8 replies to this topic

[praising_god_4ever]

I just figured out how to use mod-rewrite to make my dynamic pages look static. I'm wondering if it is possible to give each page a unique title. I was thinking I would do this with a php variable but I'm not sure if the spiders would see this.

Any thoughts?

[Jill]

Yes, you can and should make each title unique. In fact, it's one of the most important things you'll want to do. Much more important than having changed the URLs, imo.

[mickmel]

Agreed. Also, don't worry about things being inside of variable in PHP. Google doesn't see that -- they only see the HTML/CSS/JS that you output the browser. Proper use of PHP can help you give every page a proper title rather easily.

[praising_god_4ever]

Thanks so much Jill! I am thinking I would do this...can you let me know if I am on the right track?

include a php file that generates a title for the page and calls it $title.
Then incorporate $title into my <title> tag.

If I do it this way will google see the title?

[mickmel]

If I do it this way will google see the title?

Yep! If you ever wonder about things like this, just view the page source in a browser. Whatever you see there will be seen by Google.

[praising_god_4ever]

Excellent! Thanks guys!

[princezuda]

I hope no one minds me asking this question on this thread since it is related. I want to change the title of a document on the same page for example Joe shmoe clicks new shoes> all of the text and images change yet he's on the same exact page/link. Would it be SEO friendly to add a variable to change the title name so when Joe shmoe clicks new shoes the title changes along with all of the text and images? Again it is the same page, the same link just different info is shown. I just wanted to make that clear. Any responses are appreciated!

[Randy]

You're saying the URL address doesn't change at all princezuda? Are you using some sort of Javascript (client side) or server side POST to change the page without changing the URL? Or are we perhaps talking about a page in Frames or iFrames, in which the actual target page url is changing even though the displayed wrapped url isn't.

None of the above are the best possible situation for the search engines. They can at least crawl the Frame and iFrame pages, but they may end up showing the interior frames in their index. Which probably isn't what you want if the navigation and such is in the outer frame.

If it's driven by client side scripting the search engines probably aren't going to do much at all with it. They're just starting to parse some simple bits of Javascript, but what you're talking about is a lot more complicated. And if it's a POST type of html form, historically the engines aren't quite as keen to submit those.

We'd really need more information about how the page is built to give you a good answer to your question.

[Alan Perkins]

Would it be SEO friendly to add a variable to change the title name so when Joe shmoe clicks new shoes the title changes along with all of the text and images? Again it is the same page, the same link just different info is shown. I just wanted to make that clear.

No, that would not be SEO friendly. My rule of thumb is

Each piece of unique content, indexed once, at the best URL for it.

If you are changing the page title and content, then you need to be changing the URL too. Search engines won't index two (i.e. more than one) completely different page titles and contents at the same URL at the same time.