It’s important to understand that duplicate content refers to pages that are exactly the same.  Even pages with quite a few similarities usually don’t cause alarm bells to go off with Google and the other search engines.  Avoiding duplicate content can be as simple as changing the order of the paragraphs around, but the most important thing to remember is that you don’t want a lot of duplicate content on your site because it will harm your search engine rankings.

Of course avoiding duplicate content is about more than just making sure that your website does not have articles and content copy and pasted from another site.  There are some forms of duplicate content that most website owners don’t even think about, such as:

• Discussion forums that have both a regular and a mobile version of the same site
• Pages with items for sale in your retail store that are linked with multiple distinct URLs
• Web pages that have printer-only versions of the same content on the page

When Google indexes pages, the filter will essentially choose one version of each page to list.  Sometimes the pros at Google will see that there is a lot of duplicate content within a search engine listing that was meant to take over the majority of traffic for a particular keyword.  The search engine then adjusts and lowers the rankings of sites that seem to be a copy of earlier sites.  Sometimes these sites are completely removed from the Google index so that they will never show up in search results.

Assuming you’re not just out to copy the work of others, here are some things you can do to protect your site’s search engine ranking:

• Canonicalization and site indexing – tell Google which version of your website or duplicate content you want included in the listings, whether it’s the printer-only version or the main page.  This can be done via the Google Webmaster Tools.
• 301 Redirects–You can redirect the search spiders and users to the right version of the page via .htaccess files or the administrative console.
• Consistency – Internal linking among your pages should be consistent rather than utilizing more than one version of the same page.
• Top-level domains – Make sure the URLs you use for your site have country specific extensions, like .uk for the United Kingdom or .ca for Canada, etc.
• Proper syndication – When syndicating your content on other sites, include a link back to the original article and ask those who use your article to use a no index meta tag so that their site won’t be indexed in the search engines.
• Cut down on boilerplate repetition – You don’t really need copyright information on each page.  Just link the copyright mention to a separate page that has complete information.
• Don’t publish pages until you have content for them – Publishing placeholder pages before they have content creates a lot of duplicate blank pages on your site.  If you must do this, use no-index meta tags to prevent web crawlers from indexing them.
• Adjust your content management system.  Remember that blog postings may appear in more than one place on your site, depending on how your content management system works.  You may be able to make adjustments to minimize this, thus reducing the amount of duplicate content.
• Combine pages that have similar information – If you have several pages with content that is similar, look at making those into one page instead of having separate pages with similar content.

You probably won’t be able to get around all of the issues relating to duplicate content, so for the pages you can’t do anything about, you can mark them in a way that lets the crawlers know they are duplicate content.  In the past, Google recommended blocking crawlers from actually finding the duplicate content, but this can be damaging because it causes the crawlers to treat them as separate pages.  Instead, use the rel=”canonical” link, a URL parameter handling tool, or 301 code redirects.  You can also use Webmaster Tools to change the crawl rate setting for your website.

If in spite of your efforts, your page is still removed from search engine rankings, read over the Webmaster Guidelines to find out exactly why.  Once you fix the problems, you can submit a request to have your site included in the rankings again.

Sometimes you may find that another site is actually copying your site in some way.  If this happens, it’s likely nothing to worry about with your search engine rankings.  However, if you do notice the duplicate content causing problems, a DMCA request will allow you to attempt to get that content removed by claiming that you own it.

Avasoft will take care of all your website needs and help you make sure that there’s no duplicate content lowering your search engine ranking.

Where does the snippet come from?

Google uses various features of your site to automatically create a title and description for each page on your site.  In addition to the content that’s actually on the page and other links to it on the internet, the search engines also use the meta tag’s information to help determine how to describe your web page.  For sites that don’t provide meta tag information, Google uses any information that’s available from the page content.

Of course having meta descriptions that accurately reflect what’s on your site can improve your click through rate. It creates a better experience for the user by allowing them to find what they are looking for much more easily.

Since snippets are created automatically by Google, they can’t be changed manually, but by providing the best information about your website, Google is better able to generate accurate snippets for it.  There are two ways you can help the search engines be able to create more accurate titles and descriptions for your site:

• Good meta descriptions
• Page titles that are descriptive

Let’s start by tackling the metas.

