Is content relevant any more? 4

[1DMF]

Hi,

We have been approached by a company who claim they can get us on page one for ALL our keywords. They took me to google, got me to type 'house insurance' and position 6 'trdirect' is their handy work.

Well when I look at the page I see the keyword 'house insurance' twice on the page and once in the title tag. That is not enough to give anyone a genric listing of 6 concidering the high competition this market commands.

So when I asked how they did it they talked about 'the article we wrote for them'.

So is this right.

You write an article 'keyword stuffed' with a link to your website, and google instead of indexing the article, boosts the page linked to in the article?, why would it do that and not index the article?

is that what this blog thing is all about, and if so, does that mean content counts for nothing anymore, I could have a couple of words on my page where it mentions 'batteries' out of contenxt to my site , services and products, then write tonnes of articles regarding batteries and i'd be no.1 in google for the keyword 'batteries' when we don't do batteries?

how on earth does writing some keyword stuffed rubbish linking to my site make my site be no.1 in google, and if it can , then google's algo's need an overhaul.

crickey, if this is how it works, you could have a million BAD reviews, slaging off your company, website , service, products etc.. and that actually makes you no.1 in google because of all the keyword rich articles linking to your site, how stupid would that be.

That really is 'celebrity world' gotta be in the news, even if it's bad press, as long as people still hear of me, 'any news is good news' syndrome.

Man that sucks, please tell me it's not true and they are using black cat methods to boost SERP position.

Oh and if it is how it works, what questions do I need to ask to ensure they are reputable and we don't get banned by a dodgy SEO company, what info do I need to know before concidering using them and do I even need to use a company for this, if it's genuine, surely your better getting an expert to write aticles than someone like me who wouldn't know where to start, PR Press Release is not my forte!

"In complete darkness we are all the same, only our knowledge and wisdom separates us, don't let your eyes deceive you."

"If a shortcut was meant to be easy, it wouldn't be a shortcut, it would be the way!

 

[Grenage]

I would never make such an implication

Carlsberg don't run I.T. departments, but if they did they'd probably be more fun.

 

[ChrisHunt]

No chris, you miss the point

Maybe (I only had what you said to go on), but you missed my third paragraph:

Once you've followed that link, it seems to permanently break the irritating "automatically bounce me into google.co.uk" behaviour, even when you type google.com in the address line (at least, that doesn't happen to me now and I'm sure it used to)

As far as providing a globally neutral search engine is concerned, I'm not sure Google claims to be one, or whether it would want to be one.

So, you search for "home insurance" and get a selection of insurance companies back some of which, if you're lucky, might do business in the country you're in. How is that an improved customer experience?

It's hard to come up with keywords that have no conceivable commercial element to them. If somebody's selling something related to that keyword, chances are they're selling it in a particular country for a particular currency. If they're doing that, it makes sense to downgrade them in other countries' search results.

There's also the matter that I alluded to before about the same words having multiple meanings, and different emphases depending on where you are. If I say "I'm looking for a website about Wellington", you're going to make different assumptions about what I want as a Briton than you would if we were in New Zealand. Sure, you could have a "neutral" interpretation and force me to spell out what I'm looking for more explicitly - "Wellington School", "Duke of Wellington", "city of Wellington", etc... but what would be the benefit of that? Isn't it better that I can type in a single word and Google magically guesses what I'm looking for.

It's an interesting game to take two (or more) flavours of Google, type the same search into all of them, and see how they differ. Often 8 or 9 of the top ten are the same sites, but in a different order. I've not yet found identical SERPs between .co.uk and .com, nor have I found a case where they should be identical - there's always been a reason why a particular change makes sense on a particular side of the pond.

-- Chris Hunt
Webmaster & Tragedian
Extra Connections Ltd

 

[1DMF]

you have some good points there chris, however if I was looking for the duke of wellington, I would put that in not just wellington.

It's a bit like many towns in USA have adopted UK town names, coming from the days of the homesteaders, but if I was looking for Brighton USA , i would make that clear in my search string.

my example I can give for what i'm looking for that is global is music.

if I want to find sites that specialise in EDM for example it makes no odds what country i am in nor the country which the site originates that has EDM for download.

