Hi Kade

I think it depends on the two words really. There was an example the other day of a company called ConvertMedia that didn't rank in the search results for Convert Media for the reason that the intent of a search like that is to find answers to how to convert media. So in that case the one word brand name worked against them, but the very fact of having a one word name identified them as that brand.

The brand name of my business however is two words: Cracking Media. If however you search for CrackingMedia we still turn up top in the search results, but it does ask do you mean "Cracking Media".

In terms of what your SEO friend has said I am not sure that gives you a conclusion, but I hope the thoughts above may help.

Peter

Hi Sarah

I would always be concerned at hearing a company dissing another company in a public event. I have never used Wordtracker personally, but with a long track record as it has I wouldn't dismiss it. Also, in the latest search environment I think information giving you insight and context would probably be quite useful.

What examples did the company who hosted the event give that their tool was better?

The problem with any keyword research tool for search now, the data is not going to be as rich as it was. Also, with personalised search how do you measure what is 'normal'? Bing will give you search data yes, and most tools I think use that data. So if you keep in mind that the numbers are not the same as you will get with Google they will at least give you an idea of the higher volume keywords in proportion to those that are likely to be less. By using that data alongside other metrics and competitive analysis, you have a better chance than having none.

If there is a silver bullet tool out there I would be delighted to know about it.

I hope that helps,
Peter

Hi Gordian

I assume the traffic drops you are seeing are from organic search?

Often with a redesign there will be a change in the page URLs for the site. Did that happen with your site? If so, then you need to make sure that you set up redirection from the old URLs to your new URLs. This will be an important thing to address if this has been the case.

Other than that, there are sometimes bumps due to re-indexing of pages but if the content has remained unchanged then you shouldn't see much change and any change you do see should recover.

If the code is cleaner and the user experience better, then you should begin to see some improvements. The latter is that is likely to take longer because it will be based on things like reduced bounced rates feeding back to Google and thereby creating better results due to the perceived better user experience.

I hope that helps,
Peter

There appears to be some sort of redirection loop happening, but I don't know what could be the cause. Possibly a faulty cookie?

If you paste moz.com/logout into your address bar and hit return, I find you can then login correctly.

I hope that helps,
Peter