• You can easily spot problem areas by looking in Webmaster Tools at the Diagnostics button.  Check the HTML suggestions to see if Google has detected any problems.
• You will also find it helpful to use different meta descriptions for different pages on your site.  It is not unusual for several pages within your website to appear within one set of search engine results, so it is much more helpful if each meta description is different and more specific to what is actually on the page.
• You also may want to use the meta to list other information about the page that you wouldn’t put in sentence format, like the date of publication, the author, etc.  You can include whatever you think would give the reader enough information to see that this is a link they want to read.  If you’re going to follow this route, make sure that the HTML clearly tags and separates each of the pieces of information.
• Retailers may want to consider programmatic descriptions.  It is possible to program the descriptions so that they are unique for each product page within your site.  It’s all about the script you use and how it works.
• Include high quality descriptions that actually reflect what’s on each of your pages.  Although the meta descriptions aren’t actually what users will see, this information will dictate what the search engines list about your website, so you want it to be not only accurate but of high quality.

When creating titles, make sure that each page on your site has a high quality title that also describes accurately what’s on the page.  Then include this title in the title tags.  If you don’t include title tags for your site, the search engines will use other text found on the page.  Also don’t use the same title tags for multiple pages on your site because this can also result in the search engines using other text on the page.  Use the HTML suggestions section in Google’s Webmaster Tools to make sure that you don’t have any problems with your title tags.

For example: http://avasoft.net/aboutus/

Vs. http://avasoft.net/aboutus

However, this is no longer necessarily the case.  There’s no reason to keep doing it this way because Google treats them both exactly the same.

Don’t Confuse Your Users!

The biggest problem some webmasters face is when they make the two example links about lead to completely different information.  Visitors to your website don’t want to have to figure out what’s going on because most of them never knew such a distinction ever existed.

In order to avoid confusion, it’s best to make both URLs lead to the same content.  One of the URLs should be the actual page, and the other one should redirect to the main version of the page.  This cuts down on duplicate content within your site.  The less duplicate content you have on your site, the easier it is for the web crawlers to crawl it.

If your site already contains both the slash and the non-slash version of the URL and both have the same content, it’s not a huge problem though.  Google’s indexing process will figure it out.

Setting Up Your Website to Serve Just One Version

If you do decide that you want to change your website for more efficient crawling, then it’s pretty simple to do.  First, understand that it’s only necessary for a change if you have the slashed and the un-slashed version of each URL on your site and both are returning a 200 code, which basically means that they both deliver content successfully.

Here’s how to get rid of the duplicate content:

1. Decide whether the preferred version of the URLs is slashed or un-slashed on the end.  If you’re using a directory structure, the traditional way would be to use the slash on the end, but you don’t have to.
2. Make sure that your internal links all direct to the preferred version you chose.  Double check the sitemap to make sure it uses the preferred version only.
3. Implement a 301 redirect from the other version of the URL over to the preferred version.  If for some reason you can’t use a 301, consider instead using rel-“canonical”, which works just like a 301 in terms of Google’s indexing.
4. Use Fetch as Googlebot in Webmaster Tools to test the 301 configuration and make sure both versions of the URL are behaving the way you want them to.  The preferred version should send back a 200 code, while the duplicate should send back a 301 code to redirect to the preferred version.
5. Use Webmaster Tools to check for crawl errors.

Avasoft is your best source for business website design.  Give us a call for all of your webmaster questions and to get help organizing your site for best optimization.

What Did Panda Really Do?

The whole point of Google’s Panda update was to help users find quality websites that contain the information they are looking for.  The keyword here is quality.  The Panda changes were implemented to reduce the search engine rankings of low quality content and raise the ranking of sites that had high quality content.  The goal is to provide the results people actually want to find rather than the pages that have simply used a particular keyword the most times.

While Google doesn’t release the actual algorithms used to determine its search engine rankings, it does provide a key for website owners to use when decoding the term “quality.”

