The URL structure, along with other on-page SEO elements, should work to help your search engine visibility and rankings. In this post we are only going look at basic URL structure, to analyse the difference between a good URL and a bad one.

Bad URLs

Take a look at the following URL:

http://www.badurl.com/banana.asp?id=1_&category=234_1

Why is the above URL classified as bad? Well, the main issue is all those weird characters at the end.  As we all know, search engines cannot interpret characters for relevancy. That’s why it is advised to use relevant keywords in your URL, as it facilitates both search engine crawlers and human beings when it comes to navigating and understanding your site. Now let’s take a look at a good URL to see what I mean. You see the difference?

http://www.roimedia.co.za/search-engine-optimisation/

The above URL is clean, descriptive and targets specific keywords that are relevant to the page. There are no weird or funny characters. This type of URL is easily crawled and interpreted for relevancy.

Things to keep in mind when creating URLs

• Try to incorporate targeted keywords in your URL where possible
• Use hyphens/dashes as word separators
• Keep URLs short and descriptive – they will be remembered more
• Stick to lowercase letters
• Create static URLs instead of long dynamic URLs

Having a poor URL structure can result in:

• Lack of indexation by search engines
• Ranking of irrelevant keywords
• Inability for users to remember the URL

The points listed above should be kept in mind when creating or optimising URLs. There are a few other factors involved but I am keeping this very simple. If you have any to add, please do so in the comments section at the bottom of this page.

So, based on this, it’s obvious why so many webmasters become nervous, especially since the Panda update a few months ago which affected sites’ rankings based on the quality of their content and various other metrics.
So for now, it’s clear that all SEO agencies and companies alike, as well as online business owners, need to direct their attention and focus towards updating their content more frequently. Not only is this often times difficult, but it requires a lot of resources. If you find yourself to be outranked by queries from fresh and new content which you use to rank for, then you’ll obviously have to think about creating new content more often.

What Google said:

“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.”

Now, if you go ahead and think of that 35 percent figure again, what I’m thinking is that, potentially, Google means to say that around 1/3 of search engine related queries involve or relate to fresh and/or updated content.

Freshness ranking is not new, just apparently improved?! So, this pretty much goes to say that 35 percent of the searches in Google are impacted by this. That is larger than the Panda update which impacted 12 percent of the searches conducted.

What type of searches does it impact? Google said:

• Recent events or hot topics.
• Regularly recurring events.
• Frequent updates.

Well here is my concern and my two cents on this situation:

Has competition and online user activity increased so much that there is not enough room for everyone to compete on only one search engine?
If this is true then that means Google obviously has to find a way to create enough virtual business and information trading space by installing a system whereby being found online and making sales comes down to how active and relevant you are.

This definitely takes the field of SEO so much further and directly creates more work for us SEO’s but, for how long and is this also not going to be responsible for creating a lot of potential spammy results through Google cause, let’s face it, it doesn’t take a genius to update your blog or website and there are numerous plugins that you can install on your blogs that pull in data from various feeds etc.

This situation will inevitably spur on software developers to create even more auto content generating tools to automatically update the content on your site. These days it seems that Google is playing the money game and potentially rigging the system to its advantage. Have a look at the posts below and make up your own minds.

Brand VS Affiliate Spam
Google enters Make Money Online Niche

Other factors that have also created concern are the fact that Google has implemented ads at the bottom of search results, (read more here) which, combined with video & image results on the first page of Google, basically means that we are now competing for the first five of the ten spots available on the first page of Google seeing that most users only click on the results in the top fold of their screen which happens to display only between four or five results unless you scroll down of course. Some of this is old news to some but for the uninformed, this stresses a huge area of concern which has pros and cons for online users from all walks of life.

Resources:

http://searchengineland.com/google-search-algorithm-change-for-freshness-to-impact-35-of-searches-99856

http://www.webpronews.com/google-algorithm-update-focuses-on-freshness-and-recency-2011-11

http://socialmediatoday.com/jamesamartin/384642/google-algorithm-update-freshness-counts-even-more-now

http://econsultancy.com/us/blog/8244-google-s-freshness-update-what-s-the-effect-on-websites

In celebration of Mandela Day and to put our 67 minutes of volunteer work to outstandingly good use, the R.O.I. Media team decided to do what we do best – drive 67 links to an online charity that’s more than deserving of some notice. 

