Optimization of home page
-
Hi there
I have an issue which, despite searching hard, I simply cannot find the right solution for. We have an index page that used to rank pretty well for a main industry keyword. However following a revamp of the site last year the kw slipped and no longer brings in decent traffic levels.
The problem seems to be that the old static site had a sprinkling of variable anchor text links that brought value to the home page. Instead of the main anchor being "home" we would revert to "main keyword" and variations across the site sometimes in t he content but mainly on the nav bars. However the new CMS design structure restricts us considerably with anchor distribution and so instead we opted for the site logo on the masthead to have an ALT tag for "main keyword" but so as not to game google too much we added .."home" to the tag.
Probably pointless but we figured it could do no harm. This ALT text is site wide Problem now is that we have lost the spread of internal nav bar anchors and variety etc. We have slipped in the serps for "main keyword" and I cant help thinking we are not maximising the anchors as we should.
So what Im coming to is this....
How can we tell if Google is picking up the ALT tage anchor as the main anchor to rank the site at the expense of all internal text anchors. Despite retaining lots of embedded anchors - according to the Moz metrics these are not being picked up because OSE suggests the ALT tag anchor is taking precedence. The serps probably support this view as well.
Should we:
a) Vary the masthead ALT if there is no way of avoiding this being the most important link / anchor on the page
b) Remove the ALT anchor and instead opt for content links high on the page (we do have nav bar links saying "Home" site wide as well which may overrid the embedded links?)
c) Leave the ALT alone and still push for content anchors as described in b) What is the best way to handle this..?
Best wishes and thanks
Morch
-
It's the way the system is configured right now in that the original poster didn't mark any good answers. We're working on improving what's considered a featured question in the next couple of months.
-
Why is this question still featured even after one year and after so many apt answers?
-
Have you checked on the competition for the keyword, just maybe they got stronger?.
-
Hi Morch, I'm wondering what you decided to do, and if you've seen any more changes in your rankings. Do you have any advice to pass along to someone else who may be in the same situation, or any other questions to ask?
-
Hi there
We didnt see a significant drop just a modest one but when you slip from posn 2 to posn 7 you feel the difference.
Main worry is that we have removed some varied text anchors and supplanted these with the masthead main keyword anchor in the ALT tag of the logo.
My feeling is that ALT tag anchors wont carry the weight of contextual high up the page content anchors which is what Nemek seems to suggest.
Thanks for your feedback chaps
Morch
-
If your rankings slipped significantly after a redesign and never came back, I would be a whole heck of a lot more concerned at other issues instead of your internal link anchors. To answer your question though, just make the alt tag of that masthead match your keyword. Keywords in alt tags is not spammy to Google; keyword stuffed alt tags are. Just put the main keyword and not a bunch of other crap.
Other issues to consider might be number of indexed pages, duplicate content potential, presence and submission of a sitemap, keywords across the whole site, etc. Chances are very strong that your rankings slipped because of a lot bigger issues than just internal anchors.
-
Don't rely on the ALT tag too much. Normal text and standard anchor text in links have more influence than ALT text does. If you've deleted the keywords and substituted them with images with ALT text, it's never going to be as good.
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
-
Unsolved Should I combine pages?
Hi, Im not sure of the correct route to take here... We are a training provider and I manage the website. The main course offered is the transport manager CPC. Currently, I have a "catch all" landing page which links to each different course option: Landing page > Classroom Online Self study Distance learning The main keyword revolves around "transport manager cpc" I want searchers to land on the online page is they search "online transport manager CPC" for example but I think its confusing Google. I'm wondering if I should de-index the store pages (although some perform very well) and increase the content on the main landing page to rank for every related keyword on that page. Initially, I wanted to devalue the landing page in favor of the store pages but I'm unsure if that's the right way to go. I've stripped out the bulk of the keywords and content and shifted it to each individual page. but as above, Im now unsure if that's the right route to take. Any help would be greatly appreciated 👍 Thanks
On-Page Optimization | | dunbavand
Rich0 -
New Page Not ranking?
One of this client's top keyword is "oak beams". They already rank well in the UK for other related terms like "reclaimed oak beams" at /reclaimed-oak-beams/ and "air dried oak beams" at /air-dried-oak-beams/ We have created a page at /oak-beams/ but this page ranks nowhere? Instead the reclaimed oak beams or air dried oak beams page ranks for the term "oak beams". Any ideas why Google is swapping between those pages and not choosing the /oak-beams/ page? A few notes are that the /oak-beams/ page is newest page on the site and yes I know there are no links pointing to it but there are no links pointing to the other pages either?
