Negative SEO- when others (read-competitors) can affect your rankings with bad links. Is this thought just SEO paranoia or does this actually happen?

The search industry turns to Google for answers and since long Google has been saying that bad links others used against you can't hurt your sites rankings. But the search industry saw it happening and now the discussion is out in the open. Google itself has changed its replies overtime.

Earlier, the search giant was quoted as- “There’s nothing a competitor can do to harm your ranking or have your site removed from our index."

But now, it has been altered to (on March 14, 2012) – "Google works hard to prevent other webmasters from being able to harm your ranking or have your site removed from our index. If you’re concerned about another site linking to yours, we suggest contacting the webmaster of the site in question."

This change in tone from Google has webmasters confronting their worst fears- their site is at risk from competitors. If you are using Google Webmaster Tools, then you can get an inkling of sabotage from the infamous “unnatural linking” messages from Google. But if your site is out of the Webmaster Tools, then you would be wiped clean of the search results and there is pretty much nothing that you can do than simply shut shop. The entire appeal to Google will have a long time sorting itself and till you are proven innocent your site will be in the pits.

Webmaster's were pretty shaken up after Google came down upon BuildMyRank and the negative SEO trend dominated the forums again. Issues like ‘will the influx of unnatural links damage the strong domains too’ have cropped up and are a part of the multiple case studies that have been going on about the issue.

What Can You Do About It In Google Webmaster Tools, find the links to your site and if you find links from a shady domain inform Google to completely discount those. You can also go through the domain and block certain pages if you see fit. This way you can arrest the mal-intent links and identify the paid links and scrapers too.

Be on your watch and walk the tight rope of smart SEO. Be aware so that you are not shut down even when you never lifted a finger. Do you have any more ideas on how SEOs can work with Google to stop this? Please share your views.

Post from: PageTraffic SEO Blog Now updated thrice a day!

Negative SEO- What Google Says and What You Can Do?

Post from: PageTraffic SEO Blog Now updated thrice a day!

Another Panda Refresh? Webmasters Report Huge Rankings Fluctuations, Google Denies Any Refresh!

During the SMX East in September 2011, Google revealed their solution for pagination issues in SEO and search – view all & rel="next" and rel="prev".

This complex and technical topic has proved to be helpful for large sites with a lot of pagination. Google’s Maile Ohye posted a video about it on the Webmaster’s YouTube channel as an attempt to make it easily understandable.

Do you find the video helpful? Leave your comments below.

Post from: PageTraffic SEO Blog Now updated thrice a day!

Video Insights into SEO Pagination by Google!

Google once again found themselves in the midst of unwanted attention after Jonathan Rockway, an employee was caught saying:

"Instead of being able to SEO the entire Internet, businesses can now only affect the search results for a tiny percentage of users. That's a good thing because SEO can't scale, and SEO isn't good for users or the Internet at large."

The highlighted part of the statement made by Mr Rockway, is something that goes directly against Google. Over the years, Google has repeatedly maintained that they do not consider SEOs to be spams. As a matter of fact, in October last year, Matt Cutts did an entire video giving a detailed description behind the reasoning why Google does not consider SEOs to be spams. Please be noted that Mr Cutts is the head of Google's web spam team.

Another worrying comment made by Mr Rockway has been quoted below:

"If you look at the Google experience from the standpoint of customers, it's pretty good. Users get relevant search results and ads. Advertisers get their content on top of everything else. It's a good compromise between advertising and usability, and it works really well. It's a bug that you could rank highly in Google without buying ads, and Google is trying to fix the bug."

Once again the highlighted part of the statement by Mr Rockway is particularly worrisome, as it goes on to suggest that if you want to rank well on Google, you will have to buy ads.

Though three days after making the initial comment Mr Rockwaymade a corrective statement, "I shouldn’t have mentioned ads here. Position on the results page should only depend on the quality of your content; if your site has the best content on the Internet for the user’s search terms, you should be the top result. You shouldn’t be able to change your position in the organic results any other way, like by exploiting bugs in Google’s ranking algorithm. The specifics of the ranking algorithm may change, but if your site is the best, you won’t have to worry about it." This statement sort of took care of the ads issue, but SEO comment is still open for speculation.

Google jumped onto the sinking ship trying to salvage some lost pride by confirming again and saying that "As always, Google search rankings are completely unrelated to Google’s paid advertising services and other partnerships, and there is absolutely no way for a webmaster to pay money to increase search rankings." and "When it comes to SEO, many owners of high-quality sites can and do get their site listed well in Google’s search results without any outside help. Some site owners prefer to have someone else check and optimize their sites, and for these folks we’ve published some guidelines relating to evaluating SEO companies."

Google has said that Mr Rockway is new employee at Google who just about completed one month of employment, perhaps hinting that he is not fully acquainted with how Google works. This seems no more than a case of misunderstanding.

Post from: PageTraffic SEO Blog Now updated thrice a day!

Google Reaffirms: SEO Isn't Bad & Ads Don't Help Rankings!

Over 500 consultants and agencies were surveyed about their pricing models by AYTM Market Research and SEOmoz in a survey conducted in December 2011. The results based on the answers given by agencies of all sizes are put together in this Infographic:

What do you think about the cost pitted against the range of services provided? Share your views.

Post from: PageTraffic SEO Blog Now updated thrice a day!

How Much Does SEO Cost- Infographic!

United States markets have the maximum job opportunities in the SEO related sectors. The hot hiring spots and the salaries offered were put together in an infographic titled- SEO Salary Guide: For Top 20 U.S. Markets.

Onward Search has created this highly informative pictorial, and you can download the guide for a detailed study.

Post from: PageTraffic SEO Blog Now updated thrice a day!

SEO Salary Guide For The US Markets!

Google+ has been in the news since its launch, and specially with the rate at which it has grown. It had 10 million users within a few days, and even on an invite-only basis, it collected 25 million users, and the number of users shot up to 50 million in a couple of days of the network going public.

