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You can't have URL's with spaces in so Google would see them as 2 different URL's. If you have a space Google sees it as %20. I would avoid having this as your URL structure, try using test-page or test_page.

Just to add...it is really important that you match your new urls with your old ones so that you aren't just redirecting every page on the old website to the home page of the new one. I use Xenu to find all the old URL's and then match them to the new urls. That way all the link juice will be passed to the new pages.

Ok, thanks Peter, really appreciate the advice! Ill give that a go and see if that brings down the errors on the website.

Yeah, So would you recommend using either of those options over the rel=next/prev?

Thanks Peter, it's stumped me somewhat this. The site has JavaScript that loads the new pages so the user doesn't see it in the URL but the pages load in the back end and this is causing thousands of duplicate title and content issues. We don't have a view all page to canonical to and the page load speed is what had my worried that it wouldn't fix the problems

the website is www.thegreatgiftcompany.com - I'd be hugely grateful if you could have a look and let me know what you'd do. Really appreciate your time on this.

There is some SEO benefit to be gained from citations and mentions, especially if they are from reputable sources. Obviously, if they aren't then there will be minimal benefit.

Here is a resource on best practises which you might find interesting to read through...<cite>www.seomoz.org/q/creating-citations-best-practices</cite>‎

it depends on which keywords you are tracking, if it is those that you have in your title tags then you could run a software like Xenu to get all your titles into a CSV then separate them and copy and paste them into SEOmoz

Google often puts new websites high up at first and then your rankings will fluctuate whilst it figures out where to place you. You should start to see some stability soon then you can put a long term strategy together.

Start to build some high quality, relevant links back to your website and this should help you stabilise your rankings.

Hi Laura,

Just to add to what David said...if the company above you has a spammy backlink profile then there is a good chance that the Penguin refresh that is coming "in the next few weeks" will hit them hard and your client will be back to number 1! Keep building these high quality links and you will be fine.

Good luck!

GWT updates every 2/3 weeks so if you FOR DEFINITE that you don't have any then you're fine. SEOmoz crawls your websites more often so they are more likely to be right but I'd just check to be 100% sure.

I can't see it being detrimental to your rankings and I would say that as long as the list isn't too long then it'd be a helpful thing to have, if, as you say, your users aren't the most techy people!

I'd agree with the people here that it is unlikely these kind of links are the reason for the penalty. If you haven't already, do a backlink analysis on Open Site Explorer and look for any links that look like spam such as article directories, low quality directories etc. Also, have a look at the percentage of branded links vs anchor text links because it may be this that resulted in the penalty.

you need to be careful about the number of onpage links you have. I take it you have your categories or products in a drop down (or some sort of menu) in the top navigation?

I'd recommend using breadcrumb navigation so that if users get to a certain level and decide they need to go back, then they can using the breadcrumb navigation. Your SEO and link building efforts will help you drive people to the right pages so just concentrate on making the user experience as easy as possible.

I would use an internal linking strategy through the content on the page though, especially if the categories/products are similar. Or maybe a "you may also like" section.

Ok, brilliant. Thanks for your advice.

Hi dan, thanks for the reply. We do have an /Christmas/_all page. Are you staying that all the canonicals should go to this structure? We build to the none /_all versions so wouldn't this have a negative effect on rankings?

Hi all,

I have an ecommerce client and on the pages they have a drop down so customers can view via price, list etc. Natrurally I want a canonical tag on these pages, here's the question.

as they have different pages of products,  the canonical tag on http://www.thegreatgiftcompany.com/occassion/christmas#items-/occassion/christmas/page=7/?sort=price_asc,searchterm=,layout=grid,page=1 is to http://www.thegreatgiftcompany.com/occassion/christmas#items-/occassion/christmas/page=7.

now, because the page=7 is a duplicate of the main page, shouldn't the canonical just be to the main page rather than page=7? Even when there is a canonical tag on the /Christmas/page=7 to the /Christmas page?

hope that makes sense to everyone!

