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Hi,
After looking at your site, the redirect of non www ---> www is already implemented?
Did you just make this change recently, cause all URLS in Google still show non www
Just In my opinion this could be the reason for the rank drop, as Google is "Confused" but it should get it right soon (few weeks or so)
Why did you change from non www to www? are most of you incoming links coming to www version?
Shane
Have you questioned the SEO Company About their practices and how they gain your links?
This could REALLY help us here give you the best possible answer (even though right off the bat, #2 seems like a bad idea, just for the fact you need to see what is going on, so it can be stopped if necessary before other sites are penalized)
The Best Answer is #1 in my opinion
Since the most probable cause for your penalty is content farms and overuse of anchor texts, here is a nice post about a person who went through that
http://www.seomoz.org/blog/unnatural-link-warnings-blog-networks-advice
This is a little old, but it is a WBF on this issue
http://www.seomoz.org/blog/whiteboard-friday-oh-i-got-a-penalty
Here is also a post from Dr. Pete on cutting the bad links strategies
http://www.seomoz.org/blog/6-ways-to-recover-from-bad-links
IMHO
I would personally (since you know it is a penalty cause you were warned) use Dr. Pete's article to help you track down the bad links, attempt to remove them, fix any other issues you may have on your site that are "questionable" and submit a reconsideration letting them know you worked with an SEO firm, and you took matters into your own hands, cleaned them up, and it won't happen again.
And then you wait....
Hope this helps
Shane
Hi,
Just from the Looks of the site you gave as an "example" it looks like a BMR type site...
These are going to be going down hard, as they in most cases serve no purpose other than as a link farm, shrouded in thin badly written content.
These types of schemes used to work very well, but with recent updates I would HIGHLY suggest staying away from this strategy you give of searching on PR and Penalty and expand your search to include other factors such as...
User Experience
Alexa Rank
Is the content currently on the site in question even good?
Does it allow social sharing easily and are there social shares?
Is its backlink portfolio just a bunch of links from Blog comments and other shady looking sites
There is quite a bit more to consider, but just as a suggestion, I would say look further into the quality, other than just how you think a search engine might perceive the site in question
Shane
PS just as a "Real World" scenario, One of My Niche's has LOTS of guys who do this, and they all (March 23rd) lost all rankings for Anchor Texts that employed this strategy, due to it WAS their only strategy...
Sorry, I hate IIS 
I use apache
But you may want to contact the poster of the blog, you may be able to hire them for final configuration issues
I also know that Alan Mosley (is his name here on SEO) is REALLY knowledgeable on IIS, so you may be able to contract him?
You could also place a post on Odesk, with your exact requirements, current issues ect... and place a job for contractors to apply to
Shane
I think there are alot of people who would say it is a waste of time, and just let it work itself out while focusing on your own campaign, as the time you spend could be better allotted to your endeavors, as opposed to getting on the "Report Train"
With that being said... Personally it would depend on what they are doing.....
Hope this helps
w00t!
Hi,
There are MANY issues one could encounter, and sadly to say without being on your network team, and knowledge of your topology it would be a hard guess...
Below is a great resource; and runs through many common pitfalls of Apache Mod_Proxy
http://www.apachetutor.org/admin/reverseproxies
in general though these changes should not take down your root domain, so I think there must be something being missed....
If you use IIS, you may need this 3rd party plugin
http://managedfusion.com/products/url-rewriter/
Create a gateway server that brings together all your companies proprietary web application under one standardized schema through the proxy feature.
Others may have a different opinion;
But as you have described it, I am not sure there is really a good "SEO" answer other than re-write the content...
Reason;
Each duplicated page is probably already not passing rank, due to it is just duplicate content of something that has already been indexed. (I am assuming) Of course this might not be the case, but unless the content is re-written, and of high quality --- These pages are probably doing nothing for the sites (SEO/SEM wise), and the "Link Juice" they are passing is probably negligible (if any).
So to answer your question;
If the clients won't rewrite the content, the pages are probably useless as it pertains to "Link Juice" or SEM strat, so personally, counting on this as an SEO asset to the site is probably a miscalculation.
Since these are all different domains/clients a canonical is probably out of the question as well. I think you are on the right track, but more along the lines of just using for User Experience, not for any SEO/SEM tactic.