Brands and businesses were waiting for Google+ to open its doors to them, and Google+ did that in the first week of November, when it launched  business pages. Like Facebook and Twitter, brands and businesses can now use Google+ to connect with their followers and build on their brand. For SEO experts too, it is a great opportunity, as SEO is all about social now.

Optimizing Google+ Profile/Pages For SEO:

So, for SEO purposes, you need to optimize both your personal profile as well as your brand page.
Lets begin with optimizing your Google+ personal profile:
Remember that your profile details section is a very important part of your optimization efforts.

Title: Your name on your Google+ profile is your SEO Title, and always use your real name. Do not use your brand/service/company name as Google+ does not allow that. You can use these names for the business page.

Meta Description: When you put in your name, there is a one liner space, sort of a headline column that you have to describe yourself in, that is your meta description. This one line about your self along with your profession and work place is your complete meta description. You have to write the best one line about yourself- work and employer within 160 characters. Keep your profile details open to all, so that people not in your Circles can also read it.

Links: Do not go overboard with links, as there are dofollow links allowed on your profile. Like on the right of the profile you can link to all your other profiles on networks like Linkedin, Facebook etc. Even while writing your introduction, you can add links to your work description. Use your keywords wisely, but again be reasonable while linking.

Now, about the SEO tweaks you can make in your Google+ Business Page:

Since Google+ Page is created through your profile only, they are really quite similar to your profile.

Title: Your brand name is your SEO title.

Meta Description: Business Pages do not have any occupation or employer column (obviously!) so your meta description is reduced to your page's title, the one line description (headline) followed by the introduction text.

Ever since the Google+ Pages began showing up in search results, you must make a hurried effort to get all your keyword rich descriptions in place. Google+ will have a huge impact on SEO, and you must be ready to make the most of the platform.

For more tips on how to promote your brand on Google+, read this.

Post from: PageTraffic SEO Blog Now updated thrice a day!

How To Do SEO For Google+ Profiles And Pages?

Whenever Google makes a change in its search algorithm, it makes for big news. The search engine has recently revealed a compilation of the latest algorithmic tweaks it has made. Google's Matt Cutts, has posted a blog about the recent 10 algorithm changes made by Google.

As Matt says, “We make roughly 500 changes to our search algorithm in a typical year. Our goal is to make search run so smoothly, you don't even notice the changes. That said, we like giving you insights into what we're doing behind the search results you see each day. Today on Inside Search, we've posted a recap of some of the algorithmic changes we’ve made over just the past couple weeks. ”

Google has been working all through this year to provide some insights to site owners, as to how the search engine works it algorithms, and even released a video of the same recently. And now it has released this information about the ten tweaks made to the search algorithm in the past couple of weeks.

• Cross-language information retrieval updates: This tweak assured that the English web pages were translated into certain languages and displayed right below the English titles in search results. The languages for which this feature is available are: Afrikaans, Malay, Slovak, Swahili, Hindi, Norwegian, Serbian, Catalan, Maltese, Macedonian, Albanian, Slovenian, Welsh, Icelandic.

  SEO Interpretation- This tweak by Google allows marketers to reach newer markets, that were cut off due to language boundaries.

• Snippets with more page content and less header/menu content: Google made this tweak in order to help itself in determining more relevant text to use in snippets. Now, armed with a clearer understanding of the web page structure, Google will pick the text from the page, and not just the header.

  SEO Interpretation-It comes to quality content. You cannot get around much by manipulating header descriptions, and alt and meta tags. You have to have relevant and quality content on the right pages of your site. Now you know why quality content is important, ever since the Panda struck.

• Better page titles in search results by de-duplicating boilerplate anchors: Google generates a page's title based on a number of signals, one of them being the anchor text. The search engine does not consider the boilerplate links with duplicated anchor text as relevant. As a result it chooses the titles that are relevant to the page’s content.

  SEO Interpretation- Anchor texts are used by Google, we have known it forever, and that is why backlinks become so important for SEO. With this information laid out by Google, it is clear that site wide linking (in headers, footers and blog rolls) will not lead to any better ranking. This means that paid linking sites that give links to blog rolls are useless now.

• Length-based autocomplete predictions in Russian: This algorithmic tweak is applicable to the long arbitrary query predictions in Russian. Google will no longer make long predictions in Russian.

  SEO Interpretation-There is not much here for SEOs. Good usage update for Russian users though.

• Extending application rich snippets: Google's rich snippets for applications enables users to view comprehensive search results while searching for software applications. The search results show cost and user reviews with the listings.

  SEO Interpretation- If you are doing the SEO for any software company, you better get down to writing rich snippets for your applications. This will ensure you ranking high, and even luring customers to explore your site. You must input as much information about you product as possible apart from alt tags, meta tags and descriptions.

• Retiring a signal in Image search: Google has done away with the signal in Image Search related to images that had references from multiple documents on the web.

  SEO Interpretation- This tweak is aimed to improve image search function. But this can also be an attempt to lower the prominence of images with links and descriptions belonging to the many free image sites on the web. One can influence search results for images by placing an image across all the free image hosting sites. Maybe Google is trying to decrease the link juice from sites like Flicker, Dailymotion etc.

• Fresher, more recent results: This “Freshness” tweak was introduced quite recently by Google, and threw considerable importance on fresh content. Google has updated its Caffeine algorithm used to rank fresh content. The change has had an impact on 35% of total searches.

  SEO Interpretation- This tweak has its message for search experts loud and clear- updating the content daily is a must for websites now. In order to rank well in the SERP’s, the webmasters have to take up blogging and social media on war footing levels.

• Refining official page detection: Google has always stressed the importance of relevant and authoritative results. This tweak is to help Google determine which pages of a brand or a business are the official ones, and they will rank higher in search results.

