9 replies to this topic

[ircanalyst]

Recently, our company's Web site moved from a frames-based design to an ASP-based design, in order to consolidate/simplify the editing process on our site. We use a SQL server to modify and automatically update page content, intra-site links and expiration dates.

Since the upload, however, we have suffered a significant loss in Google PageRank on almost all of our pages; EXCEPT the homepage. When I went back to compare the HTML between old pages and new pages, the first thing I noticed was that our new pages had a much larger total wordcount. After closer review, I determined that the keyword density was seriously diminished, because the new non-frames pages contained all the header HTML in the page, whereas the older frames-pages had a separate file for calling on header information.

Am I correct in thinking that the inclusion of header information into the pages themselves dilutes the keyword density? Could this really constitute an ADVANTAGE (hardly imaginable) for a frames-based site?

Please advise.

Kind regards,

Walter Stevenson
www.insight-corp.com

[dimok]

Am I correct in thinking that the inclusion of header information into the pages themselves dilutes the keyword density?

I think NO if you speaking about meta info and the same. BTW, what do you mean by the "header information"?

Could this really constitute an ADVANTAGE (hardly imaginable) for a frames-based site?

I believe NO.

[ircanalyst]

By header information, I mean the logo/branding/navigation information that is organized across menu tabs across the top of EVERY page. There is also a sidenavigation bar on the left of EVERY page. Both the navigational menu at the top and at the side include extensive javascript, also written into EVERY page. By the time the actually relevant (and keyword-rich) page-specific content begins in the HTML, SEs have already scanned through 1,000 words.

[dimok]

ircanalyst, you can put Javascripts into the separate file.

Now I suppose, this can cause lower ranks, but not so much. I recomend not to worry about that.

[robwatts]

ircanalyst

I'd ignore your pagerank tool bar rating. Recent changes and new pages take a while to even out.

Provided you have applied good seo principles then you should be fine.

As dimok says, it may also be a good idea to put css and javascripts into external files.

If the links in your new pages rely entirely on javascript, then I'd also suggest using a noscript tag, to display the relevant links.

[Scottie]

Loss of Pagerank is one thing; it's not a reliable indicator. Have you actually moved down in the rankings?

[dimok]

Hi!

There is a trick with left side menu

Try this:

<table>
<tr>
	<td></td>
	<td rowspan="2">main textmain textmain textmain textmain textmain textmain textmain textmain textmain textmain textmain textmain textmain textmain textmain textmain textmain textmain textmain textmain textmain textmain textmain textmain textmain textmain textmain textmain textmain textmain textmain textmain textmain textmain textmain textmain textmain textmain textmain textmain textmain textmain textmain textmain textmain textmain textmain textmain textmain textmain textmain textmain textmain textmain textmain textmain textmain textmain textmain textmain</td>
</tr>
<tr>
	<td valign="top">menu</td>
	<td></td>
</tr>
</table>

I hope, you catch the point

[ircanalyst]

1) I guess I used the wrong word; sorry! The actual RANK on Google (not Pagerank in the toolbar) for many pages went down from a number of #1s to a number of #30s-#50s. The homepage, however, still has a VERY strong rank for optimized keywords. The header/menu and sidenav/menu are optimized for homepage keywords, although the these menus appear on all of the pages. This means that the homepage keywords are written into the menus for all pages, irrespective of these individual pages' different keywords.

2) Most of the Javascript and all of the CSS are already in separate files. The sidenav is its own table, using INCLUDE commands from ASP. Responders may want to look at the source code for www.insight-corp.com to get a better feel for some of the complex coding taking place. I should have prefaced my concern by pointing out that these measures have already been taken.

P.S. I don't think I caught the point. Is rowspan="2" significant?

[dimok]

I don't think I caught the point. Is rowspan="2" significant?

The trick is that menu is lower in the code than the main text, i.e. closer to the begining of the page.

many pages went down from a number of #1s to a number of #30s-#50s

I do not think this was caused by merging to non-framed design.

BTW, check keywords density and the same for the pages

[Jill]

Am I correct in thinking that the inclusion of header information into the pages themselves dilutes the keyword density? Could this really constitute an ADVANTAGE (hardly imaginable) for a frames-based site?

No, this would be incorrect.

Could it simply be that the search engines haven't indexed your new unframed pages yet? If they have and they're not ranking well, try playing around with the copy, the keyword phrases, and the Title tags. But make sure you don't play too much. You need to give it time to really see how it will do.

Jill

P.S. Welcome to the forum!