Welcome to the Q&A Forum

Okay, so have used video to both get my pages to rank and have Google see the Youtube result as another result for the same keywords as our page(s).

All good.

Now I'm thinking, "Self, am I better off embedding the video on our site with a third party service other than Youtube or continuing to embed the video from Youtube?"

Would I be more likely to have our page show up higher and with a little player icon in Google SERPs if I hosted it outside of Youtube?

Your thoughts?

Thanks!

Hi,

Yes, I mixed it up a lot with 10 different scripts and then images with different transitions in a different order. Best...

Hi Brian,

Thanks for the message and weighing in.With voice recognition and the link you mentioned, I can totally believe they look at audio.

You are probably right, but what makes you think they look at video as well?

Thanks...

I notice that Youtube apparently does kind of an automatic transcription.

What can Google tell about a video? Is it comparing text from a voice recognition transcript? Can it take compare the waveform of a video signal and see how different a video is from another video?

I'm putting together a variety of videos that are similar for different pages and wondering how much do I have to change for each video.

I remember one time I attempted to launch a video that was an exact copy but with a different file name, title and tags and Youtube said, "hey, that's the same video!"

Thanks!

I uploaded a video to youtube one time and then went to upload it again, but saved differently with different tags.  Youtube rejected the second upload as being the same as the first. Really, it was the same... just a different file with different tags.

Now, I was thinking about making and uploading some similar but not identical videos for embedding on some web pages. Was thinking I'd make the voice overs different, but the images mostly the same montage. Do you think Youtube/Google will see it as the same video?

I kind of assume that it didn't fly when I first tried it some time ago because youtube was looking at the audio in the way it can make a transcription.

Do you think if the audi,o, file name, tags were different, it wouldn't matter if the video was the same?

Thanks!

Thanks, Ryan!

Thanks, Ryan and duly noted about links in context. Do you think buttons higher up the page would be more valuable than footer links?

Thanks, but I wasn't asking about U/X.

Hi,

I have a site with a site-wide footer that currently has 28 internal links.The footer terms are the terms the pages are focused on.

This footer is on every page of the site (hundreds of pages). Some pages of my site have 10 or so additional links pointing to internal and external pages (besides the footer) and some pages (like the homepage) have about 50 links besides the footer.

I'm going for a half dozen new terms with new pages that I would be adding to the site-wide footer.

Do you think I should trim the existing footer before adding these new terms? I guess I would remove the terms that show no real hope of ever getting to page one... like pages stuck in the 40s. Or, pages I for whatever reason don't care much if they rank or not.

Would trimming it to a smaller number do more to help the remaining linked pages/terms?

What do you think? Thanks!

Hey Sean,

That is super helpful. Do normal title and description length parameters apply, just like a title/description tag?

On competitive terms, what determines who Google chooses to rank?

As the manufacturer, how do we get Google to change it's description of our products?

Thanks!

Hi,

I don't know much of anything about Google Pruduct Feeds. Here is my starting point on thia:

1. Is this really free? We'd be doing it without Google checkout, just landing on our own pages with our own checkout.

2. Where do you upload the file?

3. What determines if you come up or not as a result? Any strategy or tactics involved?

4. We're the manufacturer of a product and late to the product feed game. The description that Google has used for our products is not ours or great. How do we change that product description that Google has for our products?

Thanks!

Hi,

Thanks for the message. So, really, a site that is the advertiser is not going to get link juice off of it's affiliate program even if it uses a hosted solution, instead of CJ? Thanks...

Hi,

I have a client who sells consumer products and is interested in affiliate advertising. Of course, they can get set up with something like CJ.com. They are also interested in possibly using some third party software to take their affiliate effort in house and be able to offer publishers simple urls. The idea is that this might help the link profile for SEO as well.

Here are my questions:

• Does anybody have any experience with the complication level associated with third-party software for link value path? So, relative pluses and minuses.

• Can anyone recommend an affiiate software that is reliable and easy to use?

• Any opinion on one big site to go with... CJ, GAN, someone else?

Thanks!

Hi,

What does it mean when seomoz shows our domain authority as 43, but our homepage authority as 52 or higher?

More recently, the two used to be roughly comparable at around 52.

Maybe it doesn't matter, but it did change and it makes me curious.

Thanks!

Hi Fellows,

Thanks for the thoughts Mike, Charles & Kieran. All good ideas!