  SEO Interpretation-If you are handling the search for a branded site, then this update is a really good news for you! But if you are handling a comparatively new name in the niche, then this tweak works against you, as you will face difficulty in entering highly competitive niches. The official sites will get better ranks, and the industry giants get a stronger hold on search results too!

• Improvements to date-restricted queries: This tweak has altered how Google handles freshness for queries in the case a user has chosen a specific date range. Now the user will get more relevant results pertaining to the specified date range.

  SEO Interpretation- News sites will get more prominence now, as will sites that list current events and up to date content. This is somewhat in line with the Freshness update, where the users target news as it is happening.

• Prediction fix for IME queries: This tweak is specific for non English speaking users and improves how Autocomplete handles IME queries (queries which contain non-Latin characters). Say goodbye to gibberish predictions for Hebrew, Russian and Arabic now!

  SEO Interpretation-Nothing much for search experts here, just that the user experience for non English speaking users will get better.

Why Has Google Done This?

This blog revealing the tweaks in the closely guarded Google algorithm has given way to several theories as to why has Google done this sort of compilation now? Is this move by Google done to silence the allegations of secrecy and cheating that were laid against it. Is this the Google way of ensuring the antitrust regulators that it is not biased toward its own operations.

Matt Cutts, tries to play down the purpose by saying, “For those of us working in search every day, we think this stuff is incredibly exciting but then again, we’re big search geeks. Let us know what you think and we’ll consider publishing more posts like this in the future. ”

By the way, we could not help but notice the new designation adorning Matt's name in the post- 'Distinguished Engineer'. Looks like the head of the Google spam team, is now a Distinguished Engineer. Congrats on the promotion Matt!

What do you think of these 10 tweaks? Do share your views.

Post from: PageTraffic SEO Blog Now updated thrice a day!

10 New Google Algorithm Tweaks Include Higher Rank For 'Official' Pages And Improved Snippets!

Google really likes to shake things up. The search engine has now updated its Caffeine algorithm to show more recent search results when time centric events and information are searched, like developing news stories and product reviews.

What Has Google Done?
Google announced that they want search results to be fresher, and are hence putting a new search algorithm change in action. Now, not only will the results be fresher, the results will change for about 35% of all searches.
In its perusal of fresher and more relevant results, Google came up eith the caffeine index last year. Earlier this index was used to ensure that Google indexes and returns faster results. But now this algorithm has been tweaked to show even more fresh results.

As Google says, “We completed our Caffeine web indexing system last year, which allows us to crawl and index the web for fresh content quickly on an enormous scale. Building upon the momentum from Caffeine, today we’re making a significant improvement to our ranking algorithm that impacts roughly 35 percent of searches and better determines when to give you more up-to-date relevant results for these varying degrees of freshness.”

Move Over Panda, Caffeine Is Here- 35% Searches Are Impacted
This update is much larger than the Panda which had an impact on 12% searches only. This time the numbers are a huge 35%.
Here are the searches that will be impacted by this update. We are quoting Google here:

• “Recent events or hot topics: For recent events or hot topics that begin trending on the web, you want to find the latest information immediately. Now when you search for current events like [occupy oakland protest], or for the latest news about the [nba lockout], you’ll see more high-quality pages that might only be minutes old.

• Regularly recurring events: Some events take place on a regularly recurring basis, such as annual conferences like [ICALP] or an event like the [presidential election]. Without specifying with your keywords, it’s implied that you expect to see the most recent event, and not one from 50 years ago. There are also things that recur more frequently, so now when you’re searching for the latest [NFL scores], [dancing with the stars] results or [exxon earnings], you’ll see the latest information.
• Frequent updates: There are also searches for information that changes often, but isn’t really a hot topic or a recurring event. For example, if you’re researching the [best slr cameras], or you’re in the market for a new car and want [subaru impreza reviews], you probably want the most up to date information.”

Google has further stated that with this algorithmic update it is now providing fresh content for double the number of queries as before. So now freshness will make Google notice you easily, your chances are much more now as one out of three searches are impacted.

The Downside- Fresh Spam Anyone?
This update and the announcement by Google has given way to many speculations.

• How will Google define what is a fresh content?
• The same content posted a week later on a new page is fresh?
• A new page is fresh? Or a new modification is fresh?

Google may now be exposed to news spamming now as sites will publish and re publish the same stories to ‘keep fresh.’

Google says they Know How to Determine ‘Freshness’:
Google says that they will use a mixture of ranking factors to judge the page. So, apart from freshness, the content of the result, its topicality and quality will also be judged. Google has also said that one way to determine freshness is the time when they first crawled a page. In other words, tweaking a page already indexed will not make it fresh.

What About the Realtime Fresh- Twitter?
Tweets are the most updated content on the web. Now, since the Google and Twitter fallout, Google has been without real time access to tweets. With this caffeine update Google has rolled a ranking change, and still cannot crawl Twitter rapidly enough to keep up with the data Twitter generates. While tweets are out of the scene for now, Google says that they will show results of the latest blog or a news that is being shared on the web within minutes of the page being indexed.

The Takeaway:
While Google is giving out a figure of 35% impact, it does not necessarily mean for the good. Remember the Panda? The12% results it impacted were not the improved ones. The same may stand true for the caffeine update too.

What do you think of Google’s move? Are these updates coming too close after one another? Do share your view.

Post from: PageTraffic SEO Blog Now updated thrice a day!

Google Search Algorithm Favors Freshness, 35% of Searches to Be Hit!

In an infographic by Skyrocket SEO the latest and the most popular SEO tools used by the search experts for optimization have been revealed.

These insights are from a survey of 420 participants worldwide regarding the SEO tools they use and for the purpose they use them for. Study the infographic to know the tool that you may find useful for yourself.

Post from: PageTraffic SEO Blog Now updated thrice a day!

What Tools Are SEOs Using? The SEO Software Survey – 2011!