Here are the Commandments

Take this list of questions and hold it up to your site to find out if it stands up to Google’s test of “quality”:

1. Thou shalt provide trustworthy sources for the information on your site.
2. Thou shalt have experts and enthusiasts provide the content rather than people who can only write generally on a topic.
3. Thou shalt limit duplicate and similar content on your site, eliminating multiple pages that have the same information on them.
4. Thou shalt provide high class security on your website, especially if you accept payments there.  (i.e., is it clear on your site that consumers can safely enter their credit card information there?  Would you enter your own credit card information to make a purchase on your site?)
5. Thou shalt have an editor comb through the information on your site, correcting grammatical, spelling, and factual mistakes.
6. Thou shalt write about what people actually want to read within your niche rather than what might rank well in the search engines.
7. Thou shalt provide unique information on your site or present the information in a very unique way.
8. Thou shalt compare your site to others that come up in the search engine rankings along with your site and see how you stack up against the competition.(i.e., is your site the one that contains the largest amount of information and also the most useful information?)
9. Thou shalt put forth much effort in the area of overall quality control on your site.
10. Thou shalt report on the topics in an unbiased way that tells both sides of the story rather than just one side.
11. Thou shalt aim for the gold standard, which is making your site into an established authority on information within your niche.
12. Thou shalt cut down on mass production of content for your site and focus more on quality rather than quantity.
13. Thou shalt provide all of the information on the topic you are discussing rather than just part of it.  (i.e., don’t aim for word count; just aim for the length that covers everything that needs to be covered.)
14. Is there more on your site than just basic information that can be found anywhere? (i.e., expert opinions, editorials, personal insights, or little known facts)
15. Thou shalt aim to create a site that everyone wants to bookmark and share with their friends.
16. Are there too many ads on the page?
17. Thou shalt only publish content that is good enough to appear in a printed book or magazine.
18. Thou shalt create articles with good attention to detail.
19. Thou shalt listen to those who visit your website and make adjustments when you hear common complaints.
20. Thou shalt create articles that are of a good length that provide a substantial amount of unique, helpful information.

What Should I Do?

Website owners who feel like their site has fallen victim to the big, scary Panda update should use the commandments as guidelines to determine whether their site meets Google’s explanation of a “quality” website.  The commandments itself explain what exactly you should do to your websites. You can start with these two steps to recover your ranks:

1. Remove low quality pages. It doesn’t only help you improve the rankings of your entire site, but also improve your business credibility in visitor’s eyes. So keep that in mind.
2. Combine several pages of content into one page. If you have bunch of less informative content relating to the same topic, you might want to simply combine these several pages of content into one. One high quality page is always better than ten less informative pages.

Just remember the old adage that “content is king” and everything else will fall into place.  Don’t worry so much about those pesky, ever-changing algorithms.  The sites with the highest quality content will win out in the end.

Have any questions or tips on how to recover from panda update? Please share your thoughts.

The Value of Speeding Up

Google now uses the speed of your website to determine how high it should be placed on its search engine rankings, and they did it just by tinkering with the search algorithms just a tiny bit.  Studies have shown that people spend more time on sites that load more quickly, so it just makes good business sense to ensure that your website is loading very rapidly.  In fact, having a site that loads faster even cuts down your operating costs, so it is vital that you make your website as speedy as you possibly can.

Evaluation Tools

Checking the speed of your site may sound like something that’s too technical for you, but there are a number of tools that make it easy:

• Google’s Webmaster Tools – Under “site performance,” you’ll be able to see the speed of your website according to a chart that measures speed for users all over the world.
• YSlow -  Yahoo! Also offers a free tool that makes suggestions about how to make your website go faster.
• Page Speed – This open source program from Firefox will both evaluate the speed of your site and offer suggestions on how to make it better.

One of the common issues that affects website speed is website analytics scripts, which are basically the scripts on your site that analyze your website users and return information to you about them, their search engines, and the keywords they used to find you.  Also having too many graphics on the page can be a big problem.  Any site that runs JavaScript or Video will also load much slower, so analyze your content thoroughly before you make a final decision about what to use.

Of course the site speed still isn’t the most important factor Google takes into account when creating search engine rankings, so your content remain the most important thing.  Google claims that fewer than 1 percent of searches are actually affected by the speed issue, but it certainly is worth another look.  After all, you do not want to be in that 1 percent.  Sometimes 1 percent is all it takes to lose a sale.

Avasoft will help you measure your page speed and make suggestions on how to make your website go faster.  Contact them for complete web development services that will not only speed up your site, but make it look better too.

