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Checking the URl's in google they do indeed seem to be tracking URL's, which must pass info back into their alogrithm.

In some cases my list will be upto 100 locations - to the user this looks really:
a/. Spammy
b/. Ugly
c/. Unreadable

It's an irritating situation - If I am going for option 2, what I am in reality doing is pandering to search engines over users - exactly the opposite of what you should do, and SE's are very clear on this as well.

You would have thought SE's would have figured a solution to this out by now as it must be so common - and as a user when I see lists like this which are clearly for SE's not users, then I get annoyed with the site.

I'd be interested to know if there has been:
A/. Any test done on such list types to see if SE's can actually recognise that although the anchor just says the Location, if the link title has the perfect anchor, do they take this into account.
B/. If there are any other methods that could be used to try and tell the search engines the full meaning of the links - eg something like a tag on the container holding the list.

My site works a bit like a directory, so say I have a page called "Ice Cream Vendors" - on that page I would talk a bit about Ice Cream Vendors, then I will have a list of Ice Cream Vendor Locations.

My list of locations can be quite big depending on the product and the amount of locations they occur in - when you click a location, it goes to a page showing all "ICeCream Vendors" in that location.

So Currently I will have a table on the page a bit like this:

ICE CREAM VENDOR LOCATIONS
New York
Miami
Las Vegas

This is all perfectly nice, simple and usable - BUT it is not producing perfect keyword links - for perfect keyword links the list should be like this:

ICE CREAM VENDOR LOCATIONS
New York Ice Cream Vendors
Miami Ice Cream Vendors
Las Vegas Ice Cream Vendors

Now I have my perfect anchor links - BUT it looks rediculous and is NOT user friendly.

So What do I do?
1/. Build it for users and not have perfect anchor links, and loose in SEO?
2/.  Build a perfect SEO links and make it less usable and looking spammy?

OR

3/. Deliver the search engine the perfect SEO links, and the user the userfriendly version?

In this I mean I could do the following:
SE's (and screen readers I think would see):
ICE CREAM VENDOR LOCATIONS
New York Ice Cream Vendors
Miami Ice Cream Vendors
Las Vegas Ice Cream Vendors

Users would See
ICE CREAM VENDOR LOCATIONS
New York
Miami
Las Vegas

Now in my view I am doing nothing wrong - I am mearly giving the user the most userfriendly version and I am giving the SE more information on the link, that the user doesn't need.

So - In my view I am doing something that is honest  - but what are your thoughts?? Has anyone tried to do this?

Thanks

Not really no - I don't think they have anything to do with maps - suddenyl all our referral URL's seem to be like this though?

Hi,

I've been monitoring my referral URL's coming in and today noticed they had changed.

Previously when I clicked one it would be the google search result page - however now they all seem to be like this: http://www.google.co.uk/url?sa=t&source=web&cd=7&sqi=2&ved=0CHEQFjAG&url=**http://www.mysite.com**&rct=j&q=**my keyword**&ei=Bvc3TrbgB5G0hAfvqoSvAg&usg=AFQjCNFONDCPJDl3d2PYceYvale_cL7s4Q

All these URL's immediately redirect to my website pages.

Do you know what they are - they seem to be tracking URL's of some sort I am thinking??

Are they trying to analyse my site with respect to certain keywords??

Thanks

Thanks - thats pretty cools

This is just a general theoretical discussion to provoke some thought.

Suppose I have a 2 synonym keywords - which mean identical things.

EG - "Golf Holiday" "Golf Break" - probably you can think of better ones, but you get the idea.

On the following assumptions:

• Google knows these synonyms have identical meaning.
• Google want to provide the searcher with the "best possible result set".
• By definition there can only be 1 "best possible results set"

If the above is true, then Google should produce identical result sets for either of these terms - **So why don't they?  **

Yes it would - but that doesn't give you the control you need to work a really efficient adwords campaign. IE Its better to have lots of different very targetted adgroups perfectly adjusted to results and ROI, than a single adgroup which targets masses of keywords, and less control.

Thanks - that looks pretty useful

I've been using googles keyword tools to get keyword search data, but I'm pretty sceptical of some of the results it throws out on number of searches. On a number of keywords - particularly when you get to longtail, I've seen results which cannot possibly be right.

So - I am trying to find out a way of getting REAL data I can trust.

Here are my thoughts on a possible method of getting this key data:
1/. Firstly I am taking on the assumption that the adwords campaign monitoring statistics are more reliable and accurate than the keyword research tools - correct me if I am wrong!

2/. Then take a load of keywords you wish to monitor and create didfferent ads for them based of EXACT match.

3/. Make sure non of your adverts conflict with each other, so you may have to turn off any other campaigns you have running.