Page Speed or site load time is an important factor in summarizing user experience. It also has an impact on the site's search engine results placements too. How Google determines site speed and what number of sites' ranking is affected by site load speed, was what the webmasters wanted to know, and this was addressed by Google's Matt Cutts in a video.

Among many other things, Matt said that approximately 1 out of 100 searches are affected by the site speed ranking factor. He said and we quote, “that it would actually change the ranking to a noticeable degree.”

In this video posted on the Google Webmaster Central Blog, Matt Cutts stated that the site speed factor affecting the site's ranking comes  to  1 in a 1,000 sites. The bottom line: About 0.1% of the websites have page speed problems that affects their rankings.

The video offers some further insights into how Google determines page speed. Do leave a comment once you listen to all that Matt Cutts has to say.

Post from: PageTraffic SEO Blog Now updated thrice a day!

Google Reveals – Site Speed Ranking Factors Affect 1% Of Searches!

The search industry in an uproar after Google's announcement that they will now encrypt searches and outbound links by default, for signed in users. With the SSL in place, the SEOs and webmasters will not get the valuable search query string via the referrer. The fact that this data will be available to AdWords advertisers, has really angered the search community. The assurance by Google that only 10 percent of searchers will be impacted by this, but the data still remains significant

The Impact On SEOs And Webmasters- Without Referral Data, SEOs Are Blind!

The search industry is wounded deeply by this. Optimization will be hit directly as SEOs evaluate the keywords that work for them from the organic keyword data only. This leads them to design landing pages and other methods to improve the user experience as well as the site's performance. There will be no way to ensure that the traffic gets converted.

Also, at the moment, experts are trying to work their way around this but to no avail. Now an SEO has to give more emphasis on ranking rather than conversion. With no idea about the keywords dictating the users' movement on the site, an internet marketer will be clueless as to how to personalize content based on the keyword or search phrase. Even if this personalization is termed as cloaking by Google, SEOs make this effort to provide users with exactly what they come looking for on the site.

Google has been often quoted as saying- "Focus on the user and all else will follow". However, with the referral data blocked from SEOs then, a webmaster cannot focus on his users at all!

“Google's Double Standards?”

The SEO Community has been venting its feelings about Google's latest move. They have scoffed Google's reasoning of protecting users' privacy, and claim that the real reason Google is hiding keyword data from organic search is to crush third party ad networks and retargeting companies.

Also, the fact that referral data is available to advertisers, but not to organic searches. This has been interpreted as Google's veiled message, that one needs to pay the search engine to get to know the keywords that are getting the traffic.

'Privacy' Is Just A Veil'

Search professional have denied Google's intention of protecting users' privacy by introducing encrypted search. They have called is half baked privacy with users saving their data in the case of organic searches, but not in the case of advertisers. Users may not look at Google all dewy eyed. They will understand that their privacy is important to protect in certain cases, but not enough when it comes to advertisers.

Google wants to prevent users from revealing private information in referrer data through clicks on its organic search results. But the privacy is lost to advertisers in any case. So what's the point? Also, the SEOs have pointed out the previous cases where Google has been called in for invading privacy like e-mail ads and Street View.

'Privacy Could Have Been Preserved In Other Ways'

In the answer to Google's claim to be following suit with Twitter, Facebook, so that it maintains its commitment to the Electronic Frontier Foundation's initiative called HTTPS Everywhere, the SEO fraternity has dissected the HTTPS case too. Further studies were conducted to ensure user privacy through Google’s search results at the Electronic Frontier Foundation. The recommendations offered Google many ways to save its users from session hijacking. These included:

• Google could discontinue the personalized search service
• Put the ball in users' court and let them choose to use HTTPS for conducting searches.
• It could also categorize and store histories based on the different networks from which user’s searches originate.
• It could then give suggestions based on various locations.
• It could also let the user agents to bind the authentication cookies to the current IP address.

In other words, for the sake of saving privacy and preventing the users sessions being hijacked, Google could have implemented many other ways. Blocking referral data was not the only choice.

'So Why Is Google Doing This'

The real reason, as per the search community, is that Google is doing this to shut out competing ad networks. Now, that the data has been removed from the referring query string, the third party ad networks cannot measure their traffic quality. Also, the webmasters will be in the dark about the ranking ranking results, Adwords data. Another issue is that without the search query data, webmasters will be unable to verify the Google Adwords search counts.

The search fraternity is not at all convinced with the privacy argument and are calling it a cover up for the real plan of killing the competition- third party applications, other analytics providers, search retargeting services and the sites like Bing that use data for relevance.

Now the organic search marketers have no way of working on the landing page targeting. As they do not have any access to the search terms. But the fact that advertisers can do that seems grossly unfair to them.

'Even The 10% Users' Data Matters'

When Google’s Matt Cutts, said that this change will only impact referral data in single digits or up to 10%, webmasters argue that this figure cannot be generalized.

Matt Cutts also Tweeted about it-

Despite what Matt says, the “not provided” keyword data could form up to 30% for many webmasters. This assumption has also been categorized as unfair.

SEO Community In An Uproar- Google Is Evil Now?