I can see where SE intuition can be helpful, but also where it can be a hinderence.

thanks for the heads up on google.com being rememberd once clicked on, but this is still only stored (i assume via cookies) and seings as I clear my temp internet files / cache etc. on a daily basis, along with having a server domain policy to do it automaticaly when IE closes, it's not much help as it reverts back again once cache is cleared.

lol - like they say "You can't please all the people all the time" ;-)







"In complete darkness we are all the same, only our knowledge and wisdom separates us, don't let your eyes deceive you."

"If a shortcut was meant to be easy, it wouldn't be a shortcut, it would be the way!

 

[kaht]

Funny you pick Brighton USA, I live about 13 miles northwest of Brighton

http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&hl=...0.195351&spn=0.172504,0.32135&z=12&iwloc=addr

-kaht

Lisa, if you don't like your job you don't strike. You just go in every day and do it really half-assed. That's the American way. - Homer Simpson

http://www.silkypups.com

 

[ChrisHunt]

if I was looking for Brighton USA , i would make that clear in my search string

That's because you live in the UK. If you search for "Brighton", chances are it's the Sussex resort that you're interested in.

But if you lived where kaht does, the chances are you'd want the Illinois one. How does it help him to have to specify "I want the Brighton near here, not the one thousands of miles away"? (Actually, he'd be out of luck - the first 9 hits on .com are for Brighton UK, and #10 is for one in Canada!)


-- Chris Hunt
Webmaster & Tragedian
Extra Connections Ltd

 

[1DMF]

lol - there you go so even going to google.com doesn't help anyhow, so how is that helping or being intuitive?

nice on kaht, I live 13 miles from Brighton UK , talk about small world, 13 miles between us, plus 5000 miles and a completely different continent.

Man that's so funny, my sides hurt!




"In complete darkness we are all the same, only our knowledge and wisdom separates us, don't let your eyes deceive you."

"If a shortcut was meant to be easy, it wouldn't be a shortcut, it would be the way!

 

[BabyJeffy]

... Sussex resort...

Chris... that's just so wrong

Cheers,
Jeff


[tt]Jeff's Page [!]@[/!] Code Couch

http://www.codecouch.com/jeff/blog/

http://www.coedit.co.uk/

[/tt]

Make sure your web page and css validates properly against the doctype you have chosen - before you attempt to debug a problem!

FAQ216-6094

 

[ChrisHirst]

I CANNOT GO TO GOOGLE.COM BY CHOICE!

Google Toolbar -> Options -> Search Box Setting -> Use Google site:

Chris.

Indifference will be the downfall of mankind, but who cares?
Woo Hoo! the cobblers kids get new shoes.
People Counting Systems

So long, and thanks for all the fish.

 

[1DMF]

google toolbar, you're kidding right, I don't use toolbars.

taking up real estate on my screen, damn things try to be forced on you when you install adobe reader , flash or other such stuff.

scurge of the free downloads - and on top of all that it is not allowed on company machines as it breaches the user licence "Not for commercial use" and therefore breaches FSA regulations. come on Chris you should know that right?

Jeff, what's wrong with Sussex resort?



"In complete darkness we are all the same, only our knowledge and wisdom separates us, don't let your eyes deceive you."

"If a shortcut was meant to be easy, it wouldn't be a shortcut, it would be the way!

 

[kaht]

google toolbar, you're kidding right, [!]I don't use toolbars.[/!]

You're missing out - the I use the web developer toolbar for firefox on a daily basis

-kaht

Lisa, if you don't like your job you don't strike. You just go in every day and do it really half-assed. That's the American way. - Homer Simpson

http://www.silkypups.com

 

[1DMF]

I'm not allow to use toolbars if they are not for commercial use, period.

does the EULA say not for commercial use or personal use only, also I don't use FF as mt browser of choice.

any commercial toolbars for IE available.

"In complete darkness we are all the same, only our knowledge and wisdom separates us, don't let your eyes deceive you."

"If a shortcut was meant to be easy, it wouldn't be a shortcut, it would be the way!

 

[kaht]

There's an IE web developer toolbar as well, but I don't think it's as good as the firefox one. However, if IE7 is what you usually use to develop pages it may be helpful for you:

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/...64-672D-4511-BB3E-2D5E1DB91038&displaylang=en

-kaht

Lisa, if you don't like your job you don't strike. You just go in every day and do it really half-assed. That's the American way. - Homer Simpson

http://www.silkypups.com