egomaniac - 6:21 pm on Nov 26, 2001 (gmt 0)

I have a few questions about implementing themes. I want to overhaul one of my sites using the theme concept to secure high rankings*. I have spent many hours reading over everything I can find here at WebmasterWorld and at other sites on the web. I appreciate all of the time and effort that many of the more senior people here have already contributed on this topic. Due to the abstract nature of this concept, I feel that I won't know if I've "got it" without some outside help.

(* I know that inbound links can have a big effect on rankings. For this discussion, I want to focus on how to implement a theme).

My site will be 50-100 pages after the overhaul. I have identified a number of medium-high-traffic, on-topic 2 word keyword phrases using Wordtracker. My content consists of articles and newsletters that I have written around my main topic (which I can break-up and reuse however I need to). I sell 3 different training products/services off of this site, and I have plans in the future to add another product line or two.

My strategy with the site has been to offer a lot of interesting content to the surfer to build credibility, and eventually lead them to a sales letters for one of the products/services. To do this effectively, most or all of the content need to have text links to these sales letters. If I create 3-keyword phrases that target these products/services, they would be "on-target", but they would be low-traffic. Yes, I know targeted is good. I believe however that I can draw people in from broader search terms, keep em on the site with good content, and then sell them a focused product with a good sales pitch (or at least get em signed up for a newsletter).

Let's say for example that I am selling products/services for management training. And let's say that the following are the top 5 terms out of the Wordtracker database followed by their "Count" number (these aren't the real terms and numbers, just an example - I have actually identified about 20 good search phrases):

1) Management Training - 800
2) Human Resources - 650
3) Management Techniques - 500
4) Executive Training - 250
5) Management Tips - 125

So here is my challenge: How do I organize my search terms into a theme hierarchy for my site?

One reason I am getting confused is my main terms are somewhat synonymous without all using the same root word (i.e. they don't all use just "management" as a root word). So while exec training and management training are similar in my mind, and perhaps the surfers mind, what about the SEs (particularly Google)? And then what at the HR term? Different, but I think people searching for it will be interested in my content and products/services.

My inclination is to pick #1) Management Training as the Level 1 overall theme of my site. Because this is the most trafficked term. It is also the major category that both ODP and Yahoo use. At this point my head starts to hurt as I try to figure out how to come up with subtopics if I use this as a overall them for the site.

My way of thinking of subtopics is to ask myself "what is an example of this?" Well tips and techniques can be examples of training. But HR is not an example of training. Both Executive and Management could be "examples" of the other one. As you can see, a lot of these terms are somewhat s

Another way to go would be to make #5) Management Tips as the Level 1 theme for the site. This would encompass everything pretty well. But this term is not as highly trafficked. Would that make my subtopics weaker? Or if I build enough pages to reinforce a strong subtheme of Management Training, will that make that term competitive?

Management Training is the term that I want to dominate long term (I know this won't happen overnight - I want to create a structure now that I can continue to build upon). I am afraid that by picking the tips theme, that I will have relegated my training pages to a lower status, hampering their rankings.

Some other things that confused me in the articles I read here:

1) Looking at Brett's pyramid, I get confused about the 2nd Level pages. He says that these aren't necessarily highly trafficked pages on your site. Yet these are supposed to be sub-indices for your primary phrases?

It seems like my 2nd level pages would be my main search terms. Yet I am supposed to look upon these as indices that only reinforce a theme, but don't attract surfer traffic?

Should I use the primary terms to define the subdirectories, and have pages targeting the 2-word terms within that as well? Something like this?
www.mydomain.com/management-training/management-training.htm

2) When do you link across pages within your site, and when do you not? Brett's article implies that you don't link across within a level. Yet, another discussion here implies that you do ( [webmasterworld.com...] ). In other words when or how do you put up walls between content to reinforce a sub-theme (or do you at all)?

3) How do I handle common navigation links without diluting a subtheme?

I have a traditional left-hand side set of navigation links using images. At leas one will go to one of sub-indices (e.g. tips or techniques), but some will go directly to deep content such as a product sales pitch.

Should I just make them cgi script links so that the spider can't follow it? Is using an image link (versus HTML text link) enough to keep from damaging the subtheme?

4) If I create sub-directories, am I hurting my page ranking? I thought pages were supposed to be close to root (maybe this is just old SEO info in my part).

Thanks for taking the time to read this. Any help you can give me I really appreciate.