Google is claiming that they have done this to ensure the users' privacy. But the fact that those using Google Ads get the referrer data points to a totally different reason- to get the keywords, paying to Google is mandatory now? The rule of security varies for advertisers brings this move by Google under suspicion. While on one hand Google claims to be highly concerned about user privacy over personalized search, where as on the other hand, AdWords advertisers can “buy” this private data

This has got the SEO community crying foul. The views of those prominent in the search industry are given below:

Joost de Walk- “This is what I call hypocrisy at work. Google cares about your privacy, unless they make money on you, then they don’t. The fact is that due to this change, AdWords gets favored over organic results. Once again, Google gets to claim that it cares about your privacy and pulls a major public “stunt”. The issue is, they don’t care about your privacy enough to not give that data to their advertisers. ”

Peter Young- “To be honest the fact that its perfectly acceptable for PPC data to be tracked in the same circumstance that Google says it cannot pass organic data through for “privacy purposes” would suggest again this privacy is the least of their concerns. “You can have the data – as long as you pay us” would appear to be the rhetoric here. ”

Patrick Alcroft- “To me this seems like a move designed both to make Google appear to be protecting users as well as an opportunity for them to take away data that helps big sites build more effective SEO campaigns. ”

Aaron Bradley- “I’m a little perplexed that Google has cited privacy concerns with this move. Unless I’m missing something, there’s no way for a Google Analytics user to trace back a referrer to a specific individual whether they’re logged into Google or not. Even with log analysis you’re only going to get an IP, and you’d have to associate that with a user, somehow (and here a logged in Google user would be no different than an anonymous surfer) ”

Tony Verre- “Moreover, those who used analytics just to surmise if people/consumers and how people/consumers found them for something other than BRAND terms, just got a punch in the face [read Mom and Pop shops who can't afford online marketing services and help]. The web might be a key component to survival for them, and taking away accurate data in the name of faux-privacy is a pretty big deal. ”

These reactions are only a few from the industry. The forums all across the internet are rife with these discussions.

My View- As an SEO professional, I am deeply disappointed by Google's move. This will put the movement of industry from 'ranking' to 'return on investment' on the back gear. Most search professionals use Google Analytics to report their clients about the traffic and visitor behavior on their sites. With the referral data held back by Google, there is no way of tracking conversions for organic traffic. This will make it very difficult for an internet marketer to justify the returns for the client. However, I am not hopeful for a roll back of this move from Google.

What do you think? Will Google roll back this move? Are search referrers dying? Do leave your comments.

Post from: PageTraffic SEO Blog Now updated thrice a day!

Google's Move To Encrypted Search- SEOs Cry Foul- Accuse Google Of Double Standards!

SEOs the world over are crying foul over Google's new move towards secure search. The search engine announced this in the blog post that changed it all. Now, Google has changed the way secure search works for users that are signed in its services. This means that if a signed in to Google user does a search, it will be on a secure socket layer (SSL) and the search term referrer data will not be passed on. But, if you are using Google PPC, then you will get the keyword data for the searches made.

What Is The New 'Secure Search'?

Google says that in order to make search a customized experience, it is essential to protect personalized search results. That is why the users signed in to Google will have their search queries encrypted.

As Google says, “Over the next few weeks, many of you will find yourselves redirected to https://www.google.com (note the extra “s”) when you’re signed in to your Google Account. This change encrypts your search queries and Google’s results page. This is especially important when you’re using an unsecured Internet connection, such as a WiFi hotspot in an Internet cafe. You can also navigate to https://www.google.com directly if you’re signed out or if you don’t have a Google Account.”

With the secure site search, the websites that get the clicks from the users will not know the search terms they were clicked for. This leaves the search experts and webmasters in the dark as they will not know the keywords that are working for them. They will lose valuable data that helps them understand what people come looking for on their site. They will just know that someone came!

Why Is Google Doing This?

Google says that it is following suit with Twitter, Facebook and doing its bit towards the Electronic Frontier Foundation's initiative called HTTPS Everywhere.

Again, signed in users need to protect their privacy from organic webmasters, but not from advertisers? The search fraternity is questioning Google's lopsided view on “privacy”.

What About Google Analytics?

Well, if you were thinking of signing up for the paid Google Analytics, then think again, as it too is blocked from this encryption. You will just know whether the visit was from a paid or organic result, but what was the search term, you won't get to know.

As it says in the official Analytics blog “When a signed in user visits your site from an organic Google search, all web analytics services, including Google Analytics, will continue to recognize the visit as Google “organic” search, but will no longer report the query terms that the user searched on to reach your site. Keep in mind that the change will affect only a minority of your traffic. You will continue to see aggregate query data with no change, including visits from users who aren’t signed in and visits from Google “cpc”.”

Google further said that they have marked the signed in users organic search visits with the token “(not provided)” within Organic Search Traffic Keyword reporting. The referrals will be there, but the search queries entered will be missing. However, secure site searches that lead to clicks via search ads, will still provide the search.

Where Will The Keywords Be Available?

Google has assured that the search queries can be found at the Google Webmaster Central. So, some solace here for the SEOs as they can get the top 1,000 queries that a site appeared for at Google and was clicked for. This data is available for a 30 day period. The Official blog takes an understanding approach towards the SEOs problem of the highly valuable data being taken away from them, but puts forward its service and data. Webmasters and search experts have the only hope that the 30 day data period be extended to an indefinite period, so that they can analyze their site better. The fact that the Google Webmaster Central data has been integrated in to Google Analytics provides some comfort to the SEOs.

All OK For Google Ads And PPC Though

If you are an advertiser with Google, don't sweat, you will know the search query that led the searcher to your site. Things will be just the same, as it is with unencrypted search. This is because advertisers have the right to know what people are looking for, to better their campaigns.

As Google wrote in its post, “Your browser will continue to send the relevant query over the network to enable advertisers to measure the effectiveness of their campaigns and to improve the ads and offers they present to you.”

There is a question here, when advertisers get this data from the AdWords system, why are they not blocked in Analytics too? Also don't the users need privacy from advertisers? This is one question that is being speculated everywhere.

The Silver Lining For SEOs

Google's Matt Cutts has been quoted as saying that this change will impact less than 10 percent of searchers. Now as an SEO you can see it as 10% lost or 90% saved. But yes, the keyword referral data is lost to you. But there are ways out- shift to other analytics, and get the keyword data. Good news for Bing maybe?

What do you think of Google's SSL move? Is it a balanced move or there is more into it than looks?

Post from: PageTraffic SEO Blog Now updated thrice a day!

Google Encrypts Signed-in Search Data – No More Referral Data For SEOs!

