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I wouldn't just go ahead an do it without looking into it further, maybe waiting for more comments on here to weigh it up. It sounds counter-intuitive to me.

Sorry Johannes I think I confused matters... I didn't mean there is spammy content now, I mean the spammy content that you removed. I'll be cursed for saying it but it's quite possible some of that spammy stuff was working if there were exact matches in there then which aren't now. Google isn't perfect yet so unfortunately some spam does still work (for now) though it will likely hold risks too. My suggestion with that was to look at the spam that was removed and figure out how to incorporate some of it back into the site in a non-spammy way.

With regards to the link numbers, yes if it was me I think I'd remove at least some of those footer links too.

My mistake with the rel canonical, I didn't spot it but just noticed it was a bit lower down.

The duplication could well be the issue, but if that's the case and the dupe is no longer there then it should sort itself out pretty quickly.

You must still have bad links that you weren't able to get rid of it, try this: http://www.linkresearchtools.com/case-studies/link-networks/ tis awesome

If one were better than the other (and I'm not sure of any research comparing the two), then I would guess at .cn, since that's as top level as you can get with it (I know their both top level but that was the original).

Did you always have as many links going out of each page? There's quite a few... plus that spammy content, whilst I hate to say it, might have provided the longtail exact matches you were ranking for. Maybe get those keywords back in to their pages in a non-spammy way?

There's no rel="canonical" tags which would help if it is down to dupe issues.

Also, you're cannibalising a lot with the keywords... not just content and links but for a quick demo look at your page titles, the same keywords cropping up in a few of them.

Hiya, no it's fine to keep the global nav on all pages... you should do anyway. What I mean is, trim the number of links in that global nav down by placing some of them only within their category areas instead, in a secondary menu maybe. But... you can still use flyouts in the main menu so that the menu items are listed and then a hover-over of a category brings out more items, and again for a sub-category, etc... in which you could use a technology which isn't crawl-able/followed. That way users can still access all menu items from the main nav but Google will only see the top level links, with further links not followed (without using NoFollow) and bypassed. Not sure the best way to do it though since JS and Ajax are by all accounts a lot more crawl-able now.

My recommendation would be to do whatever you can to get as much experience as possible by submersing yourself in with anybody there who deals with the SEO, and get the theory by reading, spending time on here, and doing an SEO course such as MarketMotive, SearchEngineCollege, or Quirk... they're three of the decent ones, and it's kind of like having interactive books with deadlines, coursework and tests to ensure you're doing things right. They're kept nicely up to date too

Try these:

http://www.marketmotive.com/internet-marketing-training-and-certification-signup?top=how&topic=SEO

http://www.searchenginecollege.com/certified-search-engine-optimizer/

http://www.quirk.biz/courses/course/seo?utm_expid=47245799-5&utm_referrer=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.quirk.biz%2Fcourses%2Fhome

And get these:

http://www.artofseobook.com/

http://www.dannydover.com/lp/seo-secrets.html

My mistake, I wrongly assumed demoting all that currently show would effectively turn them off.

According to this, there's no way to do it: http://productforums.google.com/forum/#!category-topic/webmasters/removing-content/GrV8Axa81Ec

It's still on there under "Configuration"... there's instructions on how to turn them off at https://support.google.com/webmasters/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=47334

NoFollowing internal links won't save you any link juice... Rand did a WBF on it here: http://www.seomoz.org/blog/whiteboard-friday-how-do-we-plug-the-nofollow-leak

You're far better off going broad to narrow with your menu and trying to incorporate the pages those hundreds of links go to into categories and sub-categories, so try to combine what those pages are about in the main nav and then give options to go into more detail once users are within the category area (not of the main nav).

Don't use it on it's own. I use it a lot but never use it for any more than a rough guide. It's based on searches performed in Google... not specific to ads or organic. It throws up numbers that you know are wrong for a start. When you use it, don't use broad match, watch for keyword phrases that are in reverse, and just don't take it as gospel. With the search volumes, use it more as a measure of how popular one keyword is over another. I do use it loads more than other keyword software and despite how volatile and deceitful it is I still think it lies a lot less than any of the others. But once you've got somewhere with your keyword research try then in one or two other tools too i.e. Wordtracker and/or Keyword Discovery

I love it, it's brilliant. You get to peruse through the questions to see real world examples of SEO issues, and help with things you do know the answers to, as well as learn loads from seeing others answers on things you don't know the answers to... I'm getting addicted to coming on here!