4/. Put you bids and available spend as high as possible, so that ideally you will your ads will always be shown for every search match, and ideally always come in No1 spot on the ads. IE your aim is to create a neutral environment where your ads are shown for every search match and appear in the exact same position for each search match.

Run the campaign for a period of time long enough to be confident that you have enough search data.

From this you should have the vital data on keyword searches done on your exact match keywords.

5/. Repeat the test, but this time use phrase matches and again make sure there are no conflicts.

6/. Repeat again with broad match - this would require very careful implimentation not to have any conflicts and you would likely need to make heavy use of the "Not Include" keywords.

What are your thoughts on the above process? - Any flaws, or other better solutions?

Obviously one key thing with doing this is you need to have to be prepared to have a decent budget to get this data - but it won't be wasted as you will also be getting the adwords traffic.

Thanks

I need to create some mass adwords campaigns, and doing this by hand can be a huge chore - I was wondering if people can recommend so tools to speed up the process.

Here's an example:

I have certian core sets of keywords which when combined together make up my long tail keywords.

So I have

Long Tail Keyword Variations = [Set 1 Keywords] + [Set 2 Keywords] + [Set 3 Keywords]

When you have a significant number of keywords in each set, it extrapolates into thousands of possible variations - especially if you alter the order of each set.

So are there any tools which would help me speed up the process of creating these combinations?

Thanks

It will probably show the link title if the image is wrapped in a link tag and you have no alt tag. Alt tags do have SEO significance - and they do show when you hover on an image. Use normal text

The Alt tag is primarily there for usaility - ie when you hover the user can see the alt information. Therefore write how you would write normal text

Try these for article posting :
http://www.vretoolbar.com/articles/directories.php

http://www.fridaytrafficreport.com/top-21-the-best-article-directory-list/

There are also various scripts to help you post articles to multiple sites at once to speed things up. We have used http://www.articledriprobot.com/ before and it was pretty good - you can also use it to spin your articles.

This is a resonable resource for info on Press Release sites: http://www.subhub.com/articles/the-best-free-and-paid-press-release-websites-and-when-to-use-them

Hi,

I'm looking into software solutions for building an online community - IE forums, blog, Polls, Galleries, User Profiles etc. It needs to be asp.net to integrate with the rest of our system and after a lot of research I have narrowed it down to the following few.

1/. http://www.mono-software.com/MonoX-ASP-NET-CMS-Social-Networking-Platform/
2/. http://www.mojoportal.com/home
3/. http://www.kentico.com/home.aspx
4/. http://www.composite.net/C1.aspx
5/. http://www.sitefinity.com

I like the sound of Kentico, but the others also seem to have a lot of merits - has anyone had any experience with any of the above software and any thoughts that may help my choice.

Many thanks

Hi,

I'm building an affiliate system for our website, and I obviously want to gain as much SEO benifit from it as possible.

So I am wondering what the optimal solution is with regard to how an affilaite URL is tagged.

After looking into it a bit more - I have come up with the following.

1/. Use an affilaite URL idendifier with a #
EG like www.mysite.com#123

2/. 301 redirect the affilaite URL to the "real URL"
EG www.mysite.com#123      301 ->  www.mysite.com

What do you think of this?

Thanks

This is just a general discussion on your thoughts on the value of obtaining keyword Twitter & Facebook accounts ( especially if you have a brand name not connected to your primary keywords)

For Example:

What do you think the value/benifits are of obtaining accounts such as:
http://twitter.com/#!/**keyword**
http://facebook.com/**keyword**

Thanks

Hi,

I'm building our own affilaite system.

I want to make sure I get as much SEO benifit from affiliate links as possible so I am in search of the perfect solution.

My thoughts after doing a bit of research are to do the following - using the # as my identifier:

1/. Use an ID like www.mysite.com/#A123

2/. Redirect via 301 these urls to www.mysite.com

Any thoughts on this, or other things I should be thinking of with regard so building an affilaite system that has strong SEO benifits?

Thanks

Hi,

Yes I'd definately be looking at Joomla or Droopal as a starting point if our systems were built in php - but they aren't - its all .NET - and a I think long term there would end up being issues with integration.

I'm currently looking at .NET equivelants - Sueetie, Kentico, Episerver and Umbraco, as a starting point.

While I agree with a lot of people saying build something totally from scratch as that way you will get EXACTLY what your after (Note we have spent 2 years building a total ground up solution to run our entire office and core of our website), I would disagree that when it comes to things like blogs, forums etc that it the best solution is to build totally from the ground up - if there is a blog / forum solution for example that does 95% of what you want then use that and customise to get that missing 5%.

I guess it is just impossible for people to give an objective answer without knowing the exact details - I believe there are cases for total ground up builds and customisation of existing application, depending on the situation. It's all a case looking for solution that provides the optimal ROI.