The Panda 2.5 is moving forward, and on the night of the 13th of October, a minor update was rolled out by Google. The update was confirmed by Google's Matt Cutts in a tweet. The webmaster forums have a raging discussion going on about the same, where site administrators have reported a severe loss of traffic.

The Panda 2.5 has seen a lot of speculations. Last week when the Panda 2.5.1 came in, discussions were rife about it being a roll back. Ever since the Panda 2.5 hit, and the winners and the losers declared themselves, the focus has been on the timing of the update. The festive season is on and these frequent updates have led to massive losses to many webmasters. That is why most have categorized the minor updates as a major one.

Is your site affected? Do share your story with us.

Post from: PageTraffic SEO Blog Now updated thrice a day!

The Panda 2.5 Moves Forward With A Minor Update – Panda 2.5.2!

siFR stands for – scalable Inman Flash Replacement. In a nutshell, the technique behind sIFR is the same as image replacement, however, it relies on JavaScript and Flash to replace XHTML text with Flash text. Put simply, sIFR can be a website designer's dream tool as it allows website headings, pull-quotes and other elements to be styled in whatever font the designer chooses. And that too, without the user having it installed on their machine.

What Makes sIFR better?

To begin with sIFR allows designers to create a style sheet and set the size and other parameters of a headline, in other words, one can design their headlines any which way according to their fancy. Now, as sIFR requires JavaScript to be enabled and the Flash plugin installed in the reading browser. In this case, if you are without either JavaScript or Flash, then the reader's browser will automatically display traditional CSS based styling. Result- the user won't know the difference!

How To Use sIFR?

To begin with, you need to download the .zip file containing the script. With this you will also get a Flash movie template. Double click on the movieclip on the main stage in the Flash template. Now you should be at the actual text box. It is a simple step of changing the font for the text box to the desired font and simply publish the movie. All you have to do then is to upload the resulting .swf file to your site. See For example how the retail site Klutz uses sIFR-

For more examples on using sIFR- see this.

The SEO Benefit:

Now this SEO friendly way that lets you use your custom fonts, without the need to use an image is useful for any website that used Image or Flash as the headings. Now with sIFR, you can finally optimize your H1 tags. Since sIFR replaces short text blocks with Flash of selected typefaces, you are free to use your desired fonts while maintaining the optimization of the H1 tags. Say goodbye to images now! Google crawlers will index the text content-and your headings will play a role in rankings then.

Post from: PageTraffic SEO Blog Now updated thrice a day!

Using sIFR to Optimize h1 Tags!

Google+ is creating gigantic waves, as of now, the gates are not open, but businesses are waiting in line to get their pages on the social network. In waiting are the SEO experts too. Most have already started experimenting with the various features of Google+- tweaking and testing the same to see their effect on search. Google+ is destined to be one of the most important aspects of “social” in SEO, and internet marketers are keeping a close watch on every new feature introduced by Google, and understanding its impact. In fact in the recently concluded SES San Francisco 2011, Google+ and the +1 button were discussed in detail.

Social Is The Key:

Google is the search engine that is primarily the focus of every SEO when they optimize the site. That is why, when Google showed its inclination towards social, the search experts caught up with that. Firstly there were the real-time results from Twitter etc. in the search results. Then Google came up with the +1 button- where the data of sites +1ed by users was collected by Google. This was to help understand the popularity and social value of sites and their content. Then the search engine giant came out with Google+ . The rate at which the Circles and the Stream have become popular, it shows that the network will go a long way.

Social Media is revolutionizing the web and this is what the thought behind every SEO move must be now. SEO's shift to social is discussed more elaborately here.

There Is More To +1 Than Just A 'Like' :

It is quite evident that search results will have social pages too. So, the results will include pages that are related and have been +1ed on Google+. The integration of Live feeds in to search results has a direct impact on rankings and placements. The importance given by Google to social results will make sure that the +1es will change the search results. Just like search is influenced by Facebook "likes" and Twitter "tweets". They are actual proofs of what is being recommended on the web by real users.

Moreover, Google has recommended that sites add the +1 button to their pages. This will let Google know how many times has a write up or product been +1ed. This number will affect the search engine results placements, more the number of +1es, from genuine users, more the chances of a better rank. Also, the +1 button beside the search results also has a close impact on the page's ranking. The bottom line- for getting those +1es create content- offers and products that are unique and relevant. The key is to ensure a positive customer experience- so that the clicks on the +1 come nice and easy, and they will get people to endorse their businesses.

Many experts are seeing the +1 button as having huge impact on search results and altering the ways of doing things on the web.

SEOs all over the world are experimenting with Google+, and other social sites. Most of them have come up with one answer- search results are affected by social take on the keywords. Links shared on Google+ stand a good chance of being indexed faster, and will probably show up in good positions pretty quickly too.

SEO Success Lies In The Center Of The 'Circles'

Google+ has these hight interesting terms on its interface- the “Hangouts”, “Sparks” and most importantly-the “Circles”. These Circles are the ones that have a huge SEO potential.

This is how it will work. If someone +1ed something, then this activity will show up in the news stream of hundreds that have that person in their “Circles”. The idea of social is that people interact with each other and are influenced by what their contacts are saying. So, if someone +1ed something, it is more than likely that others will see what that thing is, and possibly +1 the same too. Remember- it is the case of like minds at one place. Also, users will trust the opinion of someone they know rather than the clinical review of a stranger.

Circles have the potential to be a huge data source, with users' preferences lined up- this can be harnessed for SEO to achieve great results.

The Bottom Line: Google+ seems ready to have a huge potential for SEO. There is a section in the industry that disagrees, citing the examples of Google Wave. But this time the entire search scenario has changed. Social has already made its place, and Google+ and the +1 button are just further additions.

So, if you also found this post interesting, do +1 it!

Post from: PageTraffic SEO Blog Now updated thrice a day!

Google+ Impact on SEO!