Hope this helps
w00t!
Gotchya Kynduvme,
I must have misunderstood that comment, I thought you were stating that it is "Okay" to trick consumers or "Bait and Switch"
But i see now i was mistaken
w00t!
Yeah, I got that, I am still not so sure that everlasting is the correct word or even mentality with the tool you suggested, as it will only "last" for about 3 - 6 months, then it will either get de-indexed or penalized... The fact that it does not have to be paid is a moot point, why would you care if it is everlasting if the benefits are not everlasting?
This is not a 100% statement, but it is even more of a constant, and will continue to be as such with more Panda Style Updates,
So from an SEO perspective, and the "Goal" of SEOMOZ Community, just giving someone a tool that is possibly out of their realm of understanding the consequences, is just not a good practice in my personal opinion.
I am not so sure it completely answers his question.... His question was about "Everlasting" Links, as an SEO the term everlasting and spun content, in content farms does not fully align....
I would also think that he wanted those links to "pass rank" for "eternity
I understand your response may be that even High Quality Content and Blogs are not "Eternal"
But you have a much better chance of longterm success, over a 3 - 6 month gain, unless this is for this purpose, but without knowing more I am afraid to say you did not "answer" his question.
You only gave him an answer that was a possible solution to one aspect of his question if you are getting technical about it
**No I don't mind I think it is funny. I don't believe "Ethics" and "Marketing" belong in the same sentence frankly. **
That is kind of a scary comment not only for Users, but also for your clients in my opinion from MANY!!! angles
So without ethics in Marketing, how are consumers to trust anything?
Personally it is outlooks like this in my opinion that are the "Bad Apple" that spoils the bunch...
Hi,
everlasting is a term that is rarely associated with the type of links it appears you are looking for, as unless you are submitting high quality articles/blogs to sites that are not just content farms, "everlasting" is a term i think you will rarely find.
Personally, I think http://myblogguest.com/ is good, but there is a monthly fee.
Will Critchlow from Distilled did a recent post and talked about different tools they used...
http://www.seomoz.org/blog/link-building-tools
There was a specific tool called http://ontolo.com/ that would satisfy the ability to look for Blogs/site by keyword, niche ect... But this DOES NOT allow the automatic placement of links, you still must build a relationship, and have high quality content.
But onto the actual question, I am not sure there are any tools that are single payment, and would give the benefit of everlasting link that you would actually want (or would give authority) for longterm purposes.
Hi,
Technically yes,
Be sure to back up your .htaccess before trying but this below should remove the trailing slash (by redirecting / to non slash), and fix duplicate if you have it. But like i said back up first just in case
#remove trailing slashes RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} !^\.domain\.com$ [NC] RewriteRule ^(.+)/$ http://%{HTTP_HOST}/$1 [R=301,L]
EDIT
Since I am not full aware of your actual situation... Below is if you only want to redirect trailing slash on URI's that are past root (sub directories redirected, but www.example.com/ is left alone
<code>RewriteEngine On
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_URI} (.*)$
RewriteRule ^(.+)/$ http://www.domain.com/$1 [R=301,L]</code>
Hi,
The tag you reference only means there will be no cached copy of the site within SERPS
http://www.google.com/intl/en/help/features_list.html#cached
I can only assume their reason for this, is with a site that is about current events, a cached copy might muddle and confuse, and they do not want anyone to see an older version of the site, even if it is only a few days (as I am sure NYtimes.com is crawled quite often)
HeHe I love network and IS teams, something can always "Not Be done"
Where there is a will there is a way, they just did not want to look for it
Hi,
I would have your network team look at reverse proxy..
http://www.seomoz.org/blog/what-is-a-reverse-proxy-and-how-can-it-help-my-seo
This will allow you using either IIS or Apache modules to use a reverse proxy to turn blog.website.com into www.mysite.com/blog/ even if they are hosted on two completely different servers
hope this helps!
w00t!
Hi,
Use;
Redirect 301 /olddirectory/example.html http://www.example.com/newdirectorylocation.html
keep in mind that it is relative to document root, and if you have spaces in any of these, you will need to put quotation marks around like so...
