionals are really what is being sold and thus what is marketable. Patients really don't want a "hospital" they really want a medical team that can make them well. In the small communities where I have lived anyone searching Google for a physician by name will very frequently encounter the large database publishing sites rather than the website of that physician's practice or the institution where he/she serves. These database sites rank well because they have professional SEO yet some of them are close to professional spam. That does not serve the searcher well at all, they don't need his/her name and address.  Instead what they would hope to find is a page about this person and learn about his/her education, experience, expertise and personality - along with the connection to the hospital where service is rendered.  If people are doing comparison shopping for a physician this is the information that they need to find.

there are some rumors they gonna effect the QS in adwords also.

the keyword isnt as competitive as "books". it's more in a niche market. however, some sites have the keyword in the url and most of the links have the exact anchor text. we on the other hand tried not to use the keyword in the anchortext as often... we are mostly linked like "brand + forum". I guess we need more links with the "keyword forum" and maybe onpage optimize. Thanks for your replies.

If you have 301 redirects of every page in place as the new design is uploaded then the traffic that comes in through the old URLs will be moved by your server to the new URLs.  Also, search engines will follow links to the old URLs and give the new URLs most of the linkvalue. If you don't use 301s on a page then any person who clicks a link to your site on another domain or in a search engine will not see the new page.  They could see the old page if you did not remove it or an error if you removed it.

In addition to EGOL on the news front, your news needs to be unique. Aggregate or scraped news won't last long in google. With respect to the site, are you dealing with duplicate content? After taking a large phrase from a new news item and wrapping it in quotes, the SERP page shows a large number of pages with different titles/urls. Without knowing how your site is structured it's a bit difficult to give specific advice, but run the SEOmoz custom crawler over your site and see how much duplicate content you have or are creating.