Google's Tiffany Oberoi, in an interview with Eric Enge of Stone Temple, sheds light on the all important, Google's reconsideration requests.

Many websites have fallen victims to Google's emphasis on quality. In their attempt to get their websites back on track, webmasters end up sending endless reconsideration requests. This interview set's out to clarify the reconsideration request process.

Matt Cutts from Google, was spotted Tweeting the following:

To me, the highlight of this SEOs must read interview, especially for those who have already submitted or are in the process of submitting a reconsideration request is, when Tiffany was asked “ What would you recommend the structure of a reconsideration request look like? In other words, what major issues should it address? Are there things to avoid?”

To which she replied, “ Here are a few tips:

1. Be specific. Carefully review Google’s webmaster guidelines and tell us what issues you found on your site and how you fixed them.

2. Avoid hiding information. This is the time to address the issues head on. For example, a reconsideration request that says, “My sites adheres to the guidelines.” is not as useful as one that says, “I had some hidden text at the bottom of my homepage, but I have removed it now.” The second example makes it clear what the initial problem was and what has changed. The more detail you can provide, the better. It helps us assess the situation more fully.

3. We want to be assured that we aren’t going to see these spammy techniques again. It’s helpful if you can include details about steps you’ve taken to prevent it from happening again, policy changes, etc. The people who review these requests want to be confident that the spam techniques have been removed and are not likely to return.

4. Don’t mention how much you spend on ads. The team that handles reconsideration requests only cares about search quality. It’s irrelevant and doesn’t help your case to mention buying ads or being a partner or customer of other products.

We get a lot of reconsideration requests from webmasters that are not even affected by a spam issue, so my other advice is to explore other possible issues as well. For example, check Webmaster Tools for crawl errors. Make sure your robots.txt isn’t blocking Googlebot from accessing your site. Here’s an article with a detailed discussion of other possible ranking problems. ”

Post from: PageTraffic SEO Blog Now updated thrice a day!

Tips For Google's Reconsideration Request!

Social Media is no longer for just social purposes. Search engines are taking the social explosion very seriously, and more and more social results are now included in search results. This changing pattern of search has caused a major shift in the basic orientation of SEOs. Now SEOs have turned or are turning really fast to social media too.

Search parameters have changed drastically. Now the organic results incorporate a whole lot of social media links too. And if you look closely, results from the social networking sites are usually on top, or in the top 10. Why is that? This is because, search engines give quite an importance to social websites. The engines trust the world of the “social web”, because the content and information generated here is interconnected with real people and real relationships. Every information shared, Liked or Tweeted has a definitive human touch to it that is what makes these results so much dearer to search engines. How social media helps you:

Social Media Gets You A Higher Rank- Search Engines view the social networking sites as generators of genuine content and information that real people share. That is why, if your brand is mentioned here, then they consider it worthy enough. So, if your brand/keywords related content is Tweeted enough or shared on Facebook, it will get a higher rank on search results.

Brand Domination- If you spread your brand on leading social sites, like Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, MySpace etc., then you will dominate the search results. The results from these sites are featured on the first page usually, that is why, you will come out as a dominant brand in the search results. You can imagine the impact that it will have on your users, when they will search for your brand on a search engine, and will come across your pages on various sites, and with real people talking about you. The presence of other users will constantly attract more and more users. Your base will spread, so will your brand domination on the Internet.

Deep Social Crawl By Search Engines- Search Engines crawl the social networking sites pretty often. So if you keep updating your profile there, or make sure that people talk about you or 'Tweet' your blog or 'Share' you on Facebook, the engines will consider it as fresh and genuine content. This way your keyword/ brand name will always show up with fresh results. Social platforms are always alive. People are constantly thronging them. New comments, responses are generated quite frequently and that is why, engines find something new every time they crawl.

The Key Is To Be Active On Relevant Social Networks- Be it Facebook, Twitter or the latest Google+ (they are still not open to businesses though), you have to make sure you find the right niche. Since these websites have a huge user base (facebook- 750 million and Twitter -200 million Google+ 20 million and counting), you will take some time to work your way to your target audience. You must spread your circle and gain the trust of the people there. The best part here is that these people are most related to your work. They interact with you as they share your interest that is why they will take genuine interest in what you have to say. This way, your content will be shared among the right audience and the traffic that you will get will be highly relevant and most likely to lead to conversions.

To Conclude-Raise Your Social Graph- Use social media to reach the target audience, and this will let your content gets read and shared. Search engines will notice, they will be able to judge the trust generated by your domain as opposed to others. You will rise up in the social graph, and so will your rankings.

Social Media is here to stay and is the biggest thing on the World Wide Web right now. With Google+ coming in, the search giant is also going social in a big way. That is why the need for SEOs to shift to social media is now imperative, to get better rankings that lead to conversions too.

Post from: PageTraffic SEO Blog Now updated thrice a day!

How to Leverage Social Media for SEO!

E-commerce websites thrive on quality product descriptions. In fact here is the statistic, that will interest you a lot:- e-commerce conversion rates have seen an increase of 30% more (sometimes 100%) when the content description quality has been bettered. So, not only is the traffic leading to sales, the amount of traffic coming in every day also steadily increasing. All because, a unique copy is written for each product. It is highly inadvisable to rely on images to sell products, or use the manufacturer's product description or even use inadequate copy.  So, here is how unique product description helps:

1. Duplicate Content Is Like Cancer For Your Site: It is really important for your e-commerce website to have content that is not duplicate. Search engines do not like duplicate content. They  are making huge efforts to ensure that only 'quality content' reaches their search engine results. Google brings the Panda update, which is an algorithm update, that decides how Google ranks the websites. The entire effort is put by the search engine giant to ensure that search results are high quality and more and more relevant. The Panda 2.3 has just been launched as well so it forms one of the roughly 500 changes Google makes to its ranking algorithms each year. As Google has been quoted, "We’re evaluating multiple changes that should help drive spam levels even lower, including one change that primarily affects sites that copy others’ content and sites with low levels of original content. We’ll continue to explore ways to reduce spam, including new ways for users to give more explicit feedback about spammy and low-quality sites. As “pure webspam” has decreased over time, attention has shifted instead to “content farms,” which are sites with shallow or low-quality content." This means, the Panda will thrash you for poor quality content. So, if your product pages are lacking quality information, your site will most likely lose out on good rankings. What's even worse, search engines may even penalize you for duplicate content. Make sure that the hundreds of pages on your site, with thousands of product descriptions, do not carry duplicate content. This is a challenging task, as other websites too carry the same products, so to be different from all is tough. But you have to work on it, as there is no other way around it. 

