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True, that page is higher quality. If you're not set on that being the reason, then I suggest restructuring the 'People' content to be as simple as possible. Remove any unnecessary nesting, get the microdata as short, simple, and flat as possible. Then, give it some more time and see if that makes the SERP update. If so, then you know you have some kind of code structuring issue.
Are you only looking to have the person's job title available via snippet? I hope you're not looking to have the person's photo show up in the SERPs, I believe that is still a discontinued feature.
The People icrodata you've implemented appears to be correct. You could try going with microformats instead of microdata and see if that helps, https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/146897\. Google's example used microformats, so maybe they favor that schema.
However, I'm more inclined that they've deemed the page quality too low and not doing much to update the SERP. I would try adding content to the agent's page, maybe highlight content pieces they are proud off, skills they possess, previous travels they have put together, locations they specialize in, testimonials from customers of the agent, and anything creative you can think of - then see if that helps it get updated in the SERPs.
"Google Shopping doesn't allow the promotion of services."
Reference: https://support.google.com/merchants/answer/2770285?hl=en
Hi Anthony,
It's great to see you updating your business' local information. Consistency is very important in local search.
I suggest editing the old profile to have the same, consistent information as your current profile. Then, find the old local listing on Google Maps and click 'Suggest an edit.' There you can submit feedback to let Google know the old listing should be removed in place of the new listing and information.
I don't think canonicalization would be inappropriate here. Each page is different, but each page of a forum topic is supporting the OPs' main post on the first page. You can canonical the subsequent pages and pass the authority to the main page so it ranks highest.
If someone uses a specific search term that another person used on page 4 of the topic, that page will still show in Google's SERPs and direct the user to the deeper page, rather than the main page. So, we're not applying a canonical tag because of duplicate content issues, but to support the forum topic's parent theme.
I suggest adding rel/next logic to your site's theme and let Google rank the subsequent pages accordingly. Once proper canonical and rel/next tags are implemented, I wouldn't worry about duplicate meta information.
What SEO plugin are you using? If Yoast, there should be settings you can apply to differentiate subsequent pages' titles.
However, your blog should have canonical and/or rel/next settings added to properly inform Google (and other SEs) that the page being viewed is page 2..3..4..5..ect. Then, the SEs understand that this is a continuation of the original page and factor on-page SEO into the ranking accordingly (i.e. do not count the duplicate titles against you).
I do think you would be working against yourself, given the scenario you've outlined. You may find more success if you include zip code content into the landing page of each city you've created. I.e. We service the following zip codes - and provide a table of zip codes your business area services.
You'll want to make sure that each location your business has/services, also has its related local information in the local directories (Google business, Moz Local, ect). Also, be sure to include a proper, consistent NAP (name, address, phone number) on your websites.
Get creative with your content to satisfy all related keyword terms. For example, if you know people will search 'plumbers near me' then you may want to include a headline and content section about Plumbers near Dallas, Texas and talk about all the plumbing related services you provide near the Dallas city (Dallas and plumbing are only used for examples).
I suggest focusing less on Keyword Density (the amount of time that you use a keyword on a given page) and more on creating value-added content around your keyword - including synonyms and closely related keywords.
Do not worry about overuse of the word in your image file names. However, your image file names should represent what the image is. I.e. Sussex catering team, Sussex catering chef Joe Schmoe
Overusing a single keyword, or group of closely related keywords, could be viewed as keyword spamming. I would worry less about this in your image file names and worry more if the same keyword is used throughout your page copy. If you're reading your content and finding that you're using the word Sussex in ever sentence, that's going to be too much.
Create copy that is easy to read, quick to understand, and focused on your keyword terms.
If your company plans on having the acquired domains redirect to your primary domain, then 301 redirects would be the proper method to use.
You'd set those up in the acquired domains' .htaccess file.
It looks like you have canonical URL meta information in place. However, there is no 301 redirect from the non-ww version to the www version.
For instances such as this, you want users to resolve to a single URL, which I believe you want the www version of the URL. You should implement a 301 redirect from the non-www to the www URL.
Also, in your Google Webmaster Tools, make sure to configure the setting that tells Google what your preferred domain/home page is.
This should help clear up any duplicate content issues for this case.
Not so much SEO implications, although you may want to noindex the page if the only content shown will not be unique (i.e. you're copying the content you post on social to your website).
I would be more concerned about the implications on the users. If I click a social icon it is normally because I want to go to the social property. If doing that on your site takes me to a page that has your newsfeed, but I need to make another click to get to your FB profile it would annoy me mucho.
If you've implemented the GA tracking code directly to the template, then you should see 2 tracking snippets in the source code (view source, search for your Analytics ID).
However, if you've implemented GA tracking through a Tag Manager, you may have a single tracking code in the source and the second wouldn't necessarily show up in the source.
I cannot necessarily say that you should be noticing higher than 14% increase in pageviews, tbh. It depends on the implementation, error, and browsing activity. (i.e. it isn't a straight 2x increase)
It sounds like Google Analytics tracking could be implemented twice. Google fires a pageview when a visitor lands on the page. If two GA snippets are implemented and someone lands on your page, they cannot track the bounce since they think the other snippets' page view counts as an interaction and the bounce rate drops to nearly nothing.
Are we doing something wrong or does it take Google more than a month to update their results for this type of change?
It looks like you've implemented the 301 redirect properly. In addition, Google is caching the newer version of your site. You just need to wait until G drops the page from their index.
As others have mentioned, using a 301 redirect in this situation is not the most efficient use case, especially if you want all versions of your site to be indexed and available to users.
For displaying regional content (e.g. you have the same content, but it is translated to a specific language on different page versions) you would want to use hreflang to tell Google that you have multiple versions and the regions they satisfy. This will allow Google to serve up the regional specific content to users in international Google search engines and Google will index/know which versions are appropriate.
Reference link: https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/189077
Additional reference: https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/182192?hl=en#2
Referrals tend to be a great source for effective SEOs. The low barrier to entry allows for a lot of individuals, many times inexperienced, to present themselves as an authority and word of mouth referrals help weed out the ineffective SEOs.
I can be contacted through my Moz profile, Moz PM or directly through the website listed.
Elance can be a good community, but the risk is high if you cannot identify the low quality profiles.
Hi WMCA,
Unfortunately, I doubt that the community can provide a resource that says 'if you improve local seo, your traffic will increase by x%' - you're assumption that these numbers are highly dependent upon the locale and website is correct.
You can do something like the following:
It's not - the agencies most likely rely on brand appearance and driving traffic through other means (blog content, ppc traffic) for conversions.
Digital marketing agencies compete in a tough organic niche. It's a growing business niche and has very low barrier to entry. Therefore, websites need to find other ways to compete rather than targeting the broadest terms and ranking their home page organically for them. Sometimes, leaving information out and having a luxurious or successful appearance is enough to convert traffic.
Hello Ali & welcome to the Moz community!
There could be many factors influencing your SERPs position, especially for a new website. Since your site is new, Google is just learning about its content and performance. It could be that your article came up high in the SERPs and then Google noticed some significant pogo-sticking and lowered its rankings.
Have you checked the behavior metrics of the traffic that came through that day? I also suggest adding the term that sent you traffic to Moz's keyword tracking tool so you can monitor its SERPs progress and see how Google is adjusting the rankings.
The Moz index is usually refreshed once a month, however, it's been longer than that since the last update this time around. Moz has a big index update schedule for the 28th, I believe.