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Notes Taken At The Search Engine Strategies Conference
- From 
File Structure -
Entry Pages -
Site Map -
404 Error Pages -
Problem Strategies -
Your Audience -
Visible Text -
CSS -
SSI -
More Problems -
Popularity
Participants of the Successful Site Architecture session were in for an exceptional treat in Dallas recently when industry leaders Barbara Coll and Shari Thurow discussed strategies for creating search engine friendly Web sites.
Barbara Coll, CEO of WebMama, opened by discussing the importance of considering search engine optimization in all areas of your project development. "If you'll start thinking `SEO tactics' when you're designing your site, you'll have better results," she said.
Highlights of her discussion follows.
File Structure
According to Coll, site architecture can definitely impact your results in the search engines. For example, regarding file structure, most search engines don't know about anything beyond two directory levels. They'll index 40-50 files in those directories and do it alphabetically.
So, it's crucial for you to place your most important pages at the first or second directory level, breaking it up into 50 files per directory. Be sure to name your files and directories with your keywords. Don't use the underscore to separate keywords. Instead, use hyphens.
Don't stuff too many keywords in your file or directory names. Make them keyword rich but not too long.
Entry Pages
Coll calls any pages that bring you traffic "entry pages," and she recommends optimizing and submitting each of those pages. Make them stand-alone pages, just like your home page. When a visitor lands on one of your entry pages, will the visitor know where they are, who you are, and what the page is about? Include full navigation on all entry pages and make it obvious what the page and site is about. Don't assume visitors will find the index page first.
If your visitors come through your "contact us" page, for example, and all they see is a form, that doesn't tell them where they are or what the page/site is about.
Coll also recommends naming images after keywords, which is particularly important now that AltaVista and Google have image searches. Name your PDF's after your keywords as well.
Site Map
A very important entry page on your site is your site map. "Site maps have food that search engines love, and they have links to every single page that your visitors care about," explained Coll.
Therefore, make sure you submit your index page and your site map. Put your site map at the root level, and name it after your keywords. Use standard navigation on the site map. Add a blurb about the company or services at the top of the page or left column before the links. Use keywords in your links as well. Keep your site map simple, using no or few graphics.
Custom 404 Error Page
Coll also discussed the importance of a custom 404 error page, which she calls "error trapping." Through your custom 404 error page, make it easy for the users to find where they want to go. Use HTML links and include a search box. META data on your pages is important for onsite search engines, so be sure to include it on every page.
For information on how to create custom 404 pages for every type of server, visit the 404 Research Lab (http://www.plinko.net/404/). The site also features many examples of custom 404 pages.
Problem Strategies
"Skip intro" pages are the worst thing you can do to your site, according to Coll. "Skip intro" or "splash" pages generally have no or very little content, often contain a movie, and frequently redirect to another page.
Your introductory page needs to contain content, so get rid of your intro page if it doesn't. Instead, stick Flash in a window on the home page and include it as an element, like an image.
Remember that Web technology that detracts from the content or provides no static content will negatively affect search engine rankings. Sites developed completely in Flash or other interactive technologies, large animated graphics, or movies are deterrents to content seekers and detrimental to search engine rankings.
Spiders don't see image maps and don't follow those links. They can't read graphics. Anything in an image is useless.
Coll also recommends not using frames. If you do use frames, she recommends making sure that you include META and title tags on all frames and frameset pages. Don't allow a frame to be shown without redirecting to the frameset first. Use a < noframes > tag and add keyword-rich content.
*For a more in depth look at search engine marketing strategies by Barbara Coll, visit her Web site and order "Tactics for Optimal Search Engine Positioning." http://www.webmama.com/seo-white-paper-webmama.htm
Shari Thurow, Webmaster and Marketing Director of GrantasticDesigns.com, opened her portion of the session by outlining the essential components of search engine optimization: text, links, and popularity.
She also discussed her definition of site architecture:
A site's navigation scheme (referring to image maps, text links, and dynamic content);
Layout of individual pages;
How directories are set up on your Web server.
In order for you to sell your products and services, your target audience needs to find what they are looking for as quickly as possible.
