Archive for the ‘Search engine optimization (SEO)’ Category

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More additions to the PA top Technorati ranks table

Friday, May 25th, 2007

The top technorati ranks table for Planet Atheism members has been improved again. :) In addition to showing the Technorati rank, number of incoming links (from Technorati as well), and Google Pagerank, the table now shows Alexa ranks as well.

You can now also click on any of the above column titles to sort the table by that particular value/rank. Incoming links and Pagerank are “the more, the merrier”, while Technorati rank and Alexa rank are “the lower, the better”, so sorting takes that into account.

A note of warning: I’ve mentioned before that you shouldn’t really take any of these ranks too seriously, and this is especially true for the Alexa ranks. Alexa is a nice idea (it’s the only one that measures traffic instead of incoming links), but it has the following problems:

  • it only counts hits if the user has installed either the Alexa toolbar (for Internet Explorer) or the SearchStatus Firefox extension (I recommend the latter, since, as everyone knows, MSIE sucks), and
  • it often lumps all subdomains for a particular domain together (i.e. doesn’t distinguish between aaa.domain.com and bbb.domain.com, even though they may be totally unrelated). It apparently has some hard coded exceptions for some (not all) blogspot.com blogs… but the values aren’t really reliable. Still, you can use it to measure the changes in traffic for one site.

Incidentally, the application I’ve coded (and have been improving) to generate this table from a list of blogs is almost ready for public release. :)

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Posted in Programming, Search engine optimization (SEO), Unix / Linux / *BSD software | No Comments »

Blog moved

Saturday, November 18th, 2006

I finally had some time today to move Way of the Mind (note the new URL) to my Slicehost virtual server. The new WotM Forum is also up, using MyBB, instead of phpBB like my other two. So far, I’m liking it (MyBB) a lot, though it’s a bit weird to have the entire theme inside the MySQL database instead of normal .php or .css files. :)

Moving the WordPress blog was simply a question of following these instructions. Basically, you go to the WP options in the old blog, change the 2 URL fields to the new address, dump the database, do a search & replace to change any images and other URLs in the database to the new address, import the database to the new server, copy the files, and that’s the proverbial “it”.

As for redirection, there came the eternal dilemma: if you redirect everything, then people will be lazy and keep using the old address (thus wasting your bandwidth); if you don’t, it’s inconvenient, and you lose everything you had in terms of incoming links and SEO.

What I did was to redirect (301, to signify a permanent move) every URL except the front page, which shows a message telling people about the change, and redirects after 5 seconds. I believe that this is the best of both worlds. Any link to an individual post will be redirected transparently, but whoever arrives at the front page will told about the change of address, encouraging them to update their bookmarks.

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Posted in Blogging, Search engine optimization (SEO), Unix / Linux / *BSD software, World Wide Web | 2 Comments »

Slicehost: An experiment

Wednesday, November 15th, 2006

Currently (as it’s been from the beginning), my sites are all running on my home server (an OpenBSD box). I like the control it gives me; most web hosting services are of the “we provide this software for you” kind. Sorry, but, to me, it’s root access or nothing. :)

Even though my uplink is quite lousy (384Kbps), I haven’t actually had any problem with it, even when I was Dugg / Redditted / Shoutwired / del.icio.used / whatever. :)

However, I’ve long wondered about whether the fact that my server is located in Portugal is harming me in terms of search engine results for my English-language sites. The fact is that I get a comparatively large number of people arriving there from google.pt, even when the site in question is in English. Now, if google.pt is benefiting my English-language sites simply because they’re physically located in Portugal, it stands to reason that google.com (which is several orders of magnitude more important) will benefit US-based sites… and, if it puts those ahead, it follows that others are put behind.

(Did I make any sense just now? :) )

Slicehost

Therefore, since a few minutes ago, I’m a customer of Slicehost. In just 2 minutes, I had an Ubuntu virtual server running, with full root access by ssh. There’s nothing running there right now, but soon there will be: I will be moving one of my blogs, Way of the Mind, there (and it’ll be getting a new domain as well). I’ll only do it about a month from now… but I may start other sites there, in the meantime.

