Welcome to the Q&A Forum

Hi Jennita.

This statement - "In our mind it simply means that the original poster got the answer they needed." - makes me wonder if you might have missed a key point Dana was trying to make, that being shouldn't the original poster be the one who decides if they "got the answer they needed" or not? Perhaps you got that totally and I'm making a mountain out of a mole hill, but I think her point is an excellent one and that's why I'm circling back on it again... just to be sure.

You both (EGOL and DANA TAN) raise good points of consideration. I'm glad this topic came up b/c I have myself been frustrated when my question gets marked "answered" when I feel it has not. I like her proposal.

EGOL, I suspect your first two observations are accurate - that people "mark a question as "answered" when they get a response that they "like" instead of the response that they "need" and that "the best answer sometimes gets thumbed down because it requires work."  A suggestion would be that they simply get tagged "closed" with no judgment as to whether the answer was good or bad, answered the intent of the query or not. That might also help when people do a subsequent search for a topic and find conflicting answers. That's happened to me, and to EGOL's point (rules and best practices change over time), I understand why. But seeing the question marked as "answered" just adds to the confusion, especially if you're new.

I  think your suggestion about making "active" the default view is a good one.

I also want to say that I love it when Moz chimes in and marks an answer as a good one or endorses it. Really encourages participation and provides helpful information to all readers.

Great question. Great discussion.

Matt Cutts very specifically said "if you’re using guest blogging as a way to gain links in 2014, you should probably stop" (http://www.mattcutts.com/blog/guest-blogging/). He didn't say "stop guest blogging altogether". Two different things.

Lizzie Borden murdered her parents with an axe. That doesn't mean axes should be outlawed for chopping wood. (Sorry, but it gets my point across.) As others above and elsewhere have pointed out, there are and remain very good reasons to guest blog. If you continue to provide value to your intended audience without trying to draw too much attention to yourself, you'll be fine. I know that's subjective, but EGOL gave concrete examples of what NOT to do.

Don't start out trying to be all things SEO to all people. Find your niche. What subset of SEO are you passionate about? What are you particularly good at? Where is there a need?

If you have a reputable and respected SEO firm in your neighborhood, look to get hired. Ask for a mentor. Learn from him or her and thru osmosis.

Yes. It seems in this instance there's not a big difference, if any difference at all, between search volumes for "Jacksonville water heaters" and "water heaters Jacksonville". And as vzPro points out, with Hummingbird, Google will find you anyway.

I agree with VzPro, it's at least an indication.

I also do things like search for "keyword+location" and then just "keyword", but using the targeting and location options on the left to select Jacksonville FL only (vs the entire US).

So in your example, plugging "water heaters Jacksonville" turned up 0 searches a month. Plugging in "water heaters" and then targeting Jacksonville FL only turned up 40 searches a month.

Hi Dave,

I think the sequencing of words in the URL is less important than the sequencing of words in the title tag. That said, if I were you I'd look up "keyword+location" and "location+keyword" in Google Planner and make my choice based on what I learn there. Which version gets the most searches? Which is harder to rank for? And which looks like it might have the better commercial value?

The length of the URL is going to be the same either way, so err on the side of the sequencing that best fits your overall ranking objectives.

Are you sure you want to do this? You say 80% of the site consists of gallery and blog pages. You also say there are a lot of internal links to those pages. Are you perhaps under estimating the value of long- tail traffic

To answer your specific question, yes link juice will still pass thru to the pages that are no indexed. They just won't ever show up in search results. Using robots noindex gets you the same result. 301 redirects will pass all your link juice back to the home page, but makes for a lousy user experience. Same for deleting pages.

Given you "can't say" how the old numbers were derived, you might try plugging your key phrases into Google trends to see if there's been an obvious diminishing of search volume over the past few years. That might help you figure out whether there's been less searches or whether your "old" numbers are from exact match searches or something else.

The RS SEO Joomls extension looks very promising. I've only just begun to poke around with it, but would recommend starting there unless others have different suggestions.

Sean, What is the URL for your site?

Hi Diana.

First, I agree with EGOL that you absolutely have to be able to show value.

Second, given where you're at on the learning curve and your own admission about being challenged by technical SEO, I  think it might be premature for you to be thinking about branching out on your own.