The instant-ness of it all makes it much better than any other SEO forum out there in my opinion.

I think that's awful (no offense). I get tonnes of link requests, and other such emails every day. I don't have the time to reply to them and neither should I have to. Some of the emails state that "As they haven't had a reply from me... etc..." And then presume to suggest that I should take time out of my busy day to reply to their unsolicited emails.

Continuing to ask after no reply the first, or even second, or as you say 5th time is not getting the message and is little less than harassment.

A lot of people, like myself don't reply because:

a) It open the doorway to more such spam, and

b) Sometimes replies are little more to the sender than confirmation the email exists and responds so they can sell your data

I think it's rude to keep sending people emails. Why should I have to write "No" hundreds of times per week when I didn't even ask for the email in the first place.

So, what you're saying is that you're one of those people who hassle and bug people like me who are just trying to get on with my work, and you won't ever stop despite the fact that I don't reply?

It gives all of the industry a bad name when people do stuff like that.

Also, why should I have to unsubscribe, when I never subscribed in the first place? Not to mention that most of these requests don't have the option to unsubscribe anyway.

Sorry for the rant, nothing personal but I see it as pressure sales via spam... which I'm surprised works at all to be honest.

I've noticed something in the forums.

Many people are asking the wrong types of questions with regards to SEO and having success with their sites on it.

This is understandable since many of the questions being asked are by those who have only just got in to SEO. But it does show that the emphasis of the industry must still be very much focused on getting links and changing META data, etc... with little mention out there in all those resources of what actually matters.

Thankfully, the questions are answered with people explaining that the wrong questions are being asked, and that it's not just about random traffic gained through rankings for general keywords.

Do you think that in time we'll see an evolution of the questions, as awareness grows, moving from questions of how to rank to questions on how work out the best KPIs to measure, and how to action strategies for improving them?

This will always be the case... there are different sources, and different interpretations of what constitutes errors. I wouldn't go thinking that just because GWT is Google that means it's the most efficient though, Google have a lot of other business to be thinking about and are unlikely to be too concerned if everything isn't perfect in their free GWT product, so I doubt it would take priority over other services of theirs. Where-as Moz of course is more focused in that particular area. I would just combine the two and iron out as much as you can from each... you'll never get them to match up though.

One of our tactics is to try to be really helpful about stuff on topically relevant forums and blogs. i.e.

1. We have a client who sells a product to combat penetrating damp.
2. We find forums and blogs where people are having problems with penetrating damp.
3. We research a proper answer for them ourselves.
4. We answer their questions and recommend the product via a keyworded anchor text link.

As long as the post or comment we've made is a valuable contribution and provides a solid, well researched answer (so not spam), then the forum mods don't seem to mind the link staying there

I respectfully disagree. I know they don't necessarily pass loads of link juice but some of the paid directories don't have all the millions of spammy links to spammy sites in... because they're paid. Some are very, very cheap too. I know most are rubbish and not worth squat but there's still lots which are cheap and do pass link juice which far outweighs the cost.

Also the paid ones add you much faster... and if you want a diverse backlink profile it's worth getting a bunch of directories in there as well as your other link types... rely on the free ones and you could be waiting forever for that.

I wouldn't worry about the PR. It won't be due to content changes anyway, since PR is based on incoming links only and has nothing to do with what you have on-page. We've gone from PR 4 to PR 5 with the update but I don't care as I practically ignore PR now anyway... can't wait for them to hopefully get rid of it. It's one tiny metric which isn't a true reflection of what they have anyway. So much more that matters.

At the moment you have a direct link from the homepage to the quickbooks hosting page with anchor text in the footer. Above that, you have some body content about quickbooks hosting (still on the homepage), put a link in there to the quickbooks hosting page. Body content links are better than footer links by far.

Also it seems that you've had the following URL's for that page:

/quickbooks-hosting.html
/host-quickbooks.html
/hosted-quickbooks.html

Were/are these all the same page just with URL changes? Have you put 301's in for them so that both older URL's point to the new one?

Alan is totally right, offering money for it is the wrong path to take, plus, as you'll need links more and more you'll forever be paying for them. Are the sites even that good that the links are of any value? If the page already links out to loads of people then that could make the link worth less.

Sure, pay for a link off of a site with huge credibility (as advertising), but not any old site with a links page.

Write something they'd like to link to and then tell them it exists.

It's all so practical too. I would bet that anyone who spent an hour or two each day in here just reading through the questions would make a great SEO after a year