Two Minute SEO

Michael,

You pointed out meta description. I know it’s being used for the text in the search results. Is it good for anything else ? Are meta keywords any good at all ? (I know “everyone” says “no”, but wanted to hear your opinion about this).

Related question: Meta description can help to prevent tripping the “duplicate content” filter.. that is scary. In our case, I see it happen with 2 book pages (ergo: totally different bodies of text) but which have the same page and h1 title tags.

Question: what does changing something small like meta-description say about how well google can analyze on-page relevancy ? If two bodies of text are completely different, and it depends on title, h1, meta description.. to decide “duplicate content yes/no” then.. I think I am missing some important points. Google cannot be that dumb.

Patrick

tincherbell: personally I think one has to be a bit careful with the whole “user generated content” story. This is not new: in the 1990’s we had (and still have) forums and discussion lists and newsgroups.

If you talk about “perception”.. remember the discussion lists with 10 postings and 0 comments ? What is the perception of that ? I.e. if you have a wiki.. but just a couple of stubs… don’t forget how spoilt people are with wikipedia. They’d expect to see the same thing. If not.. what does that do to your brand ?

Secondly.. if you have the wiki there: are you basically telling your visitors the thing VC”s are telling their startups: let the users generate the content, it’s cheaper this way ? What does that tell your visitors ?

Michael–Gottcha on the building brand value comment. That will be my new goal. I’m trying to promote the brand as much as possible in as many multiple formats as possible, but I don’t have a brand yet.

What I have now is a website, blog, wiki, and videos on Google and Youtube. I’m including every type of multi-media that I can. I’ll be adding downloadable e-books and interactive quizzes soon. But I don’t have a company, I don’t have a company name, I don’t have any money, and I don’t have an investor. Right now, I’m promoting the website address.

What I have at this moment is a hobby that is out of control. The product I’m producing is better than I ever expected, but it has a long way to go. I’d like the site to have about 1,500 pages.

I hope Michael doesn’t mind the ongoing conversation here..

We are in exactly the same boat (If that is the proper expression, I am Dutch). About investors: they will come when it’s a proven concept, not much sooner (there are always exceptions: one is if you’ve already worked with them before, successfully). I think the mistake we made was taking on too many projects at the same time. I know it’s easy for others to give a structure of how things should progress, but if you’re running out of time, I think it’s a different story altogether.

In case your site is focused on one topic, and offers different components (which it sounds like) then try to go for sponsorships. Forget adwords (my opinion). It’s ugly, it gives a poor impression, and it takes space on your page which you want to dedicate to the visitor. PLUS if you have this design of leaving “buffers” on the sides for 1024 resolution, you have barely any space to begin with.

Sponsorships require a strong relationship you have to build (so take 6 months for that) and ofcourse a proof of your site’s potential. But…it looks better, you do not immediately need to show huge amounts of traffic, it can actually add value to your site (with the right brand), it takes less space than a whole bunch of adwords, and it probably generates a lot more money.

Ofcourse you really need to be honest with yourself and ask if there is enough interest potentially for what you’re doing, if the market is big enough, or wealthy enough or.. well something special that justifies what you’re doing.. at least to yourself. But ok that is a no-brainer.

Partnerships is another way to go..not only do you build a network around you, but also the links you can get from these sites, can generate extra traffic and potentially be the type of links you want, to score well in google. And you make it more difficult for others to “move in your space”. But that really depends on “your space”.

We got a few links like that and I don’t know which one it is (they all looked good to me but I am sure Michael would have a different opinion about it if he saw them) but our home page suddenly gets crawled every 2 days (at least the last week), but suddenly we also lost 3000 pages and our google traffic dropped with 20 %. So am I having heartburns ? Yes absolutely.. but I also know what it will take to “come back with a vengeance”.

Anyway .. all I can say is.. “hang in there”.. at some point.. the time must come that it starts to pick up traffic, you can find some money and live from it.. and build from there.

Michael: There is a very specific reason. It isn’t “quality matters more than quantity”. I presume it is not a type.. (my guess would have been quality more than quantity). Aside from a discussion on using linkfarms etc.. I have no idea.. any hints ?

Dodito Said: Sponsorships require a strong relationship you have to build (so take 6 months for that) and of course a proof of your site’s potential. But…it looks better, you do not immediately need to show huge amounts of traffic, it can actually add value to your site (with the right brand), it takes less space than a whole bunch of adwords, and it probably generates a lot more money.

Thanks for your reply. Sponsorship is a good idea in a case like mine for all the reasons that you mentioned. It’s a non-commercial site on a subject that screams sponsor me. Okay, maybe it doesn’t scream too loudly, but in my mind it is begging to be supported by a highly successful corporation with an established reputation for helping the community. An angel investor with experience in the field would be another alternative. I made an informal offer (begged) to one person, but never heard back on the offer. Boo-hoo! But the heck with ‘em. Full speed ahead.