Welcome to the Q&A Forum

Thanks Mike, 
I had never tried it and it works fairly well. I do notice the occasional random city but a lot less than what I was getting. 
Big help.

Actually, I was using Chrome. Interestingly I got the download through the extensions tab in Google and nothing.

Then I took it completely off again and instead did a search for Moz bar and used the download now feature from Chrome. All of a sudden there it was where I could create my own search profile with city, etc.

So if it was downloaded straight out of Extensions it did not have it. If it was downloaded without going through extensions it did. One other note is that you have to put something in the search bar to get it to show. If you just have Mozbar on and then open a new page to a google search it won't show until you search on something. 
Thanks for the big assist.

I checked my version and it was 3.1.128 which is current mozbar. I then trashed and reinstalled and I am now convinced you have a more special relationship with Moz than I have. I will speak with my therapist though.

OK, now I am feeling a bit cheated and hurt...

My Mozbar has Moz, Page Analysis, Links Pencil, Page optimization, then Link info, social info, ?, Cog, dock placement, turn off.

Are you paying them on the side?

Do I need to reinstall???

I am curious as to what those of you who are agencies and are checking specific cities for SERPs are using to geo locate a SERP in a city you are not in. PLEASE I am not looking for great Rank tracking software, etc. I want to see specific searches; I am not trying to check rankings of a specific keyword per se.

After Google changed the ability to use location settings I found that using a query string like: https://www.google.com/?gws_rd=ssl#q=purple+fuzzy+jellybeans&near=**city I want**

I noticed in the last few weeks that type of query is returning more and more results that are geo diffuse: a search with &near=denver returns some denver but also raleigh NC, Houston, etc. I realize there are other work arounds, but it would seem reasonable to want to know what is actually happening in a given city for a given search if you have multiple locations, just took on a client in DC, etc.

Love to hear what you are using.

Hello J.P.

This is a common misconception and I still am surprised when I see people doing this. There is no point in buying a bunch of domain names and redirecting them to your site if there is no content for the domain you are redirecting from. So, if you are a plumber and you are in Fresno with FresnoPlumber.info as your site, buying and redirecting best fresno plumbers, super fresno plumbers, naked fresno plumbers won't be of any benefit. 
Conversely, I doubt you would ever receive a penalty for that either.

Now, if we use the same example, I am not against having fresnoplumbers.com, .net, .org, etc. redirect but that is more to keep those domains with the client. They could also own them and do nothing with them. I would not buy up all the .biz, etc. sites but some of the more generic TLDs might make sense. But only where they really match the current domain.

Hope that helps.

Robert

Having worked with quite a few firms and large partnerships I have always wondered a bit about how Google or Bing approach terms like attorney or lawyer, attorneys or lawyers. Having done a lot of KWA analysis I can tell you that in some states you will have a preference for one over the other and it is rather fluid. Even when you get into specific disciplines within the law, you will see searchers favor one over the other. So, for an example you might see in Texas that divorce attorney is searched more frequently than divorce lawyer but Criminal lawyer is more prevalent over criminal attorney.

Does anyone know if search engines look at attorney and lawyer as interchangeable such that if you build a page and only use lawyer you would still be able to rank as attorney, etc? I have my opinions based on experience but just thought it would be cool to hear from others.

Thanks

Don't forget all you did so that you can help others going forward! Really happy for you!
Robert

Lauren,

I don't think I would be concerned based solely on the basketball issue. My first guess with the outdoor vs. indoor basketballs or rubber vs. composite is that for whatever reason, there is less competition for the composite search or you have in some way out SEO'd one over the other. For me, the consumer, I like comparisons that are straightforward and abhor lengthy narrative.

Why not have your narrative be about your product for sale and use an ordered list of some type for the comparison. So on left side vertical you would have many pebbles, rougher to touch, indoor, outdoor, both, etc. then have each of them at the top with a column underneath. Simple checkmarks show which is best for what. By having your narrative be about the product you are selling, you don't confuse others or the search engines.

Also, I am assuming you are using product markup for your items?

Hope that is helpful.

Assuming it makes navigational sense, I don't think there is a problem. If you have other healthcare solutions beyond just identity, it would make sense.

Hope that helps,

Personally, I am fully confused at what you have done. I suggest you slow down a minute and let's clarify what you had, what was done, and appropriate next moves. 
You said you created subfolders in one place which would be mysite.com/subdirectory/page-for-something.

Now you are saying you created micro sites? which would be microsite.com/page-for-something

What did you have first and what change did you make?

Hello NappyValleyNet

I took a look and recreated the issue myself. I tried it with and without the OR operator, etc. We need a Moz staffer to explain it but my guess is that the urls being dynamically generated is tied to the issue. To know it is dynamically generated as opposed to a static page, when you look at the URL you see question marks, equal signs, ampersands, etc.

Hey Moz Associates, hook us up pretty please

In SEO much of what we do is an experiment. We think we KNOW things but we are experimenting. We look at a website page for kumquat vendor and realize the brand is before the keyword in the Title Tag and go "AHA!" as if changing that convention to the acceptable Kumquat Vendor | Kathy's Kumquats is going to shoot us to position one over all the other kumquat vendors who have the same exact thing wrong because we KNOW the answer. (My use of caps is not yelling; simply emphasis.)

If we think we are not experimenting I have one question: Why do we constantly hear others ask and often ask ourselves: Why is that site outranking mine when my SEO is of the highest and best variety? We don't ask this before we made the changes we ask it because we made the changes and nothing or little happened; thats experimentation followed by question and it's all good. But, it's still experimenting.

