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High Rankings Advisor: How deep can spiders crawl - Issue No. 050April 9, 2003 ________________________________________________________
~~~IN TODAY'S ADVISOR~~~ *Introductory Comments: ----> All for the Price of Chocolate *Search Engine Marketing: ----> How Many Levels Deep? *This Week's Sponsor: ----> Award-winning IBP Software ----> Nitty-gritty of Writing for the Search Engines *Guest Article: ----> Getting Organized with Usability Checklists *Other SEO News: ----> Atlanta Half-day SEO Basics Seminar ----> New Yahoo Search *This Week's Sound Advice: ----> Misconceptions About Google PageRank *Advisor Wrap-up: ----> Anybody Know Mother Nature's Number? ________________________________________________________ ~~~Introductory Comments~~~ Hey guys! It's the 50th issue! Got more good stuff for you today. I finally got around to answering a question that I see a lot in the forums, i.e., can pages many levels down in the directory structure get spidered? Plus, we've got the second installment to Kim's usability series of articles. Good stuff. All this just for the price of a little chocolate. What? You haven't sent me your chocolate yet? Okay, you can't read any further then. ;-) For the rest of you who've been good and sent your chocolate...on to the good stuff! - Jill ~~~Search Engine Marketing Issues~~~ ++How Many Levels Deep?++ From: Jeff Laurie Jill -- Congratulations on the spectacular success you've achieved in the SEO world. I understand that spiders only go to the second level of a site. Unfortunately, all of our 413 previous newsletter issues are on the third level of the site. If I put a page on the second level -- an archive with links to the individual issues -- would spiders follow and index the links to the third level? Thanks a lot in advance. Keep up the great work. Jeff ~~~Jill's Reply~~~ Hi Jeff, Actually, the spiders will go to any depth of a site, not just the second level. However, they don't place as much emphasis on pages within the site that take more than a couple of clicks to get to from the main page. It's not the physical directory structure that slows the spiders down, but really the number of clicks it takes to get to the pages. In other words, say you have a page that's four-levels deep in the directory structure like this: yoursite.com/dir1/dir2/dir3/dir4/deep-page.htm. Let's also say that there's no link to that