Why does someone's FB page rank so highly?
-
Hi Everyone,
i recently ran a non-personalized search and saw that this facebook page https://www.facebook.com/tampapersonalinjurylawyers ranked very highly for both "personal injury attorney" and "tampa personal injury attorney." The page has very few likes, and they don't even post that often. From my limited knowledge, that leaves me guessing it's because its a quasi-exact match facebook page, but that can't be right...can it?
(Ranking screenshot is attached)
Thanks,
Ruben
-
This, in my opinion, is the BIGGEST flaw with Google's algorithm right now. In order to beat back spam, Google gives heavy preference to high authority domains. That's why you see the SERPs dominated by brands right now. If you Google "brown boots", you'll notice each of the top results has little to NO links pointing to that page, but a HUGE overall domain authority.
SEOs are taking advantage of this loophole right now. Because properties like Facebook, Yelp, YouTube, SlideShare, etc have so much trust and equity built up with Google, you can spam the HELL out of them and not get penalized. And even if you do get penalized, it's really no skin off your back because it's just a social profile. No one was finding it through Google before so it doesn't matter if they can't find it in the future.
I rank a ton of YouTube videos and SlideShare documents with really crappy gigs on Fiverr. Low quality social bookmarks, cheap web 2.0s and old school spam link wheels work really well. All the garbage is essentially filtered out by the high authority of the domain.
P.S. You can't find the links with OSE because the link index is only updated once a month, and even at that, OSE's link indexer is pretty sub par.
This response was written by Ryan Stewart.
-
Actually, I just ran it through the free version of seo majestic and found a bunch. So, I guess I should be using more than one backlink checker from now on!
Thanks guys,
Ruben
-
Hey Dennis,
What did you use to find those links? I ran it through OSE, and I got nothing.
Thanks,
Ruben
-
Hi Ruben
For one, he built a lot of links to it
http://www.reflectivepractice.ca/program.htm
http://www.mymakhzenandme.com/the-director.html
http://www.sourceabc.com/alpha/T/
http://theislandpartypei.ca/news.html
http://www.besthotpick.com/alpha/T/
all from sites he probably controls.
If you are going to ask why it's not penalised, that's another long story which is probably already answered here in the QA area somewhere.
-
I would a keyword difficulty analysis on that keyword and check the scores of the other pages ranking there. Remember that the root domain authority still holds a ton of value in rankings (facebook's being 100). And you're right, it's also grabbing some exact match text in the h2, url and body.
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Merging Facebook Pages - Getting Support from Facebook
Does anyone know how to get in touch with Facebook regarding issues with Facebook Pages and Merging Pages - I have posted on the Facebook Community Help Pages but no one from Facebook Support seems to read them or get in touch. Anyone got any ideas of how to get help from Facebook? Our original question on Facebook Community Help Pages was this but the question just got "merged" with another question where people were complaining about the same sort of problem with no one (out of 5 people on the thread) having come up with a solution of having heard from Facebook Support. We need to merge two company pages - The category and the address of the company of the page is the same on both pages - one page has a custom url - one does not. Both have the same first two words (i.e. the company name) as the page title. I do not want to list the pages publicly. Is there a way a member of facebook support can message us privately to discuss this please.
Social Media | | JohnW-UK0 -
Way to reset Facebook page Reach sending patterns
I have a client that posts a bunch of really poorly formatted and nonengaging content on her a Facebook business page. This has caused her reach to be very low, despite having 9000 real followers. Due to a history of poor content and therefore low engagement Facebook just does not send her stuff out anymore. Is there a way to change that? I heard you could reset that notion by staying off the page for a couple of weeks and then beginning to post once more with better stuff. Is that remotely true?
Social Media | | Atomicx0 -
Possible to automate/semi-automate twitter followers into specified list(s) after the fact without doing so one-by-one?
I have a list of about 3,000 Twitter followers and would like to segment my followers into separate lists for "emergency preparedness" and "travel." Is there a tool that can help me automate this without reviewing each profile one-by-one?
Social Media | | Timmmmy0 -
What to post on my facebook page for maximum results
Hello, What do you recommend I post on my facebook page for maximum reach?: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Bob-Weikel-Associates/217292791620485 my site: bobweikel(dot)com and how often? It can't be too time consuming. I'll invite more friends once I have some content. Thanks!
Social Media | | BobGW0 -
Does promoting a new page on twitter/facebook help it get indexed faster?
I know this probably won't matter much to people who get crawled on a regular basis, but for those of us who don't, does promoting a new page on social media help it get indexed faster with google? My site rarely gets crawled, but I've recently been adding new content. When I add new content I started to promote it on facebook/twitter and I do get minimal traffic from it. I noticed that a couple of the pages seem to be indexing quicker than pages normally do for me, although I'm not sure if it's because I recently migrated to WP or what..? I know T/FB are no follow sites, but is there a chance that promoting a page may contribute to the pages getting indexed? Thanks for any insight you can shed on the matter. It's more for curiosities sake than anything else. Pete S.
Social Media | | psokoloski0 -
Does adding your google plus page help stop scrapping
I have created a site that has 100 percent original content in my business category. I have written over 100 articles myself that not only to help me rank, but most important to help the use find the right anwser to their search. I didn't farm out not one sentence of any of the content. With that said how do I prevent others from scrapping my site for this info and using it as their own. 1. Is there something to add to each page code wise that will lead them back to my site. 2. Does using the google plus help this situation in that google thinks it's yours and treats the others as duplicate content. 3. I dont mind placing this info on other sites as long as the readers know its mine. Sorry to ask such a noob question but I have spent all my time on the content and really know nothing about the coding side of things. Any help would be great. thanks
Social Media | | JasonRae1 -
Google+'s +1 for business....
I'm thinking (and I could be wrong) that eventually the number of people that have +1'd a site will begin to impact search results. After all, it is Google's platform. What are your thoughts on this? And do you know if having someone +1 your site is different than having them "follow" you or add you to their circles? Should a business have more followers or +1's?
Social Media | | juliaritz0 -
SEO & Social | More SEO effect by liking the page URL rather than the Facebook Page?
SEOMoz Gurus, I am wondering what our best implementation strategy shoul dbe around linking up the Facebook Like button on our pages. Essentially there are two options: A) Linking the button directly to the Facebook Page of the web site so every Like is actually converting into a Facebook "Fan" which can be messaged going forward through our Facebook page. B) Having them like the actual URL which might be more beneficial from an SEO and viral perspective as now a link to the actual URL gets shared on the Liker's facebook wall and it should also be easier to use that lIke for Google & Co. as it's tied to the actual URL not a random Facebook page given that search engines already convert those signals. Both approaches obviously have their benefits. Are there any common guidelines on what is a better approach to take from a pure SEO perspective? Thanks /Thomas
Social Media | | tomypro0