Google SEO Advice

:
We have been experimenting with a site (www.allapprovedcars.com) over the last few months with google.

We have by link building been able to get our google tool bar rank to be 7. This is the highest value along with others (autotrader, fish4cars) in the UK for the sector in which we operate.

When you perform a search in google for :

used cars uk

we currently come seventh in the search results list - with three sites above us with lesser toolbar ranking.

As i understand it this is related to 'on page' content. Can anyone shed any light on what i can do with the home page to improve our position? The site is currently undergoing a complete redesign so this input would be useful in how we construct that.

Similarly, i notice if i change around the order of the keywords in the google search then the results i get are quite different. Has anyone got an explanation for this?

Regards


Jamie

Try to use the keywords in your link anchor
I use "AHAVA Dead Sea Cosmetics" which gave me a boost in ranking in "AHAVA" "Dead Sea" "Cosmetics" with out making any changes to my site. It also gave me a boost in "dead" and I recive alot of traffic from people who search for dead people -this is not the traffic I was hoping for He He

work on getting links that have your major keywords as the link text

ie.
<a href="www.allapprovedcars.com">UK Used Cars</a>

that will show up like this

UK Used Cars

I hear this argument a lot regarding keywords in your link text but i don't see that this is the only contributor here. It probably helps a bit.

Look at big brands - people don't in general link to the main products that the brand serves they link to the brand name, not the keywords.

I can influence the internal links (of which there are literally 1000's) but i think changing external links will be a non starter.

Any other suggestions?

Mind if we back up a few steps ?

Nice site.

Usability issues:

Logo links to home page with alt text

As I drill down into your site I need a consistent text menu structure to not only navigate the site but in some cases jump around. This menu structure includes: home, about us, contact us, categories, privacy, and site map.

In some cases this will require additional pages on your site.

A custom error page which should include your site map.

Note: Some of your menu structure may be placed at the bottom of the page. Normally, these are less important links like contact us, about us, etc.

Edit: Your text links should also include the title="Return To Our Home Page" tag

IMHO, G rewards sites for this kind of clean and well thought out usability/design.

I admit to having a somewhat "old fashioned" view of some of these issues nor can I guarantee you that any single change will improve your SERPS but it will enhance your visitor experience which in the end is what it's all about

PageRank is what you can see (on the Toolbar) what you can't see is the relevancy of the developed PageRank.

Sites with lower PageRank can rank higher than sites with high PageRank generally because the low PR is more relevant than high to the particular query. Note: "QUERY"!

anchors with >> Used Cars UK >> is highly relevant to the query >> Used Cars UK << so the greater number of anchors that actually used this keyphrase >> the greater amount of "relevant PageRank" is associated to it, and the higher you will rank.

But it is a double-edged sword. Most sites are not just relevant to one specific phrase therefore each anchor you develop for >> Used Cars UK << is less relevant to >> Used Cars << or just >> Cars << as well as any other type or style of cars, or place within the "UK" thus binding you to a single keyphrase or less competitive phrases using >> Used Cars UK << like >> Used Cars UK brighton << but not so relevant to >> Used Cars brighton << because the "UK" dilutes the relevancy.

Therefore if your primary keyphrase is >> Used Cars << use it as all internal anchors pointing to that specific page (the page with the most inbound internal links is best) and as many external links as possible, and you will become highly relevant for every variation of query possible in association with "UK" (and probably other places as well - and you can use this to your advantage to).

Also <a href="cars/used-cars.html" title="Used Cars">Used Cars</a> is better than any other adaptation. Google also looks at information is close proximity to the anchor itself. With the "title attribute" you can't get any closer. Also assuming since this is a higher level page (with many inbound links) this also usually means many outbounds links as well. As with my previous statement -- info in close proximity to the anchor add relevancy -so each page within a specific link hierarchy should be (above, below, left or right) of other links related links - thereby drawing relevant weight (and relevant PageRank transfers) from each other.

Also - Google compares the Page Meta Title for link relevancy. Therefore if you are receiving links from an external sites/pages called "Links Page" there is no relevancy, and the PageRank is virtually worthless - contrary to popular belief. Google cares about "relevant links not just any link".

This last point is the number one reason why sites that do lots of link exchanges don't improve much - all links to them are generally stuck on a non-relevant page.

Well said fathom.

A pleasure to see you here knowing the contribution you have already made to WMW.

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My recommendation here is this...
even though you have built out this site to do some testing....it doesn't do much for me...the user...I don't see any monolithic navigation system that assists me with getting around the site...I almost feel as though I am in a framed site...there's one link at the bottom of the page stating start a new search...but this is not very useful..

Build the site for the visitors and let google test your knowledge of speaking to a specific audience ... in this case people looking for "used cars uk"...you will be able to better respond to how google reacts to your site instead of trying to figure out how to react or anticipate google...

just a suggestion on the conceptual side...

The other issue you face is that your site is just a bunch of links...and very little useable content...when I (and many others) are looking for used cars (whether they are in the UK or elsewhere) I expect to find a lot of information about each vehicle so that I can get a better sense of what's being listed....there is some information but I would increase it's weight AND there are too many click thrus to get to an actual page that has some information about a particular used vehicle...Google will not very likely crawl this far in from the index page...

Set up a search tool that gives me the option to actually search for a particular make and model or by county, city or whatever...

hmmm... I think it did already crawl -- and every page (at least the ones I looked at.

agree... a search function would help a great deal, but saying Google doesn't like links is a bit of a stretch. Actually it's down right wrong!

As i said earlier, the site was an experiment, specifically into how users on the internet locate used cars. The majority of people are finding content deep within the site, not from the homepage. The purpose of the site was to expose content from many pages, not to directly target a few keywords with search engines.

So for example the user who types in 'used audi cheshire' is presented with content relevant for those keywords since we have made content available for 'used audis in cheshire'. We weren't specifically targetting a few key pages in the site but instead looking to expose the whole database of used cars and make it accessible via search engines.

Since the experiment has proved a resounding success, the site is now being totally redesigned (and hence my questions regarding more generic keyword targetting) and will relaunch in the next couple of months. As regards functionality, our company serves 30% of all car franchises in the UK for internet locators and we are part of the same company that owns autotrader.com so i'm fairly confident that the final result will satisfy everyones needs

In one of my "way less lucid moments" I am now working hard to remove my pleasantly allocated sized 10 1/2 foot from my mouth..(what's the equivalent in the U.K.?)....

congrats on your success and good luck....back to the drawing board for me...and I will work harder to keep my eyes and mind more on the open side...

great site with 129.000 inbound links, and PR7. I show all other pages with grey bar. Why? Are these brand-new?

I've just had a quick check myself - most of the pages are showing up with varying values of PageRank - do you think it is a regional thing?

all pages below the start-page shows a grey bar, exept http://www.portfolio-europe.com/ (PR6). I tested again.

Hi Fathom,

We just read your post and find it quite interesting as to the terms you use and how you explain PageRank.

If you don't mind, we'd love to engage in some FRIENDLY dialog to see how you have come to your understanding and conclusions about PageRank? If you do mind, then there is no need to reply, thank you!

First of all, PageRank measures the "IMPORTANCE" (not the relevancy) of a Webpage. PageRank is designed to rank pages in the absence of any queries. Therefore, PageRank has no relevancy.