We’ll see if it makes a difference. I’ll post my results here.

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Posted in Search engine optimization (SEO), Search engines, Unix / Linux / *BSD | 3 Comments »

Introduction to SEO #2: what is SEO?

Thursday, October 19th, 2006

(NOTE: this is part of the “Introduction to SEO” series)

SEO stands for “Search Engine Optimization”. It’s the art of making as many people as possible arrive at a particular site – preferably those who are interested in it.

Sounds confusing, doesn’t it? OK, let’s try a different definition: SEO is the name for a number of methods for improving the chances of someone searching for the subject of a site, and having that site appear in the top search results.

Better? :)

Basically, there are two kinds of SEO:

  1. On-site: what you do in the site to make sure search engines index it optimally.
  2. Off-site: having other sites link to yours.

Each of the above will be expanded in the next two parts of this series.

You can also divide SEO in two other kinds: “white hat” (“honest” techniques) and “black hat” (less honest techniques). I will only write about the former. The latter require more effort, are effective just for short periods of time, and will, in the end, harm a site in terms of SEO, since search engines try to fight (and punish) those kinds of techniques.

Some examples of those: splogs (spam blogs), spam comments in blogs, “keyword stuffing”, hidden text (for instance, text and background of the same color), different content presented to users and to search bots, etc.. Like I said, these methods are increasing less effective – if they’re effective at all, these days – and almost always end up doing more harm than good. My suggestion: forget about them.

In fact, it is because some self-styled “SEO specialists” believe that SEO is using those increasingly inefficient methods, that sometimes people say “SEO is dying”. It isn’t. It’s just that most dirty tricks don’t work anymore. The methods I’ll talk about in the next two parts still work perfectly. :)

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Posted in Introduction to SEO series, Search engine optimization (SEO) | No Comments »

Introduction to SEO #1: series introduction

Sunday, August 6th, 2006

(NOTE: this is part of the “Introduction to SEO” series)

This series’ goal, as the name suggests, is to be a primer to SEO (Search Engine Optimization), a term I’ll talk about further in the second part. What will appear here isn’t “rocket science”, and won’t turn anyone into an “SEO guru”, although it can be a good start. There are many sites, blogs, forums and books (I, myself, have read some) out there about this subject, if you want to go further, and I’ll suggest a few of them at the end of the series. But, if you know little to nothing about SEO… you’ve come to the right place. :)

Why did I decide to write this series? One of the main reasons is the sorry state of SEO in Portugal, my home country, though I doubt it happens just locally. Around here, even the sites of “big” brands or companies are, quite often, designed and created by people who don’t even suspect that it’s possible to optimize sites to be better placed in search engines. The results are often comical: posts in personal blogs appear, in query results, before the companies or brands’ official sites. And I don’t mean ultra-mega-optimized blogs. Simply, because they use software like WordPress, or services like Blogger, their HTML is more valid than the companies’ sites (most Portuguese web designers use software like FrontPage, are completely unaware there’s such a thing as “valid HTML”, or that there are browsers other than Internet Explorer 6), and they have… titles. Yes, some people haven’t discovered the <title> tag yet. :)

By the way, the series is meant to be read in order. There’s a nice series index, which will be updated as each part is written.

Posted in Introduction to SEO series, Search engine optimization (SEO) | No Comments »

Coming soon, a new series: "An Introduction to SEO"

Wednesday, August 2nd, 2006

I believe the title says it all. :)

Some points:

  • it’ll be a relatively short series. I’m guessing 5 or 6 parts.
  • as the name implies, it’ll be a very introductory series. It won’t turn you into an “SEO guru”… but, still, you’ll know more about it than a great many people, including professional web designers, most of whom aren’t even aware that something called “Search Engine Optimization” exists.
  • the series should begin this week, and will be finished before the end of August.
  • unlike the Blogging Tips series, this one will appear, originally, in Portuguese, on my other blog A Arte de Blogar. The version here will be translated / adapted from that one.
  • some topics: titles, meta tags (yes, they’re still used), valid HTML, links formats, search engines, directories, incoming links, etc.. Yes, I said it was an introduction. :)

Posted in Search engine optimization (SEO) | No Comments »

The Portuguese and the Web

Tuesday, August 1st, 2006

Most of this blog’s subscribers speak English, and I know how annoying it can be to have a post in your feed reader that you can’t understand. And this post of mine, from “A Arte de Blogar”, doesn’t really make sense for people outside Portugal… at least, I think so. But it should be relevant to the Portuguese readers (and they exist, indeed :) ); therefore, here’s a link to it: Os Portugueses e a Web.

