Does Amazon's aStore impact on search engine positions?

[TravelSite]

Hi,

We're planning to test out Amazons "aStore" feature on one of our sites and was wondering if there are any issues with it from an seo point of view?

(The aStore is a cut down version of Amazon that resides on Amazon's servers - you can change the css and categories/products listed).

We were thinking about having a page on our site which includes an aStore, via an iframe. Is this a safe practice, or should I ban search engines from indexing the page containing the iframe? Or should we just link directly to the aStore (which would allow us to use the NOFOLLOW tag in the link)?

Thanks

[encyclo]

Will the content be very similar to your existing site? Neither an iframe nor a nofollow will in themselves stop the store being indexed.

[piatkow]

I have one and I haven't seen any impact on the keywords that I regularly check but then the products aren't otherwise mentioned on my site at all.

On the other hand a search on Widget Book Shop in Google is returning my aStore at number 1. I'll have to add that search to my check list!

[TravelSite]

encyclo - no, the content is completely different. The aStore shop is for things people might use when they buy a service/product from us. It's for add on sales (but its unlikely to really make much of a difference to us).

piatkow - that's interesting, I didn't think an aStore itself would get a high ranking/be seen in a positive way by the search engines.

[piatkow]

Nor did I! I always assumed that the only way to find it would be through the site.

[centime]

I would uess that its the page with the astore in an iframe that is ranking, not the astore itself

I had an astore, an the only page ever indexed was the homepage which would be the first thing seen by the spider in the iframe

Then again, I probably didn't implement it too well :)

I gave up an moved on to another script :)

[piatkow]

Now down to positions number 3 & 4 indented on the same search. First is to a particular item and the second to the home page. No idea what the algo could be using as I have never sold a copy of the book in question and the page would be four levels down from the home page in a specialist subsection of a specialist section of a niche aStore.