Mike is absolutely correct. Whenever you are changing your website and the URL's are changing you should always make sure 301 redirect the old URL to the new one. Saves all the hassle of finding the links.

Hi Robert,

It seems like your strategy is right now and you were unfortunate to hire an agency that has resulted in the penalty. I hate to be the bearer of bad news but I have seen websites that have never recovered from a penalty, even after having the reconsideration request accepted. However, looking on the positive side, and with the links you are/have built there shouldn't be any reason why you shouldn't start to see a recovery.

When you got them to remove the links, did they get them removed or use the disavow tool. The problem with using the disavow tool is that some agencies aren't sure what is a good link and what is a bad link so if they just got rid of everything then you have effectively started from scratch but with a penalty hanging over your head so it is going to be hard to rank again.

Look at your backlink profile again and compare it to what it was before the penalty (if possible) and then see if you still have any links that look suspect. Any article directores or poor quality directories that are still there, get them taken down.

As Moosa said, try and get them to take the articles down first because this would be better and Google says that you should try to get them taken down BEFORE using the disavow tool. If you have already tried then go ahead and use it, you can disavow links from an entire domain so you can just do that.

The reason for the slip could be the unconfirmed update from Google. As nothing has been confirmed its difficult to say but there has been a lot of talk on Webmaster forums that rankings have dropped for many websites.

Coming back to your question, there is no set time on how long it will take and as Paddy Displays said, it depends on how often Google visits the website with the link on. If, as you say, the websites are high quality then it should be soon.

Yes you should only have 1 H1 tag per page, I didn't realise the "International Mailing List" was the H1. As Market Stomper said, it was more about UX and separating the paragraphs.

The way you have done the alt attributes for the images at the bottom of the homepage is correct. Don't stuff keywords into your alt tags because you will gain nothing from it. Try get a keyword into your image alt tag but it is more important that the description matches the image.

You've done a pretty good job there. I would suggest adding some H1's into your content as well and maybe some in-content linking too which can be good for users.

I'd second what Dimitri said, using these types of websites is a sure fire way of getting your website penalised.

Cheers guys, much appreciated

We have found a couple of blogs that would be good for some unique content but I suspect they may be part of a network. Apart from checking the IP and for duplicate content of them both, are there any other signs that they may be part of a network?

Hi Chris,

Thanks for the reply. We have seen a few drops in rankings since the unconfirmed update last week so I've noted all our current rankings so I can compare them once the changes have been made. We have been SEO'ing the website for a while now but the web company made some changes to their CMS and messed things up!

Hi Mozzers,

I saw a considerable amount of duplicate content and page titles on our clients website. We are just implementing a fix in the CMS to make sure that these are all fixed. What changes do you think I could see in terms of rankings?

Hi Nathan,

This is another example of Google not getting it right across all industries (the home improvement industry is another example).

If the website is new then it may be a case that Google is testing it higher up the rankings but when it gets cached again (last cached on 22nd April) it is sure to slip. Alternatively, if those around the website are spamming then it will be helping them stay where they are.

Thats SEO in the modern times for you!! Its all about the quality of your website and the quality of your links. That doesn't mean you will never compete with these websites but it will take time. Use the crawl reports on SEOmoz and make sure that you at least have your website in the best possible conditions.

Remember, its quality of quantity so dont be tempted to just build thousands of spammy links or you will never compete with them.

I've seen some people on a few forums say that they have seen huge drops in rankings! Now, some of these people were leaving comments and including links back to their websites so might not be anything major.....i hope!

Hi Sida,

take the URL of the post and open Google and type cache:URL you will then see if Google has cached the post and link.

Don't forget, if you keep posting to the same website the benefit will be minimal in terms of SEO because it is going to be from the same IP. However, if you are writing informational posts that will be useful for the readers then that's ok.

Hi Rahul,

Your meta needs to have a call to action in it as well as containing your main keyword for that page. In my experience, I would suggest having your call to action first and then a reason why they would want to visit your website.

