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Well you can do a 301 but also be sure to 301 all the deep links...

So 301 junkthecars.com to sellthecars.com/about-us and also junkthecars.com/about-us to sellthecars.com/about-us

Be sure to also do this in your webmaster tools. You will need to have both versions verified in this account.

Ideally you want to keep the number of 404 pages low because it tells the search engine that the page is a dead end, ask any SEO, it's best to keep the number of 404's as low as possible.

Link equity tells Google why to rank a page or give the root domain more authority. However, Google does not want users to end up on dead pages. So it will not help the site, rather hurt it. My recommendation is to create a sitemap and submit to Google WMT with the pages you want the spiders to index.

Limit the 404's as much as possible and try to 301 them if possible to a relevant page (from a user perspective).

No they don't. Search engine spiders follow the link as a user, if the pages no longer exist and you cannot forward the user to a better page then create a good 404 page that will keep the users intrigued.

yes this is what I was getting at just wanted to ask first, in case it may have been another issue.

Did you link you Google Webmaster tools to your Google Analytics?

Hi MacKensey,

If I want to know my rank for bank account, do I need to list bank accounts as well or will my ranking include variations?

They are exact so the term "bank accounts" and "bank account" are separate. SEOmoz is reflecting the data they find on the SERP when you run the report.

Also, if I use the word bank as a keyword, will any search that contains the word bank (even when other words are included) count towards the ranking for that word? Or would I need to add additional keywords like dallas bank, local bank, etc?

No it will only contain the term you include.

Hi Jim,

Is this really a problem? With limited resources, what real positive effect will making all these images have unique title tags really have from a SERP perspective?

Yes it will help, giving descriptions for your images can also help visually impaired people. I would name all my images, however if theres other content on these pages that are duplicate such as URL string I would recommend adding a canonical code, this will help you avoid duplicate content penalties.

This should help:

http://support.google.com/webmasters/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=139394

"Google trends" should give you an idea of what people are searching for and if the terms are moving up/down etc...

If you want to know volumes of terms searched within Google you can use "Google adwords keyword tool".

Hi Gordon,

We use [exact] and look at the local (which is in the US) for projects within the US. If the project is global we look at global.

Targeting broad may be cheaper but might not have a good ROI. My bes response is experiment and keep you eye on analytics. What is working? what is not working? etc...

In definition:

Select a match type to see the monthly traffic volume for a keyword with that match type.

How it works: The table shows approximately how much traffic a keyword with a selected match type gets on Google.

Broad: The sum of the search volumes for the keyword, related grammatical forms, synonyms, and related words

Exact: The search volume for that specific keyword and close variants

Phrase: The sum of search volumes that include the whole phrase or near variants of the whole phrase

Yes Amber, I agree! it seems as if they have a monopoly on a bunch of listings. However, there are three directory aggregating sites that I would highly recommend getting your site listed on: **Acxicom, Infogroup, and Localez. **These three sites aggregate many of the sites from that annoying Yext index (Find the site on Yext, try to fix it ,end back on Yext.. . O.o).

Your title says "Local Coordinator" if the intension is to rank locally, look for local citations from local sites for local you can use whitesparc.ca, and for some national getlisted.org and Google ("Keyword" + Directory or "Keyword" + "Location" Directory). Lastly, how many, and our company feel about Yext <--- Overpriced!  IMO spammy, they took over my Email, once you sign up you will get an email from every directory on the Yext SERP. Now we create a directories email account for each client.

Keep in mind all your information must be accurate, we like to use the exact NAP (Name Address and Phone#) that is in the places account for each of the directories. We also make sure to fill out each listing as much as possible, and we only submit to relevant categories.

Lastly,

When submitting to directories you should use some caution, some of the sites can be of low quality or have unnatural profiles. In this case it's better to not be listed. Using open site explorer can help you determine anchor texts and low quality links of the sites you are planning on submitting to.

Hope this helps and if you have any more questions about local search, I would be glad to help.

First find the listing if it exists then

look for this...

OWN THIS BUSINESS?

"Sign in to update your listing" <------ Click on that for the listing that is incorrect. Then sign in and fix the listing.

oh and if you did not set up the original and do not have the login info

perhaps a phone call will help resolve the inconsistant listing.

Still having trouble logging in?

Call a representative at (888) 857-6722 or Email us at customersupport@local.com

Hope this helps

Hi Tim,

If the pages you are going to replace are still content rich on a similar vertical (old blue widget to new blew widget) you can do a 301 redirect which will let the search engine know that the page has moved and it will also transfer any of the authority the old page(s) has.

Hope this helps.

Only use a link canonical for two pages with similar content to avoid duplication and let the search engine know "this content is all the same but I want to rank this page"

Do a 301 redirect from the old page to the new page if you have a new page to deliver. If not build a 404 landing page with call to action for that user.

I hope this helps.

Did you do a 301 redirect from the old page to the new one? If you had an old page that you redirect you should use a 301 redirect to pass the link juice (authority and users) from the old page to the new.

Otherwise, you lose the authority of the page and the search engines return a 404.

I would recommend adding your unit number other wise it can create inconsistencies. Keep in mind once you add the H you will need to add it to all you citations (including the ones you have already submitted) and you will need to verify again in google places.

Hello Joshua,

Did you let Google know in your webmaster tools?

Did you submit a new sitemap to Google?

How we look at the site in  steps:

A)Relevancy - the site must be as relevant as possible for users (similar terms on the site)

B)Back Links/Natural Linking - then we check to make sure the site has a natural linking profile and not over optimizing.

C)Authority/Page Rank

D)Social Media - does the site have a blog with real interaction, comments, likes and shares.

A and B must be done first and if they are not good proceed to the next link.

If A and B are good, steps C and D will help you evaluate the links actual value.

Hi,

Spying on your top competitor, can help. Find out what they are doing that is working, and see how you could add value to the same users.

Find out what social networks they are in (if any) and where they are earning links from.

There are many ways to buld links, have you checked out: http://www.seomoz.org/blog/the-noob-guide-to-link-building

Hope this helps.

It really depends on what you want to rank for. How competitive is the SERP?

Is the term you are trying to rank for broad or exact?

When a site is new it usually takes some time for it to build trust in the search engine.

The more competitive the term the more quality work you will need to apply to your project to see results. There are many different ways you can rank, the goal is to find what works with the user in mind and the search engine's guidelines as the law.

A mat release is still going to get indexed and counted for. The first page it gets indexed on gets all the credit. Anything after that is duplicate if it does not trackback to the first piece of content.

Unless I am mistaken, I don't think the search engines are able to differentiate this type of content.