Remember your Target Audiences
According to Thurow, each Web site has two target audiences. The primary audience is the end user. The secondary audience consists of the directory editors and search engine spiders. Your goal in search engine optimization is to receive regular traffic over time from both the search engines and the directories.
Search engines do three things: index text, follow links, and measure popularity. End users have an effect on search engine ranking.
Visible Text
"Your target audience should not have to perform any type of action in order to view the most important text on a Web page," said Thurow. "Highlight the text on your page and copy it in Notepad, which is exactly what a search engine sees."
Thurow reminded participants that META tags aren't visible tags. ALT text is not visible, so it's not as important to the search engines as visible text. However, be sure to include your keyword phrase in your ALT text.
You can use ALT text in logos, image maps, navigation elements, Flash movies, photos, etc. "Always put width and height on image maps so the browser knows the size of the graphic. Download time is so important," said Thurow.
She also cautioned against the use of clear gifs. "Putting keywords as ALT text in a clear gif is considered spamming by the engines," she added.
Cascading Style Sheets
Thurow defined Cascading Style Sheets as an HTML addition that allows Webmasters to control Web page design parameters, such as margins, font/typeface appearance, link appearance, colors, and placement.
CSS massively decreases download time and saves a lot of time. But style sheets themselves don't matter to the search engines.
Be sure to use a robots exclusion file on sections of your site that the search engines have no interest, such as your style sheets, CGI-BIN, and any pages under construction to keep them from getting indexed. All search engines support this protocol.
Server-Side Includes
As defined by Thurow, server side includes are a type of HTML comment that instructs your Web server to dynamically generate elements of a Web page before it sends the Web page to a browser or a search engine spider. SSI's can be used to put text elements on a page, such as text links, headers, footers, and content. As long as what is in the SSI file is search engine friendly, you won't have a problem.
Problem Strategies
Common uses of JavaScript include mouseover/rollovers, drop down menus, pop-up menus, and sliding menus. JavaScript is not search engine friendly and not important to the engines, so move it to a separate .js file.
Frames must be navigational within the frames. Include an option to use the site with or without frames. And, use JavaScript to keep frames intact.
Except Google, none of the engines can follow links in Flash sites. If you use Flash, include an option to view the site with or without the Flash. Rather than making the main page of your site in Flash, place a section of your site in Flash. Use only Flash movies, not Flash pages. Place the site in a frameset and use JavaScript to keep the frames intact.
Splash pages often contain no text, a one-way link, and a redirect. Because the main page might be the only page indexed and often ranks higher than other pages, and because content is so important to the search engines, stay away from splash pages.
Popularity
Thurow stated that link popularity is measured by the number of links, the quality of links, the number of times end users click on links to your site, how long end users visit your site, and how often end users return to your site.
Orphaned pages can't get good popularity because very few links point to them. Also, orphaned pages have low click throughs, because they're typically advertising pages with no real content. Typical orphaned pages include pop-up windows, landing pages for banner ads, and landing pages for pay-per-click advertising.
In Conclusion . . .
Thurow closed with the following reminder. "Make sure your pages have visible text. Give the spiders a suitable link architecture to help them find visible text. Use external files whenever possible. Use the Robots Exclusion Protocol to exclude information that is not important to the search engines. And, keep the most important pages in the top-level directory on your server."
5 Tips for Better Search Engine Rankings
- From 
Are you getting the results you need from your website? Fact: traffic and search engine results are the key to website success. Everyone agrees that you don't just need traffic for website success, right? You need "targeted" traffic. The old chestnut of quality over quantity is far truer here more than anywhere else.
How do I improve my results on Google? In the past, Google worked by evaluating your site's meta tags - (those ubiquitous "keywords") - and the relevance of your keywords and description to the actual content inside your site. It still does this to an extent, but things have modified. Since tricksters started to bend the keyword and content rules, Google wisely changed the rules.
Indeed, new schemes and dirty tricks may fool Google's spiders for a short while, yet the clever and jolly-fair people at Google eventually put a stop to any success these scams might have, and worse, they may actually ban your site for using them. It is far, far better to stay legal and do things properly from the start.
