Optimizing My Website (Full Version)

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sunshinesoprano -> Optimizing My Website (4/16/2008 10:00:40 AM)

Hi. I manage the website for my quartet and I need to optimize it's presence on the web without paying for the submissions. It's been submitted to all the main search engines, Yahoo, Google, etc. It comes up when you type in Pure Heart. However, I need it to appear when someone searches for Southern Gospel, Progressive Southern Gospel, etc. I've tried to update my meta tags and include more text for the crawlers to read, but so far it isn't happening.

What can I do and how long after an update does it take the search engine crawlers to find my new tags?



sunshinesoprano -> RE: Optimizing My Website (4/17/2008 1:05:36 PM)

Well thanks for the help....[:@]



uniteforlife -> RE: Optimizing My Website (4/18/2008 2:04:27 PM)

It also has to do with the design of the site too. Are you using web standards? xhtml?

Im no expert on SEO, but I know it's not easy getting to the top of search engines.

My understanding of how Google works in a nutshell is this. The more sites that link to your site, the higher your ranking is. The higher rank of the sites linking to your site, the higher the rank of your site.

Another thing to try is to make a sitemap for Google: https://www.google.com/webmasters/tools/docs/en/about.html

This place seems to have some good info too: http://www.dnseo.net/

Hope that helps



uniteforlife -> RE: Optimizing My Website (4/18/2008 2:13:57 PM)

Hello again, I just took a look at the code for your website and it may help quite a bit if you look into optimizing the code first. The leaner you can make it, the better it will be for search engines.

If there is anything I can do to help, please let me know.



stellaluna -> RE: Optimizing My Website (4/18/2008 2:37:27 PM)

First things, clean up your code and look at your meta tags. Look at the actual content of your site and make sure it contains your tag words.

I think it can take several days for the search engines to pick up new things like that.



walterquez -> RE: Optimizing My Website (4/21/2008 12:32:16 AM)

Meta tags are not important as they used to be. I think Yahoo still uses them, but otherwise, they don't really enhance your search. What really counts is the content.

uniteforlife is right. What really gets you up there is the number of sites linking to your site, especially those with high rankings. Meaning, you have a better chance if you have very few sites with high rankings linking to you, than many sites with low ranking linking to you.

TIPS
Use the ALT and TITLE attributes in the tags by including keywords in them.
Instead of naming your images "main.jpg", use key terms in the name like "southern_gospel.jpg" or "pure_heart.jpg".
Change URL links to something meaningful. Instead of "http://www.pureheart.org/index.php?option=com_prayercenter&Itemid=50" try "http://www.pureheart.org/bible-in-one-year".
If the pages are dynamic, try URL rewrites.
Want people to find you on a specific search term? First, make sure the page actually talks about those terms. Then do a search on those terms, and post your page to high ranking blogs that meets those search terms.
And of course there is more...



walterquez -> RE: Optimizing My Website (4/21/2008 12:37:20 AM)

Maybe not so much of a SEO, but more of having a cleaner code.

Do not use tables for layout, use DIVs instead. Use tables for displaying data in a table format.
Also, separate the content from the presentation. In other words, use CSS files.



sunshinesoprano -> RE: Optimizing My Website (4/21/2008 7:44:31 AM)

Youch....I would definitely need some help. I don't know what a DIV is or what a CSS file is. Web design has far exceeded what I knew about it several years ago.

What exactly do you mean by cleaning up my code?



stellaluna -> RE: Optimizing My Website (4/21/2008 10:13:39 AM)

I think Google is still using meta tags. Our webmaster has been optimizing various pages on our site and that's part of what he's doing and we've risen by leaps and bounds through Google search.

Anywho...make sure your code meets the latest standards...I think HTML 4.01 transitional is most common at the moment. DIV is an HTML tag. CSS is a cascading style sheet. CSS is how you determine the look of your site...it lets you lay out the styles in one document instead of making changes to individual pages. Well, that's kind of not a good definition, but someone will come along with a better one, I'm sure. [8D]

Edited to add: XHTML 1.0 Transitional



uniteforlife -> RE: Optimizing My Website (4/21/2008 4:39:34 PM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: sunshinesoprano
What exactly do you mean by cleaning up my code?


Well, you're using alot of tags that dont need to be there. There are paragraph tags for spacing, there are font tags around images. Alot of the tags arent closed. You shouldnt use font tags by the way, use a style sheet instead.

If you dont have the time to learn css, xhtml from scratch, something that you might want to look at is:

http://www.openwebdesign.org/

There are quite a few templates there that you could use as a framework. I think most of them are up to current web standards and there are some really nice looking ones. And they're free.

Im a big fan of minimalism, especially for websites. They load faster and imho they are easier to use and better looking.