On-Page Optimization | | Marketing_Today0 -
Optimizing a large mess
An agency referred me to a client who wants a proposal for SEO. The website has been recently completed, but it a complete train wreck. I just ran a Moz crawl and I'm looking at 303 issues to fix out of a site with 377 pages. I just downloaded an xml sitemap, hoping to prioritize what needs to be done, however I'm not getting a clear sense of the hierarchy. In your opinion, what is the best way to attack a project of this size? I am clear on the client's business goals, so I can work on the most crucial pages first, but I can't leave the rest of the site a mess. Should I start by gathering for links that have no user value and plan to block them with meta tags? I'm used to optimizing much smaller sites, so any advice on how to approach this proposal would be much appreciated. Thank you!
On-Page Optimization | | ptdodge0 -
Duplicate Page Content
Hey Moz Community, Newbie here. On my second week of Moz and I love it but have a couple questions regarding crawl errors. I have two questions: 1. I have a few pages with duplicate content but it say 0 duplicate URL's. How do I know what is duplicated in this instance? 2. I'm not sure if anyone here is familiar with an IDX for a real estate website. But I have this setup on my site and it seems as though all the links it generates for different homes for sale show up as duplicate pages. For instance, http://www.handyrealtysa.com/idx/mls...tonio_tx_78258 is listed as having duplicate page content compared with 7 duplicate URLS: http://www.handyrealtysa.com/idx/mls...tonio_tx_78247
On-Page Optimization | | HandyRealtySA
http://www.handyrealtysa.com/idx/mls...tonio_tx_78253
http://www.handyrealtysa.com/idx/mls...tonio_tx_78245
http://www.handyrealtysa.com/idx/mls...tonio_tx_78261
http://www.handyrealtysa.com/idx/mls...tonio_tx_78258
http://www.handyrealtysa.com/idx/mls...tonio_tx_78260
http://www.handyrealtysa.com/idx/mls...tonio_tx_78260 I've attached a screenshot that shows 2 of the pages that state duplicate page content but have 0 duplicate URLs. Also you can see somewhat about the idx duplicate pages. rel="canonical" is functioning on these pages, or so it seems when I view the source code from the page. Any help is greatly appreciated. skitch.png0 -
Best SEO extension or plugin for on-page optimization
I was wondering what you guys might recommend for a browser extension or plugin that would help developers optimize each page for specific keywords. I'm looking for a tool that will give me a grade on how well it's optimized with a recommendation checklist. I would use SEOMoz's onpage analysis tool but it doesn't have access to my private development environment (hence the need for a plugin.) Recommendations? Thanks!
On-Page Optimization | | net32SEO0 -
Optimizing for Neighbourhoods
Say I'm optimizing a website for a Veterinarian in North York, a neighborhood in Toronto. Is it important to use Toronto in the keywords/ keyword phrases? When people from within Toronto search for "North York Veterinarian" and "North York Dog Kennel" I want to be found. If I optimize a page for the keyphrases "North York Veterinarian" and "North York Dog Kennel" and only mention Toronto once in the footer with the office address will that be enough for Google to serve up these results in Toronto? Thanks,
On-Page Optimization | | OptioPublishing
Jason0 -
Campaign for pages that I want to optimize?
Go easy on my guys and gals. I'm brand new to the world of SEO and I'm a Realtor by trade, so this is all new to me, but exciting and fascinating at the same time. You might ask why I don't hire a company to do the SEO for me for my website at: www.DiscountRealEstateFees.com since I'm one of those Realtors who makes a ton of money every year. Unfortunately, that's not the case and some day when I've built my business to a point that I can relax and breathe easy, I will hire that company. Besides, by then, I'll be an SEO expert and be able to ride herd on them if they're not doing a good job! My question is: Should I create a campaign on SEOMoz.org for each page on my website that I want to optimize or are the campaigns supposed to be for individual websites only? Thanks for your help!
On-Page Optimization | | Assist-2-Sell0 -
Has anyone with a high number of home page tiles been effected by the panda/farmer update?
One of the sites I'm working on seems to have dropped a few spots in rankings. It has numerous home page tiles, but they are not really advertising; just links to different sections on the site. Does anyone think that might be a factor in the rankings drop?
On-Page Optimization | | J.Marie0