TOP 5 TIPS for success:
5. Be Spider Friendly: don't use too much flash or other add-ons, irrelevant keywords, fast meta refresh, same coloured text as background, or duplicated pages with different domain names. Also, don't use frames - spiders don't like them.
4. Write optimised content which relates to the keywords you are targeting. You should aim for your content to repeat the keywords at a ration of around 7%. You should have at least around 300 words too. Start with your index page, and remember the more pages within your site you "optimise" in this way, the better. Don't forget that you should add this type of rich content focusing on any other keywords you want to be ranked with too. Don't overuse keywords or repeat them too much as it will be viewed that you are trying to trick the spiders and you could get banned. It can be tricky to get the content right - it can't hurt to use an expert if you're not confident that you'll get it right.
3. Remember that website design and Search Engine optimisation are two different fields - make sure your web designers know what they are doing. Beauty and the high prices you'll pay for it won't get you ranked.
2. Be aware of using: doorway pages, gateway pages, information pages, lead-in pages - all terms for filling a page your rich content and hyperlinks to your page. Such pages are both good and bad, and you need to use them carefully. You must host them elsewhere, not within your own domain, or else you could be rumbled and black- marked. Make hyperlinks effective - ideally by including your keywords within the link. This can really improve your results. Whatever you do - do NOT join dodgy schemes that post your hyperlink on "hundreds" of sites. Such link farming sites could lead you to disappear from Google's pages altogether.
1. Leg Work. Google fuels it's results on the number of hyperlinks that point to your website from other sites - the higher the page rank on these sites, the better. (You'll need to install the Google Toolbar to check a site's page rank.) You can check backward links to find out how many pages currently list your website - you can also check you competitor's backward links, and hopefully these sites will also list your site (but don't count on it, and you may have to pay to advertise). You need hundreds of these links to secure a top position on Google these days. (Likewise, if you can include your chosen keyword phrase in your hyperlinks on other sites then you'll see better results).
It's time-consuming and can seem like an uphill battle. (Luckily, though, you can outsource this work to specialist companies, the price varies immensely, but as competition rises, you should see the price dropping.) And this is mostly just for Google! If you want to tap the potential of other Search Engines (after all, why not capture the remainder of the market while you're at it) then you'll need to work on other techniques to make sure that your website secures at least a first page result.
Finally, if you have been skilled enough to get yourself a first page Google result - don't just sit back thinking all the work is done - it isn't! Search Engines constantly update and modify their ranking criteria. What was successful today may not be successful tomorrow. You need to keep up to date - after all around 150,000 new domains are registered each and every month - you don't want new sites to push you down in the ranking!
How
Searches Itself! - From 
Google has become one of the hottest companies in Silicon Valley by helping millions of Internet users search the Web smarter and faster. But how does this wildly popular search engine find the new ideas that will keep its business moving forward? By ''googling'' itself.
Most Fridays at Google, the search-engine company in Mountain View, California, Marissa Mayer and about 50 engineers and other employees sit down to do a search of their own. Mayer, an intense, fast-talking product manager, scribbles rapidly as the engineers race to explain and defend the new ideas that they've posted to an internal Web site. By the end of the hour-long meeting, six, seven, or sometimes even eight new ideas are fleshed out enough to take to the next level of development. Some of those ideas might become new features on Google, new code or search algorithms, or a new way to juice up the Google home page. "We really jam in there," Mayer says.
And jam they must. Google has taken its place as the leader of Internet search engines, answering 40% of the estimated 375 million queries thrown out on the Net each day. But newcomers ( such as Teoma and WiseNut ) are looking to unseat Google by promising solutions that are better and faster.
... ... ... ... To read the rest of the article ... go here!
How
Grows...and Grows...and Grows from
Its performance is the envy of executives and engineers around
the world ... For techno-evangelists, Google is a marvel of
Web brilliance ... For Wall Street, it may be the IPO that
changes everything ( again ) ... But Google is also a case
study in savvy management -- a company filled with cutting-edge
ideas, rigorous accountability, and relentless attention to
detail ... Here's a search for the growth secrets of one of
the world's most exciting young companies -- a company from
which every company can learn.
Rule Number One: The User Is in Charge ...
