Welcome to the Q&A Forum

It looks like #2 (+WhiteboardCreations) is a Google+ local page, while #1 is a regular page. If you have the option to delete the page, then it's likely that someone on your team with access to that e-mail address created the page at some point. If you used to use the old Google Local, then Google may have automatically created #2 for you, which you now manage.

It should be safe to delete the first page without any consequence since it doesn't appear to be connected to anything. It should warn you about any potential content that may be deleted when you go to delete it. You could also just keep the first page around if you want to, although that could get confusing. As you build out the followers for your main page, it should start to outrank the other page in the search results.

Directory links don't pass much link value, but it can still be useful to be listed in the top directories for local citations. Yext can automate the process if you're short on time & resources, but you can also submit to the directories manually for full control of the process.

They even provide a list of all the directories they submit to:

http://www.yext.com/blog/tag/business-directories/

BV does provide a newer format for their reviews, if your server allows server side scripting such as PHP. I believe it's called "Cloud SEO". This is the simplest solution.

If you can't run PHP, then I would recommend talking to YourStoreWizards (http://www.yourstorewizards.com/). They provide customized solutions that can automate the data pulling and updating process.

As far as reviews.mysite.com, you want to get that de-indexed as soon as you get the HTML reviews on your site. Otherwise, not only will the subdomain compete with your main site for traffic, bu tall the reviews on your site will be seen as duplicate content.

As you yourself pointed out, there are perfectly legitimate reasons for owning multiple domains that all rank for the same term (ex: nike.com, nikeinc.com, nikeplus.com, etc). Not sure why you are arguing with what I wrote.

Where in Google's TOS does it say that ranking multiple domains for the same phrases is against the guidelines? My original answer is correct: Google will not penalize you for owning multiple domains, only if you are being spammy about it.

Yup. Once you have the GWT verification in the header, you should be able to deindex the entire subdomain instantly.

Yes, you should be fine in that case. Google is not going to penalize you.

Yes, we manually bulk upload the HTML reviews every couples weeks or so to keep them fresh. We also had BV noindex the review.subdomain so that it wasn't competing with us in the SERPs (have them add a noindex tag in the header as well as your Google Webmaster Tools verification code, so you can instantly deindex all the pages).

Google's Matt Cutts recently responded to a similar question. Basically, Google does not generally penalize sites for having duplicate content unless they're being spammy about it. However, Google will only show one version of the same content to searchers. So your sites won't be penalized, but Google isn't going to show the US, UK, and Australia sites in the same SERPs for the same query for the same content. The geo targeting should also help.

http://searchengineland.com/googles-matt-cutts-duplicate-content-wont-hurt-you-unless-it-is-spammy-167459

How are you checking their backlinks? Keep in mind that even the best link checkers can find only a fraction of the links pointing to a site. It could be that there are more links going to the site that you're not aware of, that Google knows about. Ahrefs has the largest index of links, in my experience.

It's also possible that the site has a lot of other positive signals going to the site. Generally, the more authoritative and trustworthy a site is in Google's eyes, the more it can get away with in terms of spammy tactics without getting penalized.

You also don't know which of those links are helping with the rankings, if any. It's entirely possible that the company has already disavowed most of those links in Webmaster tools, or Google is discounting them automatically. Or maybe they will end up getting penalized in the next Penguin update.

In short, don't rely too much on competitive backlink analysis. It can give you a few ideas of links to go after, but it doesn't always give you the full picture.

Google won't actively penalize you for owning multiple domains, unless you are going out of your way to be spammy about it. However, you will need a lot more resources in terms of link building, social media promotion, content production, etc.

In general, the best practice from an SEO perspective is to have a single site with the all the content living in subdirectories of the domain. Subdomains are considered in many cases to be separate sites, so you would run into the same issues as having multiple domains.

There is no limit to the number of 301 redirects a site can have. A few hundred pages is relatively small. Just make sure they are implemented properly.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r1lVPrYoBkA

We use BazaarVoice reviews for our ecommerce site too. What we do is right below the iframe reviews, we have a link that says "click here to see more reviews". When you click the link, it opens up a div with the html version of the reviews. So similar idea to what you are proposing, but less "cloaky" than a noscript tag, and it doesn't impact user experience much.

BazaarVoice can also do html reviews that are not iframed if you have a server that can handle server side scripting like PHP (which unfortunately our legacy Yahoo store does not).

Hi Josh, I'm not sure what CMS you are using, but there should be some way to update the template for your archive pages, which will update all your archive pages. Just add this code in the section of the template:

name="robots" content="noindex,follow" />

I prefer shorter URLs, but it depends on the size and structure of your site. If you have tens of thousands of pages, then using subfolders to organize things probably makes sense. Likewise, if your site has 5 main categories, it may make sense again to have 5 subcategories to give your site structure.

If you are changing directory structure for an existing site, be aware that you will likely see your rankings drop as Google tries to figure out the changes. 301 redirects do not pass all the link value, so you may need to do a bit of link building to get back up to your current level.

If it's just a few pages you want to redirect, you could also create a shortcut URL such as "domain.com/primary" that 301 redirects to the full URL ("why/specialists/primary-care") so that you can have a short URL that customers can memorize without sacrificing your site structure.

I would say in general links from within a post/article carry more weight than sidebar links. Sidebar links have been devalued quite a bit by Google, and with Penguin you could even potentially be penalized for a sidebar link on a site with thousands of pages. With that being said, I would not turn down a sidebar link from a high authority site if offered one.

PR can be deceptive because it hasn't been updated in nearly a year. So a site can still be high quality even if the toolbar PR shows a 0. It's always nice to get links from sites that are already ranking for your keyword, but make sure to do a thorough backlink analysis first to make sure they aren't spamming their way to the top. If the #1 result is using black hat tactics, it could take your site down with them when they inevitably get penalized down the line.

Usually your site tends to bounce around a lot when it's new, as Google tries to figure out where you belong in your SERPs. If your site has been around for 10 years, then that's probably not the case. Personalization is the first culprit I would look to, and if it wasn't that then it could just be Google testing a new algo tweak.

The usual format I follow is:

Homepage: Site Name, Additional Keywords
Subpages: Page Name | Site Name

I usually try to avoid keyword stuffing in titles, but it can be effective for improving rankings. I would test several variations of your title and see which ones help drive the most traffic. It's a simple thing to change, so should be an easy test.

One thing to watch out for is personalization, because that can skew rankings a lot. Make sure you are logged out of your Google account and using a private browsing window (cookies can skew the results) to get the best results.

Besides that, rankings do fluctuate from time to time as Google tweaks their algorithm. Rankings can even be different from location to location or person to person. Next time, I would double check the results on multiple computers before making any rankings claim. Use a 3rd party tool like Moz to confirm your rankings and show proof that your site is actually ranking where you think it's ranking.

As long as the sites are high quality (i.e. high pagerank/mozrank) I wouldn't worry about it. There is nothing wrong with linking to 3 sites in a post that happen to be from the same C-Block. As long as you're not linking to the same 3 sites over and over in a spammy or manipulative way, you should be perfectly fine.

There is also nothing wrong with getting links from 3 sites from the same C-Block. Happens all the time. As long as Google doesn't suspect that you own all 3 sites and are linking out in a manipulative manner, you should be fine.

Unless you are actively trying to do something sneaky like create a link network, C-Blocks should be the last thing you're worried about as an SEO.