[hanyb]

Hello fellow SEOs!

I have a few questions that I will separate into different posts.

My first Q is pretty old school and I remember reading about this a while back.

Is it wise to move the whole navigation menu <div> to below the main content of the page? I know that google looks at the page layout and can distinguish navigation content from the body but will moving it have a positive effect? Especially in terms of anchor text in the links, if the same link is in the main body, only the first link's anchor text carries value right?

Thank you!

Hany

[joshz]

I highly doubt this will have any affect what-so-ever. Design your page for viewers, not search engines.

[devil's_brother]

Especially in terms of anchor text in the links, if the same link is in the main body, only the first link's anchor text carries value right?

Make 'em nofollow.

[hanyb]

Originally Posted by devil's_brother

Make 'em nofollow.

Thanks for the advice josh7 + devil's brother. I guess physical menu code positioning has little to no effect.

@devil's brother
Regarding your comment, I don't mean actual link juice I mean the anchor text itself. If there are two links pointing to the same page, only the anchor text in the first link is taken into consideration right?

[joshz]

Originally Posted by hanyb

If there are two links pointing to the same page, only the anchor text in the first link is taken into consideration right?

If you have both links on the same page, correct.

[hanyb]

Originally Posted by joshz

If you have both links on the same page, correct.

Even if one of the links are nofollowed?

[joshz]

Originally Posted by hanyb

Even if one of the links are nofollowed?

Good question, I honestly don't know... I would ASSUME it would ignore that link, but I'm 50/50 on it. Let's see what others have to say.

[jsteele823]

Usually your menu would contain your category pages, in which case the anchors should be some of your most competitive terms. As such, you really wouldn't want to downplay the anchor text there, would you?

I know there are exceptions, so it really depends upon how you are using that navbar.

[hanyb]

Originally Posted by jsteele823

Usually your menu would contain your category pages, in which case the anchors should be some of your most competitive terms. As such, you really wouldn't want to downplay the anchor text there, would you?

I know there are exceptions, so it really depends upon how you are using that navbar.

Yes, definitely would never nofollow navigation links. I know Google treats links in the navigation differently to other links but I wonder if links in the main content carry any anchor text value if they are linking to the same page as one of the navigation links. I hope that makes sense :p

[Dice79]

This will mainly depend on how large your site is.

For sites with 1k+ pages, especially ecommerce sites, Navigation is a key component. With Navigation you can "Tell" Google which pages are important by the entire sites linking structure.

It is good to have your most valuable sections, those that you want SERPS for as Primary links on the navigation. Effectively this gives you good internal links to those pages helping you drive ranks on keywords your targeting on those pages.

Try to avoid stuffing as many links as you can, keep them to a minimum.

If you have many sections on your site. Try and use a combination of navigation structures. Like straight HTML for links you want juice to pass to, and javascript menus or javascript links to sections that are important for your visitors or areas where you don't really want to pass juice to.

I use the Content Above navigation technique that you mentioned, with great success.


You can sum up navigation with: do you want a sniper or a shotgun. They Both Kill, but which is better for your website.