Redirect 301 "/olddirectory/example 2 of 2.html" http://www.example.com/newdirectorylocation.html
hope this helps!
w00t!
if you want to do some more research http://www.webweaver.nu/html-tips/web-redirection.shtml
is to simply place new/updated content above the preexisting elements. I'm trying to validate/invalidate the approach.
Others may have differing opinions but i personally would not do this just based off of best practices. The more tags (code) you put in the head, the more data to be read, and since crawlers in general only crawl a certain amount of your page adding superfluous code would not be recommended.
but yes, I believe in theory the duplicate title would just be ignored, and probably no penalty would be incurred.
As to the duplicate canonical.... I am not sure about that one, I would think it would be ignored, but do not want to give you bad info as that could really mess you up if canonicals are incorrectly received by Google Algo.
w00t!
You can create it, but it is better to use a currently trending one unless you have access to a very authoritative twitter account.
If you have an event or conference then yes you would need to register it, other than that I would just watch the trends with ideas in pocket with a few different scenarios of good content you have to distribute.
Hi,
The IP would be static, and in most cases it will not be shared, but the cloud host server itself is shared. I am not aware of any Cloud environment that would run off of DHCP.
I am not sure what they are currently paying, but Rackspace is VERY good in my opinion and quite reasonable in price. I also know that you CAN get a Dedicated Cloud Environment with Rackspace. But even with the shared cloud environment I have my own private and public IP's and root access, but it is in a shared VM envrioment. So therefore it is not PCI or HIPAA compliant if you are barred by security concerns
SEO Repercussions
In my opinion if you were switching your TLD to a new IP alot, this might cause some trust issues or residual issues, but changes like this are expected.
So to answer the root question, NO this should not affect your rankings
A good item to keep in mind is resources, since you are currently dedicated you may want to look at your utilization and verify that a move to a shared space will not affect your load utilization as a 2 Gig dedicated server is a little different than a 2 Gig Server in a Shared Cloud Environment.
Also keep in mind too verify you get a datacenter in the clients home country.
Hope this helps
w00t!
Hi,
Hashtags are just trends, or groups of Tweets/Posts that are all lumped together due to a trending topic or event.
Lets take a currently trending item
So what a business might do is find a way to insert themselves in a funny and witty way.
**Disclaimer the following example may be neither funny nor witty, but it is just an example 
A Skate shop might do something like...
The #StupidThingsPeopleDo when skateboarding {link to video hosted on your site of skateboarding accidents]
That was probably a pretty weak example, but it is the way businesses can capitalize on trends, but only if done in a genuine way and not just throwing in a a semi relevant trending hashtag.
A good way to look at it is possibly categories of a blog, the hashtag is the category tag, but it references the entire twtterverse, instead of just referencing your blog.
In your exact example of Vintage, I would suggest the including of the hashtag vintage when it makes since
Sale today on 70's #vintage clothing click for details (link)
This also is kind of a weak example, but it is Friday, and out of Ideas....
Hope this helps a little
w00t!
Technically Yes,
As your site is currently being used canonical seems redundant, The site is Wordpress, so the ability to redirect must be available (I am assuming of course)
So I am not sure I see a reason for a site wide implementation of Canonical, although there are so many other reasons, that really without having more knowledge about your particular situation, I cannot for sure say they are right or wrong.
I would only suggest that you ask them why Canonical is implemented, and if it even needs to be there since duplicate content does not seem to be a factor.
If you do not like their answer then I would bring it back to this forum. (not necessarily this thread as it may not get answered if alot of time has passed)
Shane
LOL,
I knew I saw it...
http://www.seomoz.org/blog/set-it-and-forget-it-seo-chasing-the-elusive-passive-seo-dream
A script engine created by virante based off of Levenshtein Distance, also known as the Edit Distance
I really did not spend to long looking at your site, but was not sure I understood why canonical was used at all?
I see that this site, is not really being utilized as a traditional "Blog" so you would not actually have the duplicated content issues that come along with Blog Posts having their own page, plus being on the homepage.
I am not sure I can give you a suggestion to give to the developers except, why is canonical being used when it appears it does not need to be used?
If you do have multiple pages of duplicate content then this would be a reason, but I did not see them.
The notices you are getting from SEOMOZ are just that... Notices that the Canonical is in place i believe.