In tribute to the 67 years he devoted to our country’s political struggle, and in honour of our beloved icon’s 93’rd birthday, every single South African was urged to do their part by devoting 67 minutes of time to a voluntary cause. That’s pretty much a lunch hour – if you’ve got a plan and a bunch of keen mavericks to pull it off, like we do… 

We chose The Smile Foundation as our target and spent time creating a campaign to drive more traffic to their site by rocking our online SEO skills. Focussing our link building efforts toward http://www.smilefoundationsa.org/, we created one link for every minute – but the reach goes much farther. By helping this charity to rank higher on Google searches, they’ll get more donations to keep the ball of awesome rolling. That’s a job worth grinning about and with The Smile Foundation being an official charity backed by Nelson Mandela, we couldn’t think of more deserving recipients.

The foundation exists to assist children with facial abnormalities in receiving free surgery in South Africa. By bringing in expert surgical care, a wealth of education and a world of support for children and their families, they are able to bring about meaningful change. Established at the request of Nelson Mandela, who is their Chief Patron, about 11 years ago, the non profit organisation receives patients via hospital referrals, word of mouth, the media, online and their toll-free number. In much the same way, they rely on the same channels of communication to receive donations, which is naturally their most vital driving force.

R.O.I. Media hopes that by devoting our time to this charity, using our profession as a way to contribute, we can help The Smile Foundation to continue making a spectacular difference.

Happy Mandela day!! 

When embarking on the launch of an e-commerce site many people do not realise that the difference between a successful site and an unsuccessful one can be the e-commerce platform you use. Some e-commerce platforms do not allow for the flexibility required to completely optimise your site and get it ranking well in the search engines.

Many a time, website owners find they are getting the traffic to their site but that it is not converting to sales. What is the cause behind this and how can it be rectified?

Choosing the right e-commerce platform

These days there are too many different content management systems (CMS’s) and e-commerce platforms, one can become confused with which one to choose. A lot of people end up choosing free or open source platforms as they do not want to invest in more expensive systems. When it comes to an e-commerce site, you need to do it right the first time. This means investing time and money into getting the structure and design right. Make sure you do some user experience testing to find out how people are interacting with your site before you launch it – do they find it easy to find the products they are looking for and is making a purchase simple?

From an SEO perspective, there are certain elements that need to be in place for your e-commerce site to not only rank well but also convert well.

1.    Clean URLs for product pages

Many e-commerce sites do not give you the type of control you need in order to optimise your URL structure. Ideally you want to ensure that your URL contains the name of your product. A good example of a CMS system that handles URL structure well is Joomla. Thanks to the SH404SEF module you can set your URLs to pull just the name of your product or you can manually rewrite the URL to be exactly the way you want it.

2.    Ability to Add Unique Meta Data on all pages

In order for your product pages to get indexed well you need to ensure that all your products have unique titles, descriptions and keyword tags. Some custom CMS solutions make use of a universal meta tag meaning that you need to ensure your developer has built in functionality for you to customise the meta data on all pages of your e-commerce site.

3.    XML and Static Sitemap

A common problem that many e-commerce site owners find is that their sites do not get indexed well. The site may contain 5000 pages but only 2000 of them are appearing in the Google index. In order to help Google index your site well you need to ensure that your site has an up to date XML and static sitemap. These days there are some great pieces of software which automate XML sitemaps. With e-commerce sites, products are being added and removed on a regular basis, hence you want to ensure that you always have an up to date sitemap. That, along with unique meta data, will really help your site get indexed better.

4.    Good Search Function

You want to make it as easy as possible for people to find what they are looking for on your site. An e-commerce site with a bad search function is bound to have a lower conversion rate. Make sure you test out your search function to ensure it is giving out accurate results before you launch your website.

5.    Site Speed

Some of the best e-commerce sites are successful due to the fact that it is quick and easy to make purchases. The point of online shopping was to make shopping a faster experience. Hence, if your e-commerce site is slow to load, you are not likely to get repeat customers. Make sure you test your site speed before you launch it. Externalise any JavaScript, Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) and compress all images you have on the site. It is little things like this that can help make your site faster and more user friendly.

So there you have it, a few tips on what to look out for when building an e-commerce site. Remember that if you get the structure and design right the first time, it will save you a lot of money in the long run.

If you are thinking of starting an e-commerce site, we recommend you contact R.O.I Media for a full website design, conversion and SEO services.

Many, if not most of us have a Gmail account that we are permanently logged in to. You will notice that you are logged in by viewing the top right of your screen. This profile is associated with all your searches; by being logged in, your search results will be customised and will most definitely be dissimilar to everyone else.