An excerpt, to whet your appetite (if you do speak Portuguese):

Por outras palavras, Portugal é como uma “selva inexplorada” em termos de SEO, e é facílimo ultrapassar os sites “a sério” em termos de posicionamento nos motores de busca (como disse, acontece frequentemente mesmo sem se tentar). Porque, por cá, ninguém sabe o que é SEO, ou como é que a Web funciona… e nem se quer saber.

Posted in Blogging, Search engine optimization (SEO), Search engines, World Wide Web | No Comments »

Google PageRank update?

Monday, February 20th, 2006

According to BlogSEO, it’s happening now.

You can use the Future PageRank tool to check a site’s PR on each of Google’s servers.

Apparently, none of my sites change in PR. The newer ones, however, didn’t have a visible PR yet, and have one now. Mostly 4s, with one 3. Not too bad. The Tlog is still my highest rated one, with a PR of 5.

Posted in Google, Search engine optimization (SEO), Search engines | 1 Comment »

How to write good post headlines

Wednesday, January 25th, 2006

CopyBlogging has a nice article called How to Write Headlines That Work. I’ve already written about it in the Blogging Tips series, in The Importance of Titles, but my version is more SEO-related, while CopyBlogging’s has more to do with marketing, and titles that “intrigue” visitors. Good, useful reading.

Posted in Blogging, Search engine optimization (SEO) | 1 Comment »

Blogging tip: promoting blogs that link to yours

Friday, January 20th, 2006

I won’t say I “invented” this thing, but it’s a fact that I’ve never seen it mentioned anywhere, and I’ve been reading the feeds for several sites on blogging for months…

Maybe I’ll eventually expand this to a part in the Blogging Tips series. But, for now, here goes…

The tip is this: suppose you discover that some blog has linked to yours, or one of your posts. Always nice to know, isn’t it? To see that someone appreciates what you write, and finds it useful and/or interesting.

But… why not go a step further? Why not “give a hand” in promoting that other blog – especially if it’s less popular than yours, or newer, or owned by someone who doesn’t know (or care) about optimization, pings, SEO and all that?

I’m not suggesting you do a lot of stuff, but there are quick, small, easy things you can do. For instance, if that blog doesn’t ping anything, maybe do a quick ping for it in Ping-o-Matic or such, which will mark it as newly updated, and make several blogging services crawl it. Maybe you can check whether it’s listed in BlogShares, or whether Technorati, BlogPulse and others know about it. If not, why not add it to those yourself?

What for? Well, for a start, you’re, in a way, saying “thank you” for the link, and helping that other blog in return. But you’re also doing it for yourself:

  1. The more visitors that other blog gets, the greater the chances are of someone clicking on that link to your blog;
  2. The more popular, and well indexed, that blog is, the more “valuable” that link to your blog becomes – for PageRank reasons, and others. Remember, in terms of SEO, some links are worth much more than others, and a link from a popular site is always more valuable.

I’m not suggesting you do this all the time, for any link to your blog you discover. First, after a while, they will simply be too many. Second, this is worthless if the other blog or site already knows about blog promotion, pings, and all that stuff. Third, if the other site is more popular / older than yours, your actions won’t probably make any difference.

But if you have reasons to believe that that person has never done anything to promote his/her blog, then this certainly can help – both them, and yourself.

How to find out who links to you? If you’re a regular reader here, you’ve probably already read Who links to you?. ;)

Posted in Blogging, Search engine optimization (SEO) | 1 Comment »

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This work by Pedro Timóteo is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 2.5 Portugal.