Rule Number Two: The World Is Your R&D Lab ...
Rule Number Three: Failures Are Good. Good Failures Are
Better. ...
Rule Number Four: Great People Can Manage Themselves ...
Rule Number Five: If Users Come, So Will the Money ...
Sidebar: Just how big is Google? ...
Sidebar: A Gaggle of Google Games ... GoogleWhack ... GoogleBomb
... GoogleShare ... Googlism ... Google Smackdown
Sidebar: How does Google keep innovating?
... ... ... ... To read the rest of the article
... go
here!
March
Search Engine News From
www.searchengine-news.com
Google - Google Buys Blogger Pyra - Google announced on 2/17/2003 the purchase of software company Pyra Labs. Pyra makes the popular Blogger software that people use for posting personal content to their own blog (aka, weblog) sites.
Overture - Overture rushes out on a buying frenzy - Thanks to Overture's recent buying frenzy we've seen more market activity in February than all of last year. First, Overture started with the buyout of AltaVista which was announced on 2/18/2003. According to their press release, the acquisition of AltaVista will enable Overture to offer a significantly enhanced Web search solution to portals.
Then, hardly taking a second breath, Overture purchased the Web Search Unit of Fast Search and Transfer announced on 02/25/2003. It appears Overture has plans to make use of all three of their search products as evidenced by the following quote: "Through this combination, Overture expects to be at the forefront of the industry in offering a full suite of paid placement, paid inclusion and algorithmic Web search products..."
Overture raises minimum bids, changes bid management Overture's minimum bid has been raised from 5˘ to 10˘ a click. Old ads are grandfathered-in, but if you change them the price will go up to the new minimum.
Inktomi - MSN Extends Inktomi Contract - MSN has extended their agreement with Inktomi through December 2005. So far it isn't clear whether or not this is an exclusive arrangement or if Microsoft could substitute another engine during that time frame. It does give a much needed boost to Inktomi and especially to their new "parent" Yahoo who was otherwise facing the possibility of losing MSN as a customer.
HotBot - No recent changes at HotBot.
AltaVista - See Overture above.
Fast - See Overture news on the acquisition of Fast.
ODP - ODP appears to be experiencing a backlog of submissions. For the possibility of getting faster inclusion into ODP, see this month's SE Bytes article that explains a potential work-around to the backlog problem.
LookSmart - No recent changes.
Yahoo - No significant changes at Yahoo.
Redesigning
the Net to save it from spam! - From 
SAN JOSE, California (AP) -- To stem the unrelenting tidal
wave of unsolicited, unwanted e-mail, people and companies
are going to extraordinary lengths -- at considerable expense.
They mask their e-mail addresses, install filters, create
white lists of approved senders and blacklists of bulk mailers.
An entire software sector has sprung up to try to defeat
the spammers. Yet inboxes are still bursting with unsolicited
offers of prescription-free Viagra, get-rich schemes and
pornography. To halt spam cold, many experts agree, requires
a radical technical solution at the heart of the Internet.
Exploring changes - So an international organization
best known for creating the Internet's plumbing has decided
to explore fundamental changes in its architecture that
would effect a fix. This would ultimately require a global
consensus -- and software updates for everybody. The Anti-Spam
Research Group plans to hold its first physical meeting
in San Francisco Thursday. Members have already been discussing
the problem over e-mail with such gusto that some participants
complain they're getting more messages on anti-spam than
from spammers.
The group was convened last month by the Internet Engineering
Task Force, which in 1982 defined the standard known as
the Simple Mail Transfer Protocol, or SMTP, that processes
all e-mail. "SMTP was developed some 20 years ago for a
totally different type of Internet, one that was very open
and trusting," said Paul Judge, the research group's chairman
and director of research at the e-mail security firm CipherTrust
Inc. "Today, the Internet is not those two things."
Stemming a growing tide - The anti-spam firm Brightmail
Inc. estimates nearly 40 percent of all Internet e-mail
is unwanted, an increase of 8 percent from 2001. Dozens
of companies -- Brightmail, Mirapoint Inc., Postini Inc.
and others -- try to block spam before it reaches users'
inboxes. Products from Microsoft Corp. and Apple Computer
Inc. try to filter out unwanted spam after it has arrived.
