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Old search engine tricks

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JRundle

Technical User
Dec 29, 2004
15
US
I know that the META isnt what it used to be, but what about the old trick about loading the bottom of the page with keywords and making the text the bg color of the page? Does that still work or has engines grown past that too?
 
That can get your domain banned from the search engines now. There's a TT forum for search engine optimization questions here:

forum828

Lee
 
jrundle,

Search engines vary widely on which data they present as a summary and how they use keywords.

White on white would probably work because I doubt that search engines would be smart enough to look into external css. However, having said that Google, for example, doesn't seem to examine your preamble for keywords. Your best chance, other than the site name itself is what is in the title bar. It is a complete waste to say "home page".

These things change and it is unwise to listen to anecdotal (sp ?) advice (including mine). Try it for your self. What I mean by that is, for example, if you want to be recognised well on google try one approach and then even though you may not at first get a top listing you will get a listing and you can look at it and see how they used your info to list your site.

I hate to say this in a thread were my good friend Chris Hunt is posting (and he does mostly give very good advice), but the most consistently useful way of getting your summary listed (which you may not want to have as the first thing on your homepage) is via the noframes tag in a frameset. I do not consider this cheating since in handhelds and other noframe devices, you really need to compensate by giving a summary of what your site is about.

I am gradually configuring all my sites to work on the blackberry as well as in a regular browser. My mainsite already does. Without the noframes summary it would be hard for a blackberry user to decide what your site was about since you do not usually provide info in the frameset page.

Experiment!


Clive
 
p.s. another problem with white on white is that blackberries, ignore css and would therefore see your keywords, which might not make any sense. Keywords anyway are hard to get recognised.

For example, I have a site that in the title says "Nurse CEUs (continuing education units). Most other sites that deal in CEUs, incorrectly use an apostrophe - CEU's (unless you considered that U's was a contraction of units). So anyone who searches for the site using CEUs gets my site first, whereas when they use CEU's I am a lot further down the list.

Hope this is useful info.

Clive
 
...the most consistently useful way of getting your summary listed (which you may not want to have as the first thing on your homepage) is via the noframes tag in a frameset. I do not consider this cheating since in handhelds and other noframe devices, you really need to compensate by giving a summary of what your site is about.

It may get results, but it is inherently wrong to use the noframe tag simply to boost rankings. If the tag is used correctly and presents sensible content to a useragent (s CliveC is doing) then there is no real problem I guess. But be warned, simply using it to stuff keywords into will probably, in future updates to SE algo's be penalised in some way.

There is no trick. Just use tags as they were intended to be used.

I'm a firm believer in doing it right from the start and looking towards longterm results rather than a quick fix that is going to mean having to fix it again later.

Incidentally, the Search Engine Optimisation Discussion Forum is here Forum828

Foamcow Heavy Industries - Web design and ranting
Toccoa Games - Day of Defeat gaming community
Target Marketing Communications - Advertising, Direct Marketing and Public Relations
"I'm making time
 
Foamcow,

I was not suggesting that he should use this in a dishonest way. It is just that I think that instead of people worrying about old browsers, they should be thinking of getting their sites ready for new browsers.

In the US the Blackberry is very widely used and many people want their regular sites to be compatible.

Clive
 
While it is important to make websites accessible to a wide range of user agents in many cases it is simply not a viable option to cover all possible devices. It's really a case of catering for target markets. If the user base for any given site includes a demographic where a proportion of users will be accessing the site with mobile phones, PDAs, Web TV etc then obviously make provisions for these. However, for the vast majority of sites it will be a needless expense to the client. Obviously if you are your own client for the site then the choice is up to you to decide if the investment in time is worth it.
I can say that in all the sites I have looked after and currently look after I have only seen a WebTV UA once, a mobile phone UA once (this turned out to be the site owner) and never once seen any of the PDA UAs. So personally I have decided that catering for these devices (currently) is pretty much a futile exercise and provided that the site is accessible and readable by a text only browser then this will have to suffice for now.

Chris.

Indifference will be the downfall of mankind, but who cares?
Woo Hoo! the cobblers kids get new shoes.
Nightclub counting systems

So long, and thanks for all the fish.
 
CliveC


If the tag is used correctly and presents sensible content to a useragent (as CliveC is doing) then there is no real problem

I didn't mean to say you were suggesting he should deceive the SE's. However, the only valid use of a <noframes> tag is if the main site was using frames.
If he isn't using a frameset then there is no justification for a <noframes> tag with any type of content - "honest" or otherwise.

Foamcow Heavy Industries - Web design and ranting
Toccoa Games - Day of Defeat gaming community
Target Marketing Communications - Advertising, Direct Marketing and Public Relations
"I'm making time
 
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