Best...Mike

Hi,

I have a client that makes products that are accessories for other company's popular consumer products. Their own products on their website rank for other companies product names like, for made up example "2011 Super Widget" and then my client's product... "Charger." So, "Super Widget 2011 Charger" might be the type of term my client would rank for.

Everybody knows the 2012 Super Widget will be out in some months and then my client's company will offer the 2012 Super Widget Charger.

What do you think of launching pages now for the 2012 Super Widget Charger. even though it doesn't exist yet in order to give those pages time to rank while the terms are half as competitive. By the time the 2012 is available, these pages have greater authority/age and rank, instead of being a little late to the party?

The pages would be like "coming soon" pages, but still optimized to the main product search term.

About the only negative I see is that they'lll have a higher bounce rate/lower time on page since the 2012 doesn't even exist yet. That seems like less of a negative than the jump start on ranking.

What do you think? Thanks!

Hi Ryan,

Thanks for the message. What I mean is my client has a bunch of sites. They want to take some smaller sites of theirs and sell links for SEO purposes. They don't care that much what happens to their smaller sites. Their main concern is could it cause a problem for their main site? Thanks...

Hi,

I have a client who is thinking about selling ads on one site they own via something like textlinkads.com. Do you think they run any risk of exposing their other sites to scrutiny, penalties  or problems?

About the only thing on these pages worth saving is their url. There's no content on them that is user relevant. The 8, altogether, have one link from another site. They get a total of about 60 visits a month... between all eight.They're old pages from some really bad seo articles that made little sense then and less now.

I have a couple of other pages I was thinking about doing this with, but also moving their text content to the homepage... to make the homepage a little deeper text-wise.

Any way that ditching pages around a shared subject could make Google think the whole thing is less relevant... even the surviving homepage?

It doesn't sound like you think much of the forwarding to the homepage thing for the link juice.

I have a website that has some good rank on competitive terms. Most of the organic search traffic goes to the homepage, but some generally newer and better constructed, more user-friendly sub pages get organic rank/traffic for a variety of different terms/subjects as well.

Then, I have about 8 pages that are older and suck. They fail in the SERPs and there's nothing much of interest from a user point of view. Rather than do the work to completely re-do these pages, I'm thinking of just 301ing them to the homepage. My hope is that this will help the homepages terms/rank which are similar to these pages subject & terms.

Do you think this will help the homepage and it's terms or merely end the existence of some old pages and sort of evaporate the link juice?

Is there some way that Google might see the site on the whole as being less relevant to their shared subject matter, if these pages go away?

Thanks!

You're a genius! Thanks!!

Hey Brent,

Following those steps, do I then choose:

"Remove Page From Search Results & Cache"

"Remove Page From Cache Only"

"Remove Directory"

Thanks, Brent!

Wow, one url at a time? Is there a bulk upload?

Hey Brent,

Thanks for the message.

How do I remove them from the index?

Thanks!

Was looking at a site's webmaster tools where there are a few hundred 404s for a site. God only knows where all those urls came from or what they once were or what. Two questions;

• How bad is all this for the site's overall ranking?

• Should I just make sure they go nowhere and 301 them all to the homepage or some other possibly relevant page? Anything bad that could happen with 301ing all this away?

• Also, the site has no sitemap submitted to Google. Any tips on that?

Thanks!

Hey, thanks Sheldon!

Yes, time counts. The site is six years old. The page is a few months.

Greetings!

Is there an advantage in no-following links to pages like "Terms Of Use" and "Privacy Policy"... pages one isn't trying to rank for? Of course, the idea would be to not waste link juice on unimportant pages. Your thoughts? Thanks!

Hi,

I only check the highest instance of it. Today, it was at #17, which is where it's been for a while.

To answer your question, it's an interior page, not the home page.

Thanks!

On that level, brevity might be a plus... easier to watch 20 seconds than two minutes.

Hi,

Thanks for the message.

I agree, certainly from a users point of view. Any evidence Google likes it longer?

Hi,

Are there any facts, opinions or anecdotal evidence to suggest that a video on YouTube has to have at least x length to rank as a result in Google?

Everything else being exactly equal, is a 20 second video about as likely to rank as 2 minute video?

Thanks! Best...Mike

Thanks Ryan!

I think it's a technique that could lend itself to borderline grey hatness, just because it doesn't really seem geared to the user and you could really bury a ton of links. In this particular example, the links don't appear as links until you roll over them. Maybe just a design goof. Thanks!

I'm probably not explaining it very well. Sorry.