It’s important to realize that while building a single language website in a single country does present a few problems, those problems are multiplied when you include other countries and languages.  You’ve got to create alternate versions of your site for other languages, and you probably want different versions targeted at each country.  After all, what appeals to users in one country may not appeal to users in another country—even if they speak the same language.

Multi-lingual Sites

One of the biggest issues with multi-lingual sites especially is making sure that they turn up in search engine results in the language they are actually in.  Google does not fully analyze the language of your site, so you need to make it obvious to the search engine which language your page is in.  You can do this easily by not having side by side translations and also by using just one language for both content and navigation on each page of your site.  When you have multiple languages on one page, the search engines just get confused.

Also remember to use separate URLs for each of the languages and cross-link the other version of the page so that people who speak one language and accidentally land on your page in another language can easily switch to their own.  People also look at the URL for a clue about which language the page is in.  It’s easy to signal the language with a code in the URL, like “fr” for French.

Multi-regional Sites

Creating a multi-regional site comes with a whole other list of do’s and don’ts.  One of the easiest ways to help Google and the other search engines to index your site for the right country is with the creation of the URL.  Use an extension on the back of the URL to signal which country that site is for.  For example, .uk signals the United Kingdom, while .cn tells search engines that the site is for China.

Google also has a geo-targeting tool, which allows you to tell Google directly that your site is supposed to be for users in a certain country.  The only reason you would need to do this is if your site does not have an extension on the URL indicating which country the website is for.

Your IP address also provides a clue to the search engines which area your content is aimed for, as does the contact information and links from other websites that are local to your area.

Avasoft will help you develop and manage your multiregional and multi-lingual sites so that you get everything you need.  Contact them right away for more information about what multi-regional and multi-lingual sites can do for your business.

1. Your videos must be crawlable. Website publishers are not always fully aware of the details about the videos on their websites.  Sometimes the URLS of the videos on their site do not allow Google and other search engine crawlers to locate them, but this is an easy fix.  All you have to do is check the robots.txt file for the video URLS.  Make sure to check it for all parts of the video, including the small thumbnail on the page, the actual content and player, and the front play page you get access from.
2. Tell Google where the video is allowed to be played. Some videos are not allowed to be accessed in foreign countries, so keeping Google up to date on this is very important.  Tell Google where the videos can be played, where they can’t be played, or just leave this detail off if it doesn’t matter.  To let Google know this information, all you have to do is set up a sitemap and submit it to Google.
3. Indicate clearly that a video link has been removed from your site.   A major part of your users’ experiences on your site includes not finding links or videos that no longer work.  If you don’t make an effort to tell Google that you’re taking these videos down, then people will still click on them in search engine results and then be taken to a page that doesn’t work.  There are two ways to make sure that Google is aware that you’ve removed a video.  If you know when the video will expire, simply give it an expiration date in the Video Sitemap or RSS feed, which are submitted to Google.  If you don’t have a particular expiration date, then just set it up to throw out a 404 Not Found response code.  This gives you an opportunity to still provide useful content to potential users even if you no longer have the exact video they were looking for.

Avasoft Solutions will keep you up to date on all of the best practices from Google and all other major search engines.  Contact us right away for tips on how to make sure the videos on your site are crawlable.

1. One of the most common reasons for a site migration is changing the name of your product or brand.  This should be done in two steps.  Start by moving your current site to the new address.  Save the redesign of the site until after you see that it has made a smooth move to the new address.
2. Another way to ensure that you take your current search engine rankings with you is to use a 301 Redirect.  This is a coding form that tells your old website to automatically redirect traffic onto your new site.  A 301 Redirect shows search engines that your site has moved to a new address, which means that your rankings will go with the move.  Just remember that you will need a 301 Redirect for each page on your site.  You must have a one to one redirect for each page on your old site.  The content on the new site can be different than what’s on the old site, but for each page on your old site, you should have a separate page to transfer users to.  Essentially, you should have the exact same pages on the old site and the new site, and the pages from the old site should transfer directly to pages with similar content on the new site.
3. Google also offers a tool to help website owners make sure that they are able to keep their rankings intact when they migrate their site.  In your Google Webmaster Tools account, just use the Change of Address tool to inform the search engine that your site’s address is changing.  Only a verified owner of both the old and new sites can do this.  You must add the new site to your Google Webmaster tools account and verify that you own it before you can use the Change of Address tool to inform Google of your site migration.
4. Updating all your links is also very important for helping keep your Google ranking intact through the migration.  Set up your old page so that all incoming links from pages owned by other people automatically receive a redirect to your new site.  Don’t forget to update the internal links in your old site so that they send users directly to your new site as well.  A link checker will do wonders to help you make sure that all your links from your old site are in good working order.  Xenu and similar link checkers will search for broken links on your site and let you know if anything isn’t working.
5. Uploading a sitemap of your new site including all the URLs will also help Google find all of the pages on your site.  After you upload the sitemap to Google, checking the Sitemap Details page will show you how many of your new URLs Google has located and been able to index.