2. More Visibility In Organic Search:  So, you need to work on product descriptions, and you will realise that customizing your product descriptions is all that’s needed to help your product pages show up in organic searches. But it is important to make sure that your keywords for every page-product-product category is kept in prominence while writing the description. The manufacturer's product description too has some important keywords for each product -so you must remember to retain those keywords used in the original content too, while ensuring that the other possible keywords are also mentioned in the new copy.

This has two advantages-

Firstly, your product pages will most probably rank above those of other retailers for the same keywords in the product descriptions.                         

Secondly, your product pages will show up for a larger set of search terms also.

Also, the architecture of your product pages must support indexing of the content in product descriptions. This will help in better search engine rankings.

3. More Conversions With Unique Content: As an e-commerce website owner, you have laid down thousands of products before users, and expect them to buy. But why will they do that unless you give them something unique. Only then, will they actually click on the 'Buy' button.

So, do not fall in the trap of just putting up manufacturer's descriptions, as the users will find it on 50 other sites. It is a known fact that manufacturer-supplied product descriptions are often bland. What will make you different? The answer is being more informative and different from them all.  People prefer to know more and more about the product before they buy it. As during online shopping, you cannot feel and see the product physically, that is why words are really important in helping users make a purchase decision. In fact, studies have shown that consumers are reluctant to buy from sites that don’t include enough information to answer all their questions. So, you have to make sure that your well-written product descriptions must be vast and include every information that a user might want in regards to the product. This way, if you have a product, that is featured by any other site, you will stand apart with your information on the product. People will quench their thirst for more and more information on the product, and this will give them the satisfaction that they are buying from a valid outlet. They will not hesitate in making the purchase, as your vast content has done the job of a fast talking salesman. That is why, those who will land on your pages, will mostly lead to conversions.

4. More Credibility With Unique Content:  You are not like others- you do not have the manufacturer's product descriptions-you tell much more than just the colour of the product. This will establish you as a trusted source of information. Your credibility will increase among the users as a reliable source of information about the product. Consumers are more likely to trust a web site that has invested in well-written, thorough product information. You will create a niche for your site in the online retail market with your well researched product descriptions. You will become an authority of sorts. Users will set you apart as a place that gives them much more than just the price information on the product.

5. More Prominent Self-Branding Unique Content: Your e-commerce site will become a brand in itself. Your site will have unique product descriptions on all the pages, through out the website. This will give your site its own tone that will let you build your own store brand. Your site will provide a consistent-persuasive and at the same time a reliable and seamless voice. This will allow you to connect with the customer like never before. This bond that you will form, will create and support greater shopper loyalty.

To Conclude: The task is tremendous, for an e-commerce website, to write unique content and product descriptions for millions of products in the hundreds and thousands of site pages. But you have to take it up, as the payoff will include- greater search engine visibility, better conversions and higher brand equity.

Be unique- it pays.

Post from: PageTraffic SEO Blog Now updated thrice a day!

SEO Tips- Why E-commerce Websites Need Unique Product Descriptions!

You are doing everything by the book, but still there is always chance of an error. So just pause. Think for a while. You might be making some mistakes, that can prove to be death traps for your site. Listed below are the Top 5 SEO Mistakes, that many commit unknowingly.

1. Not Doing The Proper Keyword Research- You may be targeting the wrong keyword. You may have picked up on a keyword that may not be what the average user will pick up. You SEO campaign can shoot up or go completely for a toss, depending on the choice of your keywords. Tip: use the Google AdWords Keyword Tool – to help you find keywords best suited for your site.

2. Lack of keywords in the URL or the content – You have done your research and know what your targeted keywords are. But, the entire effort is gone waste if your URLs are not search engine friendly and the targeted pages/urls don't have keyword rich content. Getting your keyword on your URL (the domain itself, or the file names that may be part of the URL) will rank you better with Bing, and often also with Google.  As for the content, make sure you put the keywords keeping users in mind and not the search engines alone. It is also advisable to highlighting them or making them bold.

3. Empty Title tag – The title of the page is one of the most important place to use your keyword. Having a keyword rich title tag helps you in getting better rankings. It is understood that with your keyword in your title, the search engines will show the same in the page title in SERPS

4. No use of header tags -Header tags : <h1>, <h2> — are of primary importance. Why? Because they highlights what are your web page is all about. Remember that Search engines always scan the header tags for important keywords, so always use them to highlight the main points of your text. You may also use your chosen keywords in header tags.  

5. Ignoring Social Networking – This is one of the most common mistake. Social networking platforms like Facebook, Twitter and Myspace are huge traffic sources. Sharing your posts on these sites, will drive huge traffic to your sites. Focus on Social Media too, while optimising your site. Check out recent presentation by Navneet on Slideshare.

Stay away from too many backlinks as well, as too many of them may lead to your site being penalised or worse, banned. Remember, the real task is not getting heavy traffic only. Its the conversions. You need to focus on the kind of traffic you are getting too. Question yourself- Is this the kind of traffic I want on my site?

Keep these pointers in mind, the next time you set to work on optimising your site, and see the better results with time.

Post from: PageTraffic SEO Blog Now updated thrice a day!

Top 5 SEO Mistakes To Avoid!