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1. If their pages are specifically optimised towards certain keywords - follow suit.
2. Check your site under KW's in an analysis package such as Topdog or Webposition gold, see what results you get, then do it for your competitors and look at the report summaries for keywords. If you see that on competitors kw summaries, that SE's / Ink are looking at different pages then you'll see why optimization of pages, especially concerning competitive KW's in regards to all SE's is so important.
Hope this is helpful
For example: Out of a 100 page site, you determine there are 10 pages that would be good "start pages" for people coming to your site for the first time... those 10 pages should be optimized to increase their rankings, and increase the odds people will find one of the pages you want them to enter through. Some people may still drill down through the search results and enter through page #98, but most people won't.
I have to confess I am new to these forums. Before I found this resource, I fooled myself into believing I was reasonably clued up - How wrong I am, I feel like a true beginner!
I am very interested in Inktomi as indeed all the major engines and directories.
Do you know any methods to include keywords which are picked up by the robots but not by the visitors? For example (I hope this doesn't sound cheap) black text in a table row which contains a black background image - surely, the engines could not detect this. Actually, I think I've answered my own question on that one - unless I am being naive? But do you know any more of these strategies. I want my page text to be informative and of a good quality, I don't want viewers to see blatant keyword stuffing. Also, the design of my sites are such that adding bits of text (invariably a number of sentences) would ruin the appearance of some pages.
Any help would be VERY much appreciated - Thanks again.
The engines absolutely could detect this, and could ban your site for doing it. Anything that sounds like it would be "blatant keyword stuffing" to a human visitor is best avoided altogether... the engines are getting very good at catching those kinds of tricks.
Many thanks for your comments. Please don't take this as a challenge of what you have said, I just want to learn. How will a robot know that the table row background image is black and therefore rendering the text invisible?
Also, I was not advocating blatant keyword repetitions, just merely some carefully selected keyword-heavy sentences. Is this basically the point of optimization - to match the sites content to what you believe the engines algos look for. i.e. density of keywords (amongst other things). Am I missing a fundamental principle in my approach?
I am going to loose sleep over this :)
From what I've heard around here, getting re-listed after having a site banned is more trouble than finding spider-friendly optimization techniques in the first place.
If you're interested in feeding different text to the spiders than you do to your human visitors, you may want to visit our cloaking forum [webmasterworld.com], and see what tools and techniques are available to you in that area.
The site search at the top of the page is going to become very useful as you leap into the wealth of information around here. To show just how much I found these previous discussions on background and text. I hope these help.
[webmasterworld.com...]
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There are more but that should give you a fun night of reading :)
<added>Feel free to keep asking questions. I'm sure some will come up from your reading.
Themes based search engines look at the whole site. For example, if you have a site about chocolate candy, carrying that phase across the entire site, as well as having appropriate directory listings and reciprocal links, will establish your site as having a theme of "chocolate candy." That increases the estimation of relevancy for the phrase.
However, if a searcher is specifically looking for white chocolate macadamia fudge, a page specifically geared to that phrase (still staying consistent with the chocolate candy theme) will help that searcher find exactly what she's looking for.
>the design of my sites are such that adding bits of text (invariably a number of sentences) would ruin the appearance of some pages.
Staying with the chocolate candy example, let's say you have a high end site featuring exquisite Belgian chocolates. In addition to photographs, all the descriptive text and titles are in the form of graphics to preserve the design effect and use the fonts of your choice, regardless of whether they're installed on the viewer's system.
The site is, indeed, relevant to the subject of chocolate candy. That is exactly what searchers will find. The spiders, however, are not capable of dealing with your format, due to their limitations.
The logical solution is to create an equally relevant all text page. Deliver the lovely graphical version to the user, and deliver the simple text version to the search engine spiders.
Marcia, thanks for your help I am feeling a bit more enlightened. However, I am not sure how to achieve the above - the text version would be a subpage? no I don't get it!! Please help me on this - Many thanks
I very much appreciate your help. Since finding webmaster's world, I feel very priveliged to be in such esteemed company as with you chaps! thanks again for your help?
This forum is fast!
Stop by the cloaking forum [webmasterworld.com] ( [webmasterworld.com...] ) and see what the folks there have to offer. I know what cloaking does, but have never used it.
If your pages are going to a directory as well - don't even think of using the .gif bg - it will get you banned, big time
-s-
>If your pages are going to a directory as well - don't even think of using the .gif bg - it will get you banned, big time
Could you elaborate on this point - I'm not sure how to interpret it. Do you mean if I submit to directories i.e. yahoo, odp, LS etc, they will have a problem with this tactic and ban me (due to the fact that a human editor can spot it). How about if I concentrated on the directories first - i.e. get my listing without this tactic and then re-optimise my pages for the engines using the black.gif tactic.
Thanks for your help.
it's the same as the first rule of marketing in any field...marketing begins from the first moment you think of a product idea
You have found yourself in a situation that many face. You also may want to reconsider your keyword strategy if the competition is that tough. Are their alternatives that could bring in more focused traffic? It's never too late to come up with a plan but plan you must.
it may simply be easier to start again from good SEO principles as if you had never created the previous design at all
I wish I could suggest a couple of simple quick fixes that don't affect design very much, but although it might be what you most like to hear it wouldn't be doing you any favours
My situation is not so dire. Firstly, the design is not just graphical - in fact, I have been critised from a design point of view (by a friend) for having too much text. So, I can play around with keywords a bit.
There are methods that I am opposed to, such as for example, having H1 headings containing major keywords - bacause they look so nasty. So, I guess I looking for a compromise i.e. trying to optimize without using big ugly text headings. Also, another example, I have seen used often, is keyword-heavy text at the top of the index page and also at the bottom of the page to create a 'theme'. This also can look very uncool. I am trying to use 'other' methods so that my site can compete.
Am I trying to achieve the impossible? I can't be the first to attempt this.
Kind Regards, Stavs
if you have too much text, that is a Godsend in SEO terms...it means you can split the page into two or three all targeting separate people and separate keywords
1. what is the css syntax for defining the size of H1, and,
2. does this method pose any cross-browser problems.
very gratefully, Stavs.
-s-
H1 { color:#000000; font-family:arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size:200%; font-weight:bold }
H2 { color:#000000; font-family:arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size:80% }
H3 { color:#000000; font-family:arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size:150% }
works fine...and gave me a big headline followed by a keyword rich section in a side bar that didn't take up too much space but was still full of keywords in headers
no problems with this in either Netscape 4 or in Opera, at least AFAICS
Kind Regards, Stavs
[searchnewz.com...]
>>>>I have seen used often, is keyword-heavy text at the top of the index page and also at the bottom of the page to create a 'theme'. This also can look very uncool.<<<<<<<
This brings us right back to the issue of Good Copywriting....Stavs when one uses keywords in the text...to make the site look more relevant...he/she is not supposed to miss out the marketing flow..that is from the end users point of view...meaning use some of the excellent copywriting tekneex, so that you don't lose out on either satisfying the Se's or your site visitors...
Well, i am sure , all of us know about it here..just that i want to RE-EMPHASISE..
It's a nice thread indeed..enjoyed Reading it...!!! :)
