8 replies to this topic

[deltageek]

Outside links to our site all go to www.widgets.com, but all our internal site links back to home page point to /default.aspx. In IIS the default page shown is default.aspx, then default.asp, then index.html. Google backlinks and PR are different for .com and default.aspx, even though the page is identical. I'm concerned that I'm splitting the total PR benefit of internal and external links between .com and default.aspx. How does Google treat this situation, and what can I do to maximize my PR?

[Jill]

You are splitting the PR when you have it that way. If at all possible, you should try to link back to the home page through the absolute link, www.yourdomain.com.

My site had been doing the same thing for years. I only recently fixed it, but I don't think it's filtered down through Google yet.

Good luck!

Jill

PS. Welcome, Deltageek!

[deltageek]

Thanks, Jill. That was my recommendation, actually, but my GM is worried that an absolute vs. relative link will take longer to load. That seems a small price to pay for better PR.

[Jill]

I can't imagine that it could take much longer. It would be miniscule. Sure if people were still on 14k modems or less you might worry, but how many are?

Jill

[deltageek]

Another problem for us is that we have a preparation site where we test changes before publishing to the "real" site. We'd have to change all the home links to relative ones on the test site (or end up jumping to the live site with every link), and then update them all to absolute when we publish. Lots of potential for error in the process, especially since the updates are usually not readily obvious.

Here's another thread we found on the same/similar topic: http://www.webmaster...orum3/15710.htm. Message #5 suggests making all internal site links back to home point to /. People in our organization who know more than I do think just having the forward slash instead of /default.aspx will solve the split PR problem and avoid the site-jump potential confusion.

[websage]

If you setup your IIS so that default.aspx is the default page for the directory, it should not take more time to load. Make sure default.aspx is the first in the list of default pages (i.e. home.aspx, index.aspx should all follow default.aspx).

Good luck,

Mitko @ WebSage

[Marc]

just an fyi....on taking longer to load.

keep in mind cache, once that page is cached you should'nt have to worry about load times..

take care
Marc

[Googlewhacked]

Just to make sure that I have my brain around this issue, could someone check this over for me before I go tweaking all my files?

Problem:
-=-=-=-=-
Google is splitting PR between the domain (www.foo.com) and the home page (www.foo.com/index.htm*, default.*, etc). When internal links are pointing to the home page, Google is giving that page a certain PR. However, Google is giving the PR from any external links to the domain name, and ignoring the home page.

Solution:
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To get around this, all links to the "home page" should point either to the domain (excluding the home page name in the link reference), or should point to the root WWW folder for the site (typically using "/", or "../" if there are pages in a subfolder).

This also sounds like it could tie into the whole LocalRank thing too. Any thoughts?

Thanks all!!

- GW

[csjavi]

Solution:
-=-=-=-=-
To get around this, all links to the "home page" should point either to the domain (excluding the home page name in the link reference), or should point to the root WWW folder for the site (typically using "/", or "../" if there are pages in a subfolder).

Yes. All links to home page should point to www.foo.com/ (don't forget the trailing slash) or '/'. If a relative link starts with '/', the link is always relative to the base address. The base address is normally your root. You don't need '../' or anything like that. If a relative link doesn't start with '/', the link is relative to the current directory. Does that make sense?

An example:
On page www.foo.com/bar/something.html
the link /other.html points to www.foo.com/other.html
the link other.html points to www.foo.com/bar/other.html

Setting the base address to something other than the root obviously makes a mess of the whole thing. Tip: Be very careful with the base tag.