Of course moving your site successfully does take time, so it’s always a good idea to keep your old site for at least six months after you move it.  This ensures that all the search engines and links have enough time to update your site migration in their systems.  Your Google Webmaster Tools account will help you make sure that everything is updating and working properly.  You can also look at the web crawl errors to make sure that there aren’t any File not Found errors appearing on your new site.

Avasoft Solutions is the best web hosting company to help with your site migration. Our services include complete web design, e-commerce solutions, search engine optimization, and many others.

If your site is very new, then it probably won’t be indexed yet because the search engines simply haven’t found it yet. The search engines have a way of finding your site on their own. You could also choose to take a few minutes and simple report your site to the three top search engines: Google, Yahoo!, and Bing.

If you use the content to target keywords that people are using often and that genuinely reflect the content on your site, then the search engines should have no problem finding it. You need to find out which terms people are using most of the time to search for the information on your page. You can then target these keywords to help the search engines and your potential users be able to find you.

In some cases, even though a website has been around long enough, there may be other reasons that it hasn’t been indexed. If your site has not been linked to from other sites, then it takes the search engines longer to find you. Creating high quality content is the key to getting other sites to link to your site and help it become indexed. When you have content that targets the right keywords and includes valuable information people will actually be able to use, then other sites will be linking to your site in no time.

Another reason your site might not have been indexed is if it has actually been indexed under a different name. The simplest way to explain it is this. Within every website, there are several subdomains. Even that www extension on the front of your website is considered a separate domain from the site itself, even if to you, they both have the same content.

The easiest way to fix this problem is to have your webmaster choose a preferred domain. When the search engines know which domain on your site is the main one, then it is much easier for them to recognize how your site should be indexed. Also make sure when using Google Webmaster Tools that you include all of the domains and subdomains as sites in the listing you provide to Google. This includes both the www.sample.com and sample.com versions of your home page, which Google sees as two different sites, even if they include the same content.

Avasoft Solutions is your best source for complete web design. We offer complete web products and services including everything from search engine optimization and social media optimization to pay per click services.

Levels Mean Better Search Engine Optimization

The most effective approach to creating a structure that is search engine optimized is to begin with a high level and go down from there. The top most, or highest level should be very broad, covering general topics or categories. This gives visitors an easy way to find a starting point. Not only will human visitors have an easier time navigating your site, but web crawlers will, too. This type of search engine optimization helps ensure all pages are properly indexed.

Does Structure Always Make a Difference?

Yes, structure always makes a difference when it comes to search engine optimization. It doesn’t matter if you operate an information site that is purely for readership or an online retailer that sells products or services. Any website that has a logical structure will fair much better in the realm of search engine optimization and ranking.

Use Relevant Keywords in Descriptions or Content

Everyone knows search engine optimization includes the use of keywords, but how you use those keywords also makes a difference. Strengthen your site’s structure by using relevant keywords to tie together related pages or products. For example, if you sell pet clothing, you may have a category for dog sweaters. All product pages in this category should use the keyword “dog sweaters,” even if they fall into sub categories (such as “dog turtlenecks” or “dog pullovers”).

Quick Site Navigation and Search Engine Optimization

Search engine optimization is also found in the way your page’s relate to one another. Visitors and web crawlers should be able to get from your homepage to all of your sub pages (or categories) quickly. The less clicks to get from one place to the other, the better! From a search engine optimization standpoint, this is easy for human visitors and will encourage web crawlers to index all pages on your site.

Begin with our search engine optimization overview and learn more about the basics and how you can get more out of your website.