And at least 26 states have passed laws attempting to control
spam but there is no federal regulation beyond anti-fraud
rules from the Federal Trade Commission.
Still, many users find themselves exasperated, hitting
the "delete" button time and time again. Suggestions posed
in the research group's mailing list range from replacing
SMTP to adjusting other Internet standards in order to stymie
unsolicited mass-mailings. Some experts advocate changes
that would demand the identity of every mailer or an alternative
mail system altogether that involves trusted, verified senders.
And some have gone as far as to suggest requiring paid postage.
Stopping it at the source - The ideal solution
would stop spam as close to the source as possible to limit
its impact on the network, Judge said. The research group's
work could take years, though Judge is hopeful a consensus
can be reached sooner. Problem is, there isn't even consensus
on exactly what the problem is.
"One person's spam is another person's newsletter," said
Jeff Brainard, marketing manager at the e-mail provider
Mirapoint, a group member. The group must also consider
how any proposed solutions affect other aspects of the e-mail
ecosystem, said David Berlind, executive editor at the tech
news site ZDNET and founder of JamSpam, an ad hoc group
seeking solutions.
Berlind sees JamSpam working with the research group to
identify problems that might emerge from proposed solutions.
For example, in October he tried to send a story to an editor
but it never made it because an Internet service provider
had blacklisted his mail server. Another person had used
that server to send spam.
Never-ending game - Judge promises a structured
conversation about the pros and cons of each approach before
attempting to reach a consensus. After that, any recommendation
would be submitted to standards-setting bodies. But stopping
spam may be a never-ending game. As soon as a fix is identified,
spammers, like hackers, find a weak spot. "Spammers have
an economic incentive to get their message in front of people,"
said Jeff Schneider, chief technology officer at Brightmail.
"That's what the whole game of spam is really about."
4
Pieces To The Search Optimization Puzzle! - From
We might call it "search engine optimization," but really
there are four big pieces to the puzzle, and optimization
is not necessarily the biggest challenge.
1. Search Engine Positioning - What I mean by
this is carefully researching and selecting the keywords
and search terms that you want to target. You want search
terms that deliver "enough" traffic without "too much" competition.
Services like WordTracker will help, but it's best to have
an idea in mind before you start using them.
2. Site Development - Once you've defined your
positioning strategy, map out your website to accommodate
as many pages as you will need. You can't target more than
a couple search terms on each page, although you can mix
in "modifiers" like business, low cost, etc. to increase
the number of actual searches the page will appear on. Ultimately,
your results will improve as you add more optimized content
to your site. This might seem pointless right now, if you
can't get the search engines to crawl your whole site, but
that will change as you build up link popularity.
3. Search Engine Optimization - Once you know
which words you're targeting on the page, you need to optimize
it, right? Your home page right now has little chance of
appearing in the results for searches that include "web
design" because you haven't optimized for that search term.
The good news is that these days, optimizing is the easy
part. Once you've defined your strategy, building optimized
pages is a piece of cake. I have an article on the basics
of optimization
here.
4. Site Promotion (Link Popularity) - Because
search engines look at a site's "link popularity," and Google
has its "PageRank" formula that adds weight to it, you need
to work on getting more sites to link to you. This doesn't
mean hiding links on your clients' sites, although asking
them for a single link isn't a bad idea. Swapping links
with other related sites, getting listed in major directories
like the Open Directory (www.dmoz.org), and making sure
that you're listed in every industry-specific directory
you can find, will all help. You can also use my personal
favorite link building strategy, which is to write articles
and help people learn what I know. As a designer, you certainly
have a lot of knowledge that you could share.
The nice thing about "link building" is that it has its
own rewards - this is really "website promotion 101." If
search engines didn't exist, you would still be able to
promote your site and find customers by building up your
link popularity. Focus your link building on quality sites
that are likely to deliver traffic on their own. Once your
site has a good number of incoming links, you can target
just about any search terms you like, and you'll be able
to compete. Don't stop building links once you've gotten
your site ranked, though. Your competitors aren't sitting
still. Spending even an hour a week on link building will
pay off dramatically - I usually spend at least that, and
often more, if my rankings start slipping.