So what is the simple solution; is it to logout? A few months ago, I would have replied with a definite, ‘yes’… However, the situation has now been changed. Even if you are not logged in, Google is still customising your search results on your computer. Most people are unaware that this is taking place and would appreciate knowing how to undo it. To undo it, follow the easy instructions below:

• Click Web History (top right)

• Click Disable customisations based on search activity.

Once this is done, you will begin to see pure results that are unburdened by Google’s own search activities.

Kyle says about his achievement, “The Google AdWords Qualification certifies me as a PPC analyst. Why did I spend so many hours trying to gain it? I was looking for a way to bolster my work with a qualification that can prove to clients that I have the right stuff.” Kyle explained to me that if clients see the certified by Google stamp, they immediately know that they will experience a high level of positive PPC results for their website. “This is a monster of an exam,” Kyle intoned, “any client who knows anything about PPC will trust me with their website”.

Kyle continued with some information about the exam. “It’s tough, certainly no walk in the park; 120 questions in 120 minutes. Sure, it’s all multiple choices but more often than not, two answers can both be correct.” I asked him, “So which one would you choose then?” Kyle gravely intoned that one can be more correct then the other.

I pushed Kyle for further information, his hesitation led to a flurry of answers. “I used many Google study guides but it was my years of experience that led to a pass. The written word alone is not enough.”

What lies ahead for young Kyle? “I need to write another Google exam as I have only qualified for the old AdWords rules. In the crazy world of Google, it takes two sets of exams in order to fully qualify for the new rules. After this, I will have to re-qualify on a yearly basis.” Kyle is positive that he will continuously renew his qualification in order to provide a quality PPC service for his clients.

When web developers start coding the new site, they will launch on a development URL such as http://clientsite.webdesigncompany.com and this will be sent to clients for feedback and progress. Once the clients are 100% happy that the new site is “good to go”, they sign off and instruct the web design/development company to launch their new site. Many development companies make some common SEO mistakes that will most likely result in problems when the site goes live.

I have highlighted a few problems and solutions that you can implement to avoid this happening to your site.

Problem 1: Duplicate Content Penalty

The demo link contains the new design with new populated content. Google has ways and means of self discovering new websites; one way is through the Google Toolbar. It sends a request to the spiders and within a few days your entire development site is fully indexed in Google.

Why is this problem happening? The development site contains new content and if Google discovers this first on the development link and on not on your live URL, you run the risk of launching the site, which is seen in Google’s eye as a duplicate (as the development site was indexed first).

In this scenario, don’t expect to get reward for your content; rather you will receive a punishment in the form of no rankings for those duplicated pages.

Solution:

Make sure that the developers implement the following in your robots.txt file:

User-agent: *
Disallow: /

This command tells Google’s spiders NOT to index the development site and it should always be implemented as a rule of thumb.

Problem 2 : Removing or changing URL structure

When launching a new site, you will most probably change the URL, this can be due to the following:

• Site Navigation changing
• Site Architecture changing
• SEO restructuring : index.php?id=88 to /keyword-keyword/

If you analyse the traffic of a site down to each URL you will notice that the majority of the traffic will go to sub-pages that are not the homepage. These pages have been established for years in the search.

The new site launches and these pages are either no longer active or they the URL has been renamed. As a result Google (and your visitors) find a page that no longer exists. Two common things can happen now:

1. Google receives a 404 (page not found error) . Google does not like finding these. After time it keeps knocking on your door and if no one is home, it eventually gives up

2. You redirect ALL legacy pages back to your home page. The issue with this is that the pagerank and rankings for the specific page will most likely not be salvaged.

Solution:

Scan analytics and see which pages or sections of the site receive the most traffic. If you find a section that sells “green widgets” and it used to have the following URL: index.php?id=88 , but now you have changed the URL to /green-widgets/. You need to add a 301 redirect from index.php?id=88 to /green-widgets/. Other low priority pages can be 301 redirected back to the homepage. It’s important to retain the redirection from old category name to new category name and not the homepage for traffic retention.

We will apply the above based on traffic. We also will have a record of the all the old URL’s of the site. These will all need to be 301 redirected as well. Just to make sure we haven’t missed anything, we also scan Google’s index and Webmaster tools to make sure a link has not slipped through the cracks.

Problem 3: IBL (Inbound links)

In Problem 2 we discussed 301 redirecting a high ranking page from an old location to a new location. Certain established pages in sites often have inbound links from external sites. These links are part of the reason that these pages rank so highly and are responsible for substantial traffic.