In science we learn that for any experiment we must be careful with endeavoring to test two variables at once. Yes, there are ways to do multivariate testing, but that does have limits. If I am understanding you, your client had 25 separate subdomains in each major UK city. bob.grass.co.uk, joe.grass.co.uk, wilbur.grass.co.uk, bethany.grass.co.uk, moz.grass.co.uk, smoke.grass.co.uk, etc. Each of these sites in some way ranked for terms related to artificial grass.

If the term is "best artificial grass" and in Manchester you had each one of the above subdomains ranked on page 1 and then you turn these into sub directories on the main site, your ability to rank each one of these as they did as subdomains is highly limited. Could you, yes, in a vacuum, but IMO not in reality on Google or Bing, etc. Subdomains are treated differently than subdirectories by search engines. My guess would be you thought if the subdomains all had some weight and you moved them to the main site that weight or the link juice would transfer; did you use 301 redirects for the change?

But the other issue is this is not dissimilar to what we used to do with "micro-sites." In highly competitive verticals we would have 50 websites that were all around the same item or service: dating, plumbing, attorneys, etc. Since search engines would not allow us to have 9 out of 10 positions on the SERP with one domain, we would just cheat and put up all these others as if they were not related and Voila! Then the world rotated on its axis and, bummer for us, our tactic no longer worked.

So, your best hope is to begin putting them back as they were and hope that you can continue to have each rank as if it were a separate site for a while. You might instead try to 301 the urls from half and see if that impacts the rankings for your main site. You have to either go back to exactly as it was OR you have to experiment, because when you change 25 variables it is nearly impossible to determine exactly what happened.

Hope that helps,

Robert

Good points Erica. "We should be building content (and our sites) around what people want to know."

I think that statement is 10x content. If you are answering the query and providing the info you have nailed it. You do not need a ton of words or interactivity, etc. I do think that terms like this (10X content) become overused and then misunderstood as the result. Frankly, if I hear of one more firm that does "content management" as a sub specialty or specialty I will hurl.

If you look at what I wrote, "Who is the audience, what do they want to know, how are we going to surprise them or move them, etc.," it doesn't require more than one person to pull that off. But, even if you are a one-person shop, you can't just write a bunch of stuff and assume you are giving the reader what they wanted unless, IMO, it is in a fairly narrow band vertical of some sort.

Good points, though.

Christy,

First thank you as you made me go look at Rand's examples of 10X content and there are some good ones there. (Though I loved #4). 
The most important question you raise to me is:  "what are your hesitations with focusing on shorter-form content that packs a wallop, and what excites you about it?" The hesitations are that for us as an agency with copywriters and others responsible for content that we will not do the creative work to truly create 10X content. Then, there is no length to go with no POW! ZAP!! BOOM!!! Even though I know length works for little or nothing, something about not creating something quality when you have no true length requirements bugs me more.

What excites me about 10X content are two things: First, as a reader or consumer of content I know how annoyed I get when I read a catchy title or a title about something that interests me and I start to read but when I am two paragraphs in I realize there is nothing yet that inspires or provides information that is relevant or new. Second, I know that clients are time starved business people and if you create something for them that is quality they are blown away by it. I love being in a client meeting when the client says to the strategist something like: "I have had three different people comment on this; it was great!"

The key IMO is in the planning. Who is the audience, what do they want to know, how are we going to surprise them or move them, etc. As they used to say in the print world long ago and far away... "What's the hook?" etc.

Really good discussion point to get all thinking about whether or not we are contributing to web spam or web renaissance.

Thanks

I just haven't seen where the pages reduced, but I only use that operator for a general search. I have never gone through all the pages, etc. For that I would use any of the crawler tools. It would be interesting to see a download of search, GSC, and then something like Screaming Frog to see what we see.

As soon as I wrote that I checked our site and realized what you are saying. For Google we get "About 281 results," as I go to last page of results it changes to "page 13 of 126 results."

Then out of curiosity I tried Bing and now I am scratching my head: "763 results." When I go to last possible page I get, "247-256 of 256 results." I think that means my 281 results from Google are mostly on Bing!!!! (in case someone does not realize my humor, that last statement can be defined as either jest or sarcasm.)

So, when doing the site: I get 126 with Google but search console has 428...

Certainly interesting. I will keep playing with it.

Best

Maureen,

I wanted to be sure, so did a bit of research and there are a very limited set of markups using the highlighter. Here is the list that is similar to what you see in the dropdown on the highlighter.

Given how long the highlighter has been available, my guess would be we won't see anything else that this works with. I am not sure why, but it has stayed like this for a long time.

Best

Steven,

I know we got the best answer possible for this, but I want you to try some structured data to see if you can "force" sitelinks:

Go read this on developer tools and then implement it: https://developers.google.com/structured-data/slsb-overview

It is markup to get a searchbox on sitelinks.

Then you and some friends start searching randomly for product x yoursite.com

Let's see what happens!!

BTW I am just on a mission about this now that I have more info. Cannot see a reason for them not to afford you sitelinks!

Best

I have done this many times and if you are sending the redirects to appropriate urls on the other site this is a non issue. I have done it with sites with 100K links.

If they were in some way buying non relevant domains and redirecting that would be different.

How does redirecting the old domain to the new harm new domain link building? I can't see it even if the new domain had one link and the old had 20K.