DJU Members Website Reviews

[jackcu 0]

QUOTE (Chris_Pointon @ Jun 9 2005, 09:02 AM)

Jack - is it true that Google doesn't rely as much on meta tags as other search engines and instead relies on the actual website title, the first few lines of text in the area and also the anchor text of links within the page to determine the sites topic and relevance? or is this just yet another Google rumour?

Hi Chris,

 

Nope - it's true. Google (and increasingly the other search engines) know that people are trying to con them. The easiest way is to add loads of search terms into your meta tags that don't actually appear on the page. Remember years ago when you typed in an innoccuous search phrase like "exhaust replacement cheshire" and ended up at a porn site? No? Was it just me? LOL. Anyway, what was happening was that the porn sites and others were filling their meta tags with dictionaries not to mention having loads of hidden text on the page. As I've pointed out in another thread, Corabar Steve is getting good results using hidden text which surprises me as it doesn't normally work - just goes to show it's not an exact science (or I don't know what I'm talking about - which is entirely possible). Good on Steve for taking the search engines seriously, even though I think this may not always work.

 

Back to the topic - what the search engines live and die by is returning relevant results. That's what Google especially prides itself on. This means that more people use it because it gives them good websites to visit. If relevancy slips, then so do user numbers, leading to loss of advertising revenue. Relevancy is king. For this reason they have developed their ever changing algorithm. As Darren points out, it gives more weight to your domain name, page title, headings, hyperlink text and the fact that the search terms are sprinkled throughout the body copy. Take a look at the Home Page of the site I look after:

 

www.aicr.org.uk

 

If you read the copy you will notice that the word "cancer" is totally overused from the perspective of a human reading the page. However, the copy IS relevant, albeit deliberately clumsy. Now look at the variety of terms "cancer" is linked to - breast cancer, prostate cancer cancer treatment, etc. These phrases are also hyperlinks to pages with relevant titles. All of this tells Googlebot that this site is about cancers and symptoms and research and treatment, etc. The meta tags also contain the same data and this reinforces the message, however, if they were not relevant to the page, the spiders would discount them.

 

Long answer to a short question LOL. The point is - work on the page titles, headings, hyperlinks and body copy. Sprinkle the search terms all over the place - even if they are overused (within reason) the spiders will pick up on them. think of the elephant.co.uk TV ads. Do people really speak like that? Do they repeat things over and over and over? No. But do you remember the URL? Yes. The same is very true on websites. As long as your body copy doesn't say,

 

"I run mobile discos in Cheshire and mobile discos in Manchester and mobile discos in Liverpool and think that mobile discos are the entertainment of tomorrow and mobile discos are really great because mobile discos allow you to dance in Cheshire and Manchester and Liverpool. Mobile discos are great fun for all the family in Cheshire and mobile disocs are really versatile in Manchester" etc.

 

Here's the deal - really, really think about each and every word on the page - especially the Home Page as the spiders put added importance on it. That Home Page of mine reads quite clumsily, but it took weeks to perfect....and it works. We score very well across more than 500 relevant terms and have more than 2000 top 10 rankings. If you visit google.com and type in "cancer research" we are on page 2, 19th out of 87,800,000 pages. On google.co.uk we are on the first page for the same search term. For "cancer charity" we are on the first page. The term "mobile disco" only brings back 3,470,000 pages on both UK and US Google - so it's far easier to get up those rankings.

 

Darren is also correct on inbound links - if you get a link from another site that is all about mobile discos and has a good page rank, then the spiders will push you up the ranking. The only point on which I would disagree with Darren is on the counters. In my experience, the free ones give you very basic information and I don't like putting other people's code on my pages. If you analyse your own log files you have the ability to find out every single little piece of data about your visitors - how they found you, the search terms they used, where they came from, what they looked at, how long they stayed, the path through your site, where they left from, etc., etc. Some of the counter services may give you this but probably at a price - although I could be wrong. I'm happier analysing my own stats. Once you buy the software it's free. On the other hand - using one of these services may be easier to manage if you are unused to doing this kind of analysis.

 

Hope that helps :)

 

Cheers,

 

Jack.

[Dynamicdiscos 0]

Ok I like the background it's not plain colour but not "in your face" Logo good and excellent picture showing us what your setup is.

 

Colours are complimentary and text bold and easy to read. I personally think you should keep your contact details to it's own separate link not at the botton of the front page. WHy not include you tel no at the bottom of your logo?

 

I thonk you should include some pictures of smiling punters on a few of the pages rather that the same picture used at the top of the page.

 

Recent events page is a little boring. Pictures would spice it up. Maybe link off to a gallery showing pics of each event.

 

I love the FAQ page. Good contant easy to read.

 

Contact page is good the text underneath the table could be a littl smaller it looks a little childlike being SO BIG!

 

This has to be one of the most useful LINKS pages I have seen yet. From a customers point of veiw... You are linking me to things I may actually want to buy. You don't just link me to the page but tell me a little about the product or service.

 

Hope you find my comments useful.