For example, "Contact us today for your free IT assessment from a company with nearly 30 years experience".

Removing all links is definitely not the way to go but many people are still unsure what constitutes to a good and bad link. That company have gone about it the wrong way though!

Hi Maureen,

I always get this upon setup of a new client. I think the main thing is to manage their expectations because many people outside of the digital industry are either unaware of the potential of SEO or think it can do more than it can! Find out what marketing objectives they have and then see where SEO can help.

For example, if they are aiming to increase brand awareness (which most companies want) then look at increasing the number of keywords they rank for. You can set traffic targets if they have a history you can compare with, look at their rankings they had when they reached those targets, see where you think you will be able to get them and base your objectives on that.

Totally agree with Jeremy on the "under sell, over achieve" thought though.

Hi pert,

I would recommend you 301 each URL to a relevant one on the new website rather than just redirect all to the homepage. As well as being the best way to do it from an SEO point of view, it is also the best for users as they will still go to a relevant page. Also if anyone has links to the old website they will be sent to a relevant page.

Look at "spanish lessons" and "learn spanish" as these keywords may supply you with more traffic. They would be harder to rank for of course but over the long term would give you a more constant level of traffic.

Hi Douglas,

Have you used the keyword tool to find the exact match figures? They may be industry standard terms but if the search volume is low then there may be less traffic than you think.

By highly, do you mean in positions 1-3? If so then it would point to the fact that there is little traffic to be gained and you would be best moving on to another keyword. if you are lower than that, it may be that the websites above you are very good at converting visits into sales.

Thanks EGOL, very much appreciate your time. I think I'll have to do a little more research with my clients then because it will obviously mean more budget to be allocated.

Hi all,

I am pondering whether or not to try the new model of paying for the shopping results. I was just wondering what results people had seen and your ideas/thoughts on it.

First, I think you're lucky that you only have 60 links outstanding, we recently took a client that had over 5000 bad links!!

If you have emailed or tried to contact the remaining websites then I'd say its time to turn to the disavow tool. Be really careful though when using it because you have to be 100% sure that these are bad links before disavowing them. Once you have submitted the disavow file (which can take a week or 2 to filter through to Google) you will get a message in Webmaster Tools to tell you they have received it.

I'd say at this point, resubmit  for reconsideration. If you have evidence that you tried to contact these websites then include that in your request because Google wants to see that you have made an effort to get them removed first.

If the links are as bad as you say then they are probably doing more bad than good so don't worry about the link juice they are passing.

I'd usually say redirect it to a category page (zip code or city) straight away but from a users point of view it may not be the best thing to do. Maybe leave the page up with a sold sign and then have a "you may also like" section underneath so they know the house is gone but there are some other options, probably the best for UX. After a few weeks, I'd then 301 it to a category page.

There is no harm that it can do to your SEO but, in my opinion, dark text on light background is just easier on the eye. What is your bounce rate like? If it's quite high (50%+) then it may be worth looking at.

Hi Jackson,

It would be better if there was just one uniform URL for the product but for some websites that have thousands of products it is just too big a development cost so they get around it by using the canonical tag, this is perfectly fine and there aren't any issues from an SEO perspective. So if you can, I'd change it so that there is one URL per product but there is nothing wrong with using the canonical tag

Hi Brandon,

Google has been talking about citations and there is some talk that they can recognise a brand even if it doesn't actually link. I'd contact the website and ask for an actual link though because this would be more beneficial.

Have you got some examples?

It isn't a bad thing but it depends what the anchor text is that has been used really. I take it you mean external backlinks and not internal?

It will be yeah and you will have duplicate content and titles issues as well so you need to fix it ASAP.

Brilliant, that's good news. Good luck with everything

Hi Caroline,

In this instance, you need to 301 redirect the /index.html version back to the .com version. That would be best practise.

I'd say a product page (if it is very similar to the product that is no longer available). If you have something like "You May Also Like" on the products this would be useful to have. Only my opinion though and there is no right or wrong answer.