You go here: http://www.goincase.com/products/detail/CL57925/

You click on the "Specs" tab. You get a new tab which breaks down info by "Compatability, Color, Styles & Sku". Under "Styles" there's a line that reads:

"black, CMJ, convertible, ipad, iPad2, iPad 2, snap, snap case"

Those links.

Hi Ryan,

Thanks for the message. I only say "hiding" in the sense of making text links less prominent design-wise. So, instead of having columns of text links, to do something more attractive, maybe with images or tabs or something.

On the example under the "Specs" tab, there's a line for "Styles." Those terms are links to other pages.

Do you think those links under "Styles" get picked up by a Google bot and valued as well as any other kind of link?

Thanks! Best...Mike

I'm working with a site that finds standard linking to spread authority to interior pages ugly. Here's what they don't like:

• footers

• tag clouds

• sidebar lists of links

• text heavy paragraphs with links

• a gallery of images with alt text/links

So, I'm looking for other ways to link from their homepage to these less prominent pages inside the site. Here are my two questions:

1. Would something like this work, with the links under the "Specs" tab (p.s., this is just a random example and not my client):

http://www.goincase.com/products/detail/CL57925/

2. Any other ideas for spreading the authority via links from their homepage and other pages on the site to less powerful pages?

Thanks! Best...Mike

My assumption is they'd be followed links to pass the targeted juice. Do you think it's a likely site-wide penalty or targeted penalty, like it doesn't pass juice?

He says (and I kinda agree) who can believe all the footer and sidebar links for completely paid linking that seem to get by fine and aren't even disclosed as from an advertiser. This is like, "hey, this is an advertiser."

I have a friend with a site that has a lot of content. Some of that content has affiliate links with no follows to affiliate urls. Those pages also have a disclosure on them about the affiliate relationship.

Now, he's talking about taking some of the existing under-performing affiliate links and renting them out to another site that wants them for the link juice. He says he'd have an on-page  disclosure, a display ad for the advertiser on the page and something in the text like "you might check out our advertiser..." and then some keyword targeted link.

He was asking me how risky I thought this is for him and really I don't know.Do you think Google would find this and s**t a chicken over it?  I really don't know, given that I see really blatant undisclosed rented links all the time.Of course, my easy answer to him is "don't do it," but it does make me wonder how risky that is.

Also, is that a realistic site-wide penalty kind of thing or it just doesn't pass any link juice to the advertiser kind of thing?

So, I'm posting here for others to weigh in on. Thanks!

Yes, thanks!

Yes, I didn't perceive anyone was talking about text and background the same color. You are right, obviously that would be complete ButterScotch.

Okay, so let's say your client doesn't have really deep pockets. My fear is that they would see that I got a page to rank lower than previous for the term and "thanks alot!"  Would one be better off not touching it or trying to get the page's authority up before on-page optimizing it for the term?

Hi Aaron and Keri,

So, what makes an alt image tag okay vs. "hidden text" and bad? I mean, if a picture/link is of sheepskin seat covers and you alt image tag it "sheepskin seat covers," where does the problem come in? When is an alt image tag not "hidden text?"

Hey Alan,

Interesting answer with lots to chew on there. It's kind of hard to rival the homepage for external links pointing to it. And, equally hard to get interior catalog type pages high quality links.

By focusing the inner pages on specific terms, how do you know you're not swapping a good ranking homepage for a more targeted but lower ranking interior page. It kind of feels like bomb disposal. Are there instances where you don't focus interior pages for fear of Google ranking them lower than the homepage? Thanks...Mike

What do you think of this:

http://www.seomoz.org/qa/view/24587/are-linked-images-with-an-alt-tag-equivilent-to-a-anchor-tag-with-anchor-text-in-terms-of-seo-value

I guess I always figured in general that higher up meant more important, but okay you don't think so. I really appreciate your weighing-in.

Do you guys think there's any hierarchy of link ideas, such as footers not as good as a "popular searches" cloud further up the page?

Good point! Wonder if they'll go for that.

Yes, it is something of a question about the image alt text working as well as text for a link. In desperation, I was thinking about making the nav buttons into images with alt text, but leave them reading the way they are "cool stuff" and "outdoor fun" etc.

It reminds me of Starbucks using italian names for small, medium and large... like small, medium and large aren't good enough.

Thanks for the message. They're really nutty about cute euphemisms that they feel gives a better user experience than simple actual names.  That's why I was first thinking about footers, but even that was too much for them. So, then I was thinking about slideshows or a gallery of pictures, where the alt text is the simple name.  Are there other ideas?