So i guess in summary the actual question I would have is do you really need the Canonical Tag at all? I am not sure it is hurting you, but not sure you need it either.
There are also some META tags that really have no use.. example INDEX, FOLLOW the default without a counter NOINDEX or NOFOLLOW or robots.txt is always INDEX FOLLOW.
Hope this helps
w00t!
You can help this!
You can use the data from WM tools to create 301 redirects on your site that will direct these incorrect queries to the correct page, preserving more of the authority than letting it fall off with a 404
There was actually a post recently (4 or 5 months ago) about doing this automatically using a server side script that actually "fixes" it for you automatically. But it is pretty advanced, and if you aren't dealing with thousands of them, might be easier to do yourself (or have your webmaster take care of) (I was not able to find or remember what it was called, maybe someone else will)
If this is just PDF documents and Files that have been picked up by scrapers, I personally don't worry about these so much, but someone may disagree with that
w00t!
You might be better with a server side tracker like http://awstats.sourceforge.net/
The answer from Mat probably has the best logic, but the only problem is are you legally responsible for mitigating the possibility of fraud?
I would make sure you add this to the contract, as I am not sure you are going to be able to defeat a proxy or spoofer, just in case the referrer gets smart and decides to work the system.
An anti fraud system can be put into place, but LOL I am not sure you will have the access to the multi million dollar fraud monitoring tools that Google does, that are contstantly updated and algorithmically and systematically monitor as well as have auditors who manually do random checks...
You have some good questions.
I seem to remember Rand doing either a WBF or a post.
All I could find was;
http://www.seomoz.org/blog/ten-question-litmus-test-for-professional-seos
Which is a good start once the interview process begins, (you could probably even make the questions themselves a little more niche specific as well)
Between the questions you have and putting together a rough outline of what you want to accomplish over the next 1 - 2 years is good to have as well, this way the SEO can put you on the correct path toward your goals. I would be looking more for an SEO Consultant or Web Strategy expert that specializes in SEO. Not a company that promises links and reports.
An SEO needs a relationship with the client on more than a "paper basis" in my opinion to truly understand the goals of the business, and make sure that each step in the path aligns with those goals
w00t!
Have Fun!
Every Link is not necessarily counted....
If the Blog comment was a nofollow outside of his niche, and on a completely irrelevant subject, it can't necessarily "hurt" but it sure wont help.
Maybe back in the days when Authority was based solely on the amount of links or Page Rank. But sorry, from a long term Internet Marketing and Strategy perspective it is a waste of money to get 60% Nofollow blog comments, especially since it was done by someone who there is no idea what he was posting.
So maybe if you just want to make your clients do good for a few weeks or even months, but as a longterm strategy paying someone to do this is a wasted effort in the grand scheme/big picture.
Where you are correct, a link is a link in the fact that someone looking for a service may see the post and if it is genuine and on topic you may get residual traffic, or even a conversion.
But as a strict link building tactic... It is very weak and money could be alloted to other places for more return on investment.
It is not always about just gaining links... it is about Return on the money invested.
SO in the aspect of return, it was a waste of money, but sure your right, he gained a few links.....
Lets say a REALLY powerful and trusted site in your Niche gives you a NoFollow, then the user/traffic benefits are good. Also Some NoFollow helps to make you look more natural. but 60% that is REALLY HIGH
In my opinion, sorry... You wasted your money, Live and Learn right?
Maybe not a waste of time as maybe you might get some residual traffic, but cannot say that for sure.
Happy SEO'ing
w00t!
Hi,
Maybe an Associate can put in the WB Friday where Rand went over how Google sees duplicate links on a page.
But I believe the basic concept was that the first link on any given page is the only one that is "recognized"
Example if i have a site about blue widgets targeting the keyword Blue Widgets....
"Hi, I love my site about Blue Widgets[LINK www.bluewidget.com] I think we make the best Blue Widgets_[LINK www.bluewidget.com]_ in the WORLD!!!!"
Both anchor texts above link to www.bluewidget.com, so only the first would count the other is redundant and would be ignored by Gbot.
SO
If you are integrating more links to attempt to gain clout with search engines, then this is a lost effort, but if you are doing it for navigation or user experience then this is completely fine in my opinion.
w00t!
Never done it, but I would say no.