FIRETRUST
- Anti-Spam Mail Filter! - From 
Do you remember me suggesting a email filtering program last
year called Mailwasher?
Well they have improved the program! It will filter your mail
before you open it up, if you choose so, and will highlight
"potential" viruses. Once you determine it is spam, or from
someone you do not want anymore mail from, select "Bounce"
and it will send a mail message back to the originating address
saying that your "address is invalid". GREAT IDEA!
"Stop spam, viruses, and other unwanted e-mail before
they get to your computer, using this powerful software"
MailWasher Pro is the answer to your time wasting junk
mail problems, as well as letting you preview and delete
your e-mail before it gets to your computer, MailWasher
Pro also lets you bounce e-mail back to the spammers so
it looks as though your address is not valid. Watch how
quickly this gets you off mailing lists!
Apart from being the most effective software to fight
spam, you’ll find that MailWasher Pro is probably the easiest
anti-spam software to use. We took the view that if we can’t
understand how to use a piece of software in under 5 minutes
then it’s probably always going to be hard to use. Why try
and learn a whole lot of new icons and procedures? – you
want a program with a minimal learning curve, is easy to
use and looks attractive.
View your e-mail before it gets to your computer
– now you see what e-mail is waiting for you so you can
deal to it effectively – you can even read the whole message.
Bounce back unwanted e-mail so it looks as if your
e-mail address is not valid. This will make the sender think
your address is no longer active so your name can be removed
from their list. This unique feature is great for privacy
and it couldn’t be simpler!
Blacklist. Any e-mail you bounce back get their
senders details put on the blacklist for easy removal if
they come back. You can even set it to automatically bounce
and delete blacklisted e-mail, or whole domains off the
server. Plus, MailWasher Pro can use external blacklists
such as ORDB, Spam Cop, VISI or you can specify your own.
5
Facts That Will Have You Re-Writing Your Website In A Hurry
- From
Do you know the differences between writing copy for the
web and writing copy for print? Some of the answers will go
against your intuition and against cultural norms. But, these
facts detail how people read on the web.
There's no use in arguing against them. ...Instead we
should embrace them and use this knowledge to our advantage.
Here's what the facts are and how they're going to affect
your website.
1) Where Do Eyes Go First When Your Homepage Comes
Up? - Contrary to what you might think, it isn't towards
the graphics or photos like in print advertising. Instead
your prospects eyes will first go to the copy. Specifically
your headline and sub-heads. Therefore, your first chance
to engage the prospect is through copy. Not graphics. Most
web users look at a web page for only 3-15 seconds before
deciding whether to stay or move on.
2) How Much Of Your Copy Do Users Actually Read?
- The fact is that online users, on average, read 75% of
the length of any given page. This is big news because most
web pages will have the important conclusions, calls to
action, and order information on the bottom 25% of any given
page. That's a big no-no. Because it will never get read.
You have to have your call to action and order information
presented early on your web page to ensure it gets read.
3) Why Do Most Banner Ads Produce Poor Click-Through
Rates? - 1.25 seconds. That's how long an average user
will look at your banner ad. That's just enough time to
perceive one image or 6 words (based on college student's
average reading speed of 350 words/minute).
4) Why Is Reading Online More Frustrating Than Reading
Print? - Turns out that reading from a computer screen
causes a person's reading speed to slow by 25% when compared
to reading print. That means reading long copy can be very
frustrating online. Break up the copy to help users through.
Have a few one line paragraphs.
5) Are Your Web Page Users Not Getting The Whole Picture?
- If you haven't made your web page truly scannable,
prospects to your site may only be getting part of the sales
message. Only 21% of online users read word-by-word. The
other 79% scan a web page headline to headline. Sub-head
to sub-head. Picking up only the larger, bolded or italicized
copy.
So, if online reading is so different from offline reading.
Clearly your web copy has to follow suit. Take home message?
Make sure your website is performing on all cylinders. Have
a professional web writer write your website. It will save
you money in the long run.
336-408-9075
Rich@RichsWebDesign.com
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