Hope that helps.



walterquez -> RE: Optimizing My Website (4/21/2008 11:59:25 PM)

One of the tips I mentioned earlier, you can start doing it right away. By making the links SEO friendly.

http://www.pureheart.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=76&Itemid=111 "Not" SEO friendly [:'(]
http://www.pureheart.org/bible-in-one-year SEO friendly [:D]

Notice how the former link says nothing about what the page is all about, while the latter does.

You're probably wondering why I didn't write, http://www.pureheart.org/bible-in-one-year.php
You can if you want to. But I think if you use URL rewrites, then the pages will be dynamic. Meaning, there really is not a page called "bible-in-one-year", instead, it is a query string that you can access in PHP using $_GET or $_REQUEST.



walterquez -> RE: Optimizing My Website (4/22/2008 12:11:12 AM)

Here is a link you can use, http://www.websiteoptimization.com/services/analyze/

You have a few dead CSS image links.

You can also enable compression in the php.ini file or configure the web server to do so.
zlib.output_compression = On

This will help decrease the bandwidth.



uniteforlife -> RE: Optimizing My Website (4/22/2008 12:31:04 AM)

walterquez,

excellent advice, but you have the wrong site. Her site is http://www.pureheartmusic.org/

The site you mention, looks to me likes it's using joomla.

I think to even make it simpler, just make it minimal. Nice and clean and free of non essentials. Do you agree? It seems alot of times what happens in web design is people try to put too much info in not enough space. Or vice versa.

By the way, speaking of joomla and cms's in general. If anyone wants a top of the line cms, and I truly mean top of the line. Check out krang. http://www.krangcms.com/

100% open source and free. Not really for beginners, but you cant beat it if you know perl and have some experience setting up software.



walterquez -> RE: Optimizing My Website (4/22/2008 1:39:33 AM)

Oops, sorry.

Yes, I certainly agree to keep it simple.

SEO hints
  • For page titles, don't change the fonts to make them bigger or bolder, instead use the H tags, like H1 or H2 or even H3. Google and other search engines give these a little more emphasis.
  • They also look at bold types, but use them sparingly through out the text. If they're not relevant keywords, don't bold them.

Design hints
  • People are more interested in the content, so avoid using animated gifs. They are distracting.
  • Stick to standard, legible fonts. But if you must use more font types, keep it to a minimum, no more than one. [:D]
  • Stick to a standard size. Basically, don't give them one.
  • Stick to one font color. Make sure there is enough contrast with the background. Also take into account people who are color blind. Usually sticking to a dark font and a white background is safe.
  • I guess this is my preferences, and that is not to center, or worse, right align the text. Either keep it left aligned, or justified. Also don't use spaces to indent paragraphs.
  • Don't use counters.
  • Do not put your email in the website. Do not use mailto:info@pureheartmusic.org anywhere on the site. This is how SPAMMERS add your email to their databases and starts spamming your Inbox.
    Use a form instead. I know it takes a little more programming, but at least it will help keep many spammers away.
  • Make sure there is enough contrast between the content and the background. If the background has too much grain, people will struggle reading the content.


But in any case, if this is one of your first website, you have done a lot better than I did with my first.[:)]



sunshinesoprano -> RE: Optimizing My Website (4/22/2008 8:19:04 AM)

Thanks, folks. This isn't my first rodeo, but when I started things were easy and I used templates. This has all been from scratch using FrontPage. I know enough html to know it's html but the other languages I'm clueless on.

Talk to me about H tags. I'm not familiar with how to use these. I've made the animated gifs for my page headers so I'm not sure exactly what is meant by page title.

I've tried to stick to Arial because most computers have it.

My boss likes the counter[8|]

What about my menu? I like the look of the graphics but I've heard that they are bad on the crawlers.

I guess I just need to clearn CSS and how to do the DIV thing.

Also, I've noticed some sites that are just a backgroun and what looks like one big graphic insert. How does that happen?



stellaluna -> RE: Optimizing My Website (4/22/2008 11:37:13 AM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: uniteforlife
http://www.openwebdesign.org/

This site is awesome! Thanks for posting that!



iwillfearnoevil -> RE: Optimizing My Website (4/22/2008 12:49:42 PM)

personally i'd look into wordpress and very cheap directory submissions ... as mentioned you need inbound links ...



sunshinesoprano -> RE: Optimizing My Website (4/22/2008 1:17:52 PM)

Inbound links?

Boy, I am in the greek.



iwillfearnoevil -> RE: Optimizing My Website (4/22/2008 1:36:09 PM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: sunshinesoprano
Inbound links?
Boy, I am in the greek.

quote:

uniteforlife


sorry, it's what uniteforlife (and maybe others recommended). it's very important to have other websites linking to yours. that is one of the ways google considers a web pages importance. think about it, if there are 200 websites linking to a southern gospel group versus 10 websites linking to a different group ... google will think the first group is more popular and display them first. are you trying to sell music cds or raise awareness so people may contact your group to sing? also paying for submission is dirt cheap and i'd consider it. i am not sure the rates you have been quoted but work is outsourced overseas and i've had good results in the past.



walterquez -> RE: Optimizing My Website (4/23/2008 12:12:57 AM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: sunshinesoprano

Talk to me about H tags. I'm not familiar with how to use these.