If I were you, I'd be looking for a position in a highly regarded existing SEO company. Figure out what you're good at NOW, and offer up those services. Be open and honest about your desire to learn and to eventually branch off on your own. Also set a realistic time frame during which you'll dedicate yourself to your new company and give them your all. Hunker down, do a good job, and learn as much as you can about technical SEO AS WELL AS how to run a small business. At the end of your allotted time frame, re-evaluate. You may be surprised at what you discover.

Hi Sarah.

Fast response! Thanks.

When I use the check listing functionality, I see Yahoo listed on the bottom right.

D

Wondering why the new Moz Local tool bothers to include Yahoo then? Why don't we just drop it entirely if "they are not a major player in local search"? Are there other players listed in the Moz Local tool that we can ignore as well?

Hi khi5,

I think excluding those MLS listings from your site using the robots.txt file would be over kill.

As I'm sure you well know, Google does what it wants. I think tagging the pages you don't want indexed with "noindex follow" AND adding them to the robots.txt file doesn't make the likelihood that Google will respect your wishes any higher. You might want to consider canonicalizing them though, so links to and bookmarks and shares of said pages get credited to your site.

As to how long it takes for Google to deindex said pages, it can take a very long time. In my experience, "a very long time" can run 6-8 months. You do have the option however, of using Google Webmaster Tools > Google Index > Remove URLs to ask to have them deindexed faster. Again, no guarantees that Google will do as you ask, but I've found them to be pretty responsive when I use the tool.

I'd love to hear if anyone else feels differently.

Hi Arthur,

Keri answered your specific question, and I'd like to suggest an alternative.

Try using Whitespark. While, so far as I know, you can't preselect the sites you want to acquire citations from, they do "prepare a list of new citation opportunities using our huge database of business listing sites... starting with the highest quality sources ...".

Citations are built manually. They check your existing citations before starting so no duplicates are created.

Whitespark also gives you the option to specify that you only want "hyper relevant citations that are specific to your industry or city." They charge a one-time fee based on the number and type (non-specific or hyper relevant) of citations you order. Their fees are, in my opinion, fair.

Does that help?

I'm a big fan of SEO audits. From a customer perspective:

• they tell you what's broken;
• they tell you what's working well;
• you can prioritize the work that needs to be done;
• you can more easily identify the skill sets needed to complete the work; and
• identify inter-dependencies so you acquire what's needed, when it's needed.

Audits also give you a baseline that you can use to draw "a line in the sand" and know where you're starting from. You can then more easily demonstrate measured improvements over time.

Given your goal is link acquisition versus gaining exposure and solidifying your presence in your local market, I agree with Miriam that "your efforts would likely be better spent earning links that are relevant to your industry rather than your geography." Directories don't pass along a lot of link juice and Google doesn't value them highly.

I'm also not a fan of the paid directory submission services.

• They're expensive.
• They're time boxed, meaning your listing disappears when you stop paying.
• They're limited in their distribution - not every service hits every directory.
• They don't deal with duplicates.
• You still have to do some of the work anyway - the better directories require manual verification to ensure the requester is an authorized representative of the business.

Whitespark is the exception. They're reasonably priced, get you permanent, quality listings, and because they're manually built listings, they address data inconsistencies and duplicates along the way.

As to the BBB, that's a judgment call and the thread Miriam points out will help you decide which way to go.

Thank you EGOL and Chris Menke. Very helpful. Much appreciated.

Moz just prompted me to decide whether my question has been answered or not. I don't think I've been clear in my question.

My question is about Google Webmaster Tools. Why is www.liveathomeseniors.com not eligible to rank for more than just 3 queries? I realize there is much that can be done to improve the site from a SEO perspective, and I can see that the site has been indexed - including a lot of duplicate pages. Yet it only shows up as being eligible to rank for three queries:

• "live at home seniors" with an average ranking of 1
• "seniors living at home" with an average ranking of 40; and
• "indemnity plans" with an average ranking of 450.

I also realize GWT only shows us a sampling of queries, but feel I should be seeing more queries showing up after the site has been in existence for more than year. Any ideas or suggestions as to why this might be happening?