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Hi,

I would leave them as "follow" ---- and don't see why search engines should have an objection to that.

Personally, I think it is very much part of the 'search + social' integration that is the in-thing currently.

Manoj

Hi,

I feel the days of global dominance of search results for any website are over and feel that results will have a much more geographical bias than previously.  Therefore, if the retailer has an established website that is pulling in good traffic from the UK, my suggestion would be to create another website (say, a .com) with geo-targeted sub-domains/ sub-folders, or if time and money permit, have separate country-specific domains for the main different markets you are targeting.

Hope this helps.

Hi,

I think internal linking to 'relevant' content is a must-do, because it is great for both human visitors as well as helps with improving accessibility of content for search engines.

My suggestion is to not focus too much on ratios as Dennis has suggested above. Identify and link to relevant content; don't over-do the number of links.  Similarly with anchor text, mix and match the terms/ phrases you choose to hyperlink.

Best,

Manoj

For a client of ours, we are likely to create a sub-domain that is to be targeted at a specific country.

Most of the content on this sub-domain will be from the main site, although with some specific differentiation to suit that geographic market.

We intend to tell Google through Webmaster Centre that the sub-domain is targeted at a specific country. Some questions:

a) Any idea how long it could take before google gives precedence to the content in this sub-domain for queries originating from that particular country?

b)  What is the likely impact of content duplication ? What extent of differentiation is necessary from a search engine perspective?

Thanks.

This is another one of those grey areas, I think, where is there no perfect answer.

To draw an analogy from the world of politics and elections:

a) Your vote benefits the recipient more than it will benefit you.

b) If you were fighting the same election, casting a vote for a more prominent candidate who is a  competitor for that same position will hurt you more than benefiting you.

c) If you vote for the right candidate-  because that is the right thing to do--- it might eventually benefit you, in a roundabout sort of manner.

So, I'd apply the same rules when casting your vote for a website (ie. giving out links)----do vote, but cast your vote with care!

Yes, what's done is done.  As many of the others have already suggested here, you will be much better off by focusing on getting better quality links rather than trying to clean up the mess that's already created.