I am assuming http://www.pureheartmusic.org/ is the website in question, right?

Take this page for example, http://www.pureheartmusic.org/bios.htm, the first "sub" title on this page is, "Pure Heart's History"

Change this, <font color="#800000" face="Arial">Pure Heart's History</font>
To this, <h2>Pure Heart's History</h2>

And the very top title where it says, "Biographies", use <h1> like so, <h1>Biographies</h1>, since this is the main title.

quote:

I've made the animated gifs for my page headers so I'm not sure exactly what is meant by page title.
It would be better if the image was not animated, since it is a distraction. People want to read the content, not be distracted by moving images.
Not that you can't have them, just keep them to a bare minimum, like for the first few seconds as an "intro", and then stop animating it.

SEO Tip: This is the <img> tag you have in the header of each page. <img src="phred2.gif" width="468" border="0" height="60">
Instead of naming the image file, "phread2.gif", name it something like "pure-heart-music-ministries.gif".
The first one, "phread2.gif" is not a SEO keyword, the latter is. Do this for all images, naming them with SEO keywords.

Take advantage of the following two image attributes, "alt" and "title" so it now looks something like this:
<img src="pure-heart-music-ministries.gif" width="468" height="60" border="0" alt="Pure Heart Music Ministries" title="Pure Heart Music Ministries" />

Tip: Hover over to the header image now and wait a few secs. Nothing happens. Replace the image tag with the suggested one, and try hovering there again. This time you will see a popup tooltip with the words, "Pure Heart Music Ministries". Cool don't you think?[:)] Not only cool, but also an effective SEO as well.

quote:

I've tried to stick to Arial because most computers have it.
I would simply eliminate all the <font> tags. This will keep the same size and color so it will be consistent through out the whole site.

quote:

My boss likes the counter[8|]
Counters are very bad in my opinion. Someone who visits your site will see the counter at 4700. Then a few weeks later it is at 4790. This tells the whole world how unpopular your site is. Not something you want to do.

quote:

What about my menu? I like the look of the graphics but I've heard that they are bad on the crawlers.
It is fine if you want to use images, but as I mention earlier, rename the image files by using relevant keywords. Also add the "alt" and "title" attributes in the <img> tag with relevant keywords.

quote:

Also, I've noticed some sites that are just a backgroun and what looks like one big graphic insert. How does that happen?
Not sure what you mean. Can you show me an example?
In your <body> tag, you do have a "background" attributes to include a background image. But I think it is better if you use CSS to do this.



walterquez -> RE: Optimizing My Website (4/23/2008 12:23:31 AM)

sunshinesoprano, what keywords do you want people to find your site with?

Let's say it is, "Southern Gospel".

Do a search on "Southern Gospel blog" or "Southern Gospel forum"

Look at the search results, and look for blogs or forums that deals with these specific keywords.

Then post your link to these bloggers or forums.

Why? Because the search engine believes these sites are relevant to the searched keywords. And if they link back to you, that will boost your ranking, because you now have high ranking sites linking to you.

Repeat the same procedure with other keywords you want people to find you with.

I am not guaranteeing a first page result. SEO is an art that takes lots of tweaking until you find the right combination.



iwillfearnoevil -> RE: Optimizing My Website (4/23/2008 8:55:57 AM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: walterquez
quote:

ORIGINAL: sunshinesoprano
quote:

My boss likes the counter[8|]
Counters are very bad in my opinion. Someone who visits your site will see the counter at 4700. Then a few weeks later it is at 4790. This tells the whole world how unpopular your site is. Not something you want to do.


agreed - remove the counter. there should be a stats package on your webhosting login that can show your boss how many visitors and a lot more detailed information as well such as how many unique visitors, from where, etc



wbporter -> RE: Optimizing My Website (4/29/2008 3:13:26 PM)

You might want to see how you are found on other search engines as well. For example, if you search for crenshaw berger tables (it is a type of round robin tournament) in google you will get a completely different result than on msn.com on the first page or so.



PolarBear -> RE: Optimizing My Website (4/30/2008 12:36:59 AM)

So you use FrontPage ... that is probably the cause of the bloated code others were talking about. From my experience FP generates *horrible* code.

Agreed on removing the counter. IMHO no professional site should have one. If Webalizer is installed at your host, you can get nice graphs of usage by day, by hour, by page request, by country, etc.



Psalm22 -> RE: Optimizing My Website (4/30/2008 5:03:48 PM)

I stumbled across http://www.w3schools.com/default.asp last week when I got frustrated maintaining my group's web pages and learned a lot about HTML, XHTLM, CSS and much of the rest of the alphabet.



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