By 301 redirecting a page you fix one part of the problem. The issue is that if you redirect an old page that has dozens of external links point to it, the new location will not have 100% of the “vote”. Recently Google confirmed that 301 redirects result on a pagerank loss.

Solution:

Find out which sites link to the old page and notify and request them to change the link to the new location. This can be challenging and time consuming, but well worth the fight.

Additional Points:

We also advise updating your sitemap.xml file at Google’s Webmastertools. You should also be pedantic and monitor your traffic, and notifications such as slow loading pages or broken links. Webmastertools can be a valuable source of information.

Conclusion:

It goes without saying; the new site should be fully optimised according to our stringent 85 point checklist. The above 3 problems represent some potential hurdles that can often be overlooked which result in lost rankings. If you are about to re-launch your website, we recommend contacting R.O.I Media for a full site migration strategy and implementation.

It’s an exciting time for us, with great growth year on year; we need talented professionals to join a lively Cape Town office. You will be responsible for delivering results. It’s a fast paced environment so can you think on your feet?

Requirements

- working experience with SEO (Search Engine Optimisation) – google adsense, google analytics, link building etc.
- technical knowledge and experience – Content Management experience – Reporting knowledge – a bonus
- Internet marketing experience
- Market analysis experience – a plus

Advantageous

Marketing experience advantageous

Personal Skills/Attributes

Ability to work effectively in a team and independently
Attention to detail
Deadline orientated

In covering letter send top clients/websites that you have worked on before.

So what do you think? Fancy working for a company with a fantastic culture, (good work/ life balance) then send in your CV.

Details
Remuneration: Market Related
Province: Western Cape
Education level: Matric
City: Cape Town
Type: Permanent
Job level: Junior

Contact
Lisa
ROI Media
seo.jun@roimedia.co.za

NO RECRUITERS! Only Cape Town residents may apply please.

Apply via email
Phone-in candidates will not be considered

Something you probably didn’t know was that Google can add a listing to their local results without you even submitting anything. If you have a website that is seen as an authority in the industry and is frequently being updated with fresh content, you might see yourself appearing in the local search results. If you find your company in the local business results, then you need to claim ownership of that listing:

-          Sign up/login to Google’s Local Business Centre

-          Make sure that all contact information is correct

-          Amend or add more to the current listing

-          Optimise keywords and categories you are listed under

Google local listings are socially driven. This means that the more popular your site, the better. One of the most effective ways to improve your chances of a top spot in local business search is to encourage users to provide feedback and reviews on your Google Maps page.

E.g.  Book Cape Town’s Local Listing

http://maps.google.co.za/maps/place?cid=16519483469427636445&gl=za

You can then reward people who submit positive reviews with a discount coupon for your product or service if they purchase online. The more reviews you have, the more likely your listing will be promoted by Google.

So there you go, a great way to increase local traffic to your site, improve your SEO and increase brand visibility.

ROI Media offers services ranging from online business development, Search Engine Optimization (SEO) to Pay Per Click (PPC). Ensure your online success and say YES to R.O.I Media!

A few tips on Social Media:

Identify audience – Find out who they are, what they do, the type of sites they visit etc. This will give you a better idea of which social media platforms you are going to target. For example if your target market are teenagers, then Facebook would be a good option.

Set out your goals – Why are you engaging in a particular social media platform?

-          Increase brand awareness

-          Strengthen customer relations

-          Drive traffic to your company website

-          Promote products/services you have to offer

A few points to remember:

1.      There is no point having social content if nobody can find it. Make sure you optimise your content. E.g. If your company has a blog, make sure its ranking on the search engines. This can be done through internal linking of your primary keywords. If you have released a viral video on You Tube, make sure there is a link to it from your website.

2.      Connect your social media profiles to each other – By linking all these platforms you will send users from one site to another.

3.      Use social media to build a targeted community that you can market to. Social media is all about people with shared interests coming together online and sharing information, ideas and resources.

4.      Social media is very useful for online reputation management – It is an instant response, engaging with the customer in their on space on a platform they are comfortable in.

Search engine optimisation and social media marketing are now inseparable. You just need to make sure you have a clear strategy of how to incorporate one into the other. When executed seamlessly you can increase traffic as well as actively engage your target market and improve customer relations.

For more information on social media and SEO give ROI Media a call today.  We offer services ranging from online business development, Search Engine Optimization (SEO) to Pay Per Click (PPC).