The benefits of Social, in my opinion do not come from a one time like or one time + It is the continuation of creating a genuine following that is niche related and active in your community.
Of course like most things in Search Engine Land, it could greatly help you until Google or Facebook picks up on the footprint. So I guess it is a gamble really. One that I personally would never take cause what benefits are you going to get from a bunch of irrelevant one time likes in the social sphere from accounts that are probably loners, or already on the spam radar?
I guess if you use it as a "starter" for a really great infographic, video or piece of content, it might help with initial exposure, then the REAL signals may carry you but still in my opinion it is a gamble and probably a waste of money that could be put into a real strategy instead of a shortcut.
w00t!
Hi,
I would say canonical or rel=”next” and rel=”prev”
http://googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.com/2011/09/pagination-with-relnext-and-relprev.html
Would probably be your best bets, as a 301 would solve from a Search Engine perspective, but definitely not good for users wanting to see different versions of the product in question.
hope this helps
w00t!
Hi,
Network Solutions sort of does this.
http://www.networksolutions.com/
On their homepage just type in a keyword (don't worry about checking the boxes it checks all variations of .net .co ect...)
On the results page, not only does it give you expired domains or soon to expire domains, but also suggestions it would seem on the keyword you used. Just scroll to the bottom of the page.
Hope this helps
w00t!
You can have success with either option, but the general consensus here on SEOMOZ I believe is subfolder
Example;
Shane
Hi,
I have never heard of doing a single redirect for each individual page to redirect non www to www (and not sure how one would do that, not sure it is possible as an infinite loop would be caused)
but below is how to do it in both Apache .htaccess and IIS 7.0 using URLrewrite
Apache = Must have rewrite_module modules/mod_rewrite.so
RewriteEngine On
RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} ^example.com
RewriteRule (.*) http://www.example.com/$1 [R=301,L]
IIS= URL Rewrite http://blogs.msdn.com/b/carlosag/archive/2008/09/02/iis7urlrewriteseo.aspx<configuration> <system.webServer> <rewrite> <rules> <rule name="Redirect to WWW" stopProcessing="true"> <match url=".*" />
<conditions> <add input="{HTTP_HOST}" pattern="^example.com$" />
conditions> <action type="Redirect" url="http://www.example.com/{R:0}" redirectType="Permanent" />
rule> rules> rewrite> system.webServer> configuration>hope this helps
WOW that is a SUPER loaded question...
I am not sure I would automatically pick videos, due to a video about a consumer item like shoes is a more interesting and globally accepted topic than plastics.. But i could be totally wrong, but just because something works well for one industry does not automatically translate to another so testing would need to occur (in my opinion)
I would say in order of how I would prioritize (but would still concentrate on all as an overall strat)...
#2 - for more industry relevant context
#4 for future proofing Branding and Web Presence
#1 - for link bait
#5 for conversion assist
I know you asked for the top one, but I am not sure focusing on one single tactic is really the best answer in general, as diversity is key.
w00t!
"A hyperlink in word can easily be stripped out by someone and then it is not clear what the link was to or what words it was on."
Personally in my opinion this is the nature of the beast... If you give good relevant links that help the authenticity of the article, then the poster, will not have as much inclination to remove the hyperlink...
But if it is obviously trying to be an SEO Anchor text link, then you run the risk of it being removed as this is not the aim of a link in a press release... A link should be informational and not self serving (or not seem self serving
w00t!
Hi,
Just as a personal opinion placing a self serving SEO link in the first paragraph is sort of bad ettiqute, and could possibly affect your distribution, as well as readability. But of course this is an age old battle as he is correct, a link higher up has more ability to be indexed and possibly pass rank.
I would also attempt to not concentrate on "placing" SEO links, but actually find relevant and helpful ways to place anchor text, as in the future just placing random and obvious anchor texts that "sort of" make sense will loose more and more "steam"
Shane
There is actually a patent that tackles this exact issue. Over 2012, in my opinion there are going to be more "Panda style" updates that target this method that filters out domains that are exact match, but really just a "loophole" doorway page.
Of course these are not really "doorway pages" by technical definition, but the underlying motive is to game the Algorithm into ranking a single entity for many keywords using multiple domains just junking up the web, in my opinion.
w00t!
Did I mention #STOPSOPA ?
Resource;
Yeah the 301 looks like it is correctly used, but I personally would not use canonical as well, in respect only to the redirect of "old pages" to "new pages"
In the instance of the products it does appear this is a good example of canonical needed.
All "staplers" pagination would canonical to the "Main" stapler page and so on and so forth.
This gets your users to the page to see the same product in a different color, but tells search engines that this is all the same "product". So for this "product" only the main page will result in search (page in which the canonicals for given product points to)
Hope this helps
once again #STOPSOPA
Question 1
If i read it right it appears you are using 301 redirect and Canonical, Correct? If this is so, the use of Canonical is redundant (possibly ignored by Gbot) but could cause issues.
Question 2
From the way it is described.. It would appear the only true canonical is www.example.com/new-widget-category.html?p=1 and should have <link rel="canonical" href="http://www.example.com/new-widget-category" />
The others depending on differences should not UNLESS
It is the same product, just different colors or something that does not change the product and what it does. But only changes the physical appearance. This would be an "acceptable" difference and "OK" to use canonical
EXAMPLE;
If...
www.example.com/new-widget-category.html?p=1 (Product in blue)
www.example.com/new-widget-category.html?p=2 (Product in Red)
www.example.com/new-widget-category.html?p=3 (ect...)
www.example.com/new-widget-category.html?p=4 (ect...)
www.example.com/new-widget-category.html?p=5 (Ect...)
Then canonical is probably a good fit,
but if....
www.example.com/new-widget-category.html?p=1 (Widget to tell time)
www.example.com/new-widget-category.html?p=2 (Widget that cooks you breakfast)
www.example.com/new-widget-category.html?p=3 So on and so forth..
www.example.com/new-widget-category.html?p=4
www.example.com/new-widget-category.html?p=5
Then I would suggest not using the canonical and make the content on each page different
Hopefully i read your questions right and this helps
w00t!
#STOPSOPA please
LOL,
I like the last line
"Good luck convincing the good doctor to change his/her opinion."
I can relate!!!!!!!
Hi,
Here is a link to the SEOMOZ Jobs Board where you can create a company profile and post Jobs/Search for contractors/companies within the spheres of SEO/SEM/SMM Design ect...
http://www.seomoz.org/marketplace/jobs
Hope this Helps
w00t!
I know that link wheels and such like this are pretty popular right now and have been for a few years or so, and personally I think if it is done in a fashion that is genuinely helpful to the end user in finding relevant information about the subject in question then Search Engines will probably see this as well.
But I think, with newer algorithm updates footprints left by tactics like this are looked at and scrutinized more for this type of activity as "manipulatory" or Engineered to Manipulate even if they may not be that in reality.
It is a tactic in my opinion that should be employed, but employed for referential purposes and not engineered just to pass the most amount of rank and not always self serving.
w00t!
Shane
Hi,
I am in no way experienced with E-commerce as i have never done it, but from an SEO/Marketing perspective.
In my opinion Option 3 would be the most helpful both in SEO and Branding.
Because...
SEO - you have now consolidated your link building potential into one domain instead of spreading it out. Also this way you can get a little more keyword power without resorting to exact match tactics which personally I think are going to "fizzle" out over the next few years.
Marketing/Branding - You have created a better user experience and also the possibility of an up sell.. A person that is looking for a handbag, might also be looking for a matching pair of shoes... So use a "suggestion" algorithm at checkout that suggest "relevant" products. Option 3 in my opinion is also better for branding, as you can easier position yourself better in your filed as a "One Stop Shop" for all your "accessory" needs. If you have multiple different domains, it is hard to get a "brandname" going for yourself - even if you just sell other peoples brands.
I am sure others will have more suggestions, just my 2 cents
w00t!
Hi,
I believe, and have seen many others here with the same opinion... find this is a very unreliable way to see links, it is usually very outdated, and a very small percentage of your link portfolio if any.
Personally, I would take operator link: results with a grain of salt.
w00t!
Shane
Hi,
I am not sure if maybe i am just on an old interface... But here is how i do it (Screenshot attached)
1. In Sub navigation click on "My Q&A"
2. Next below Sub Navigation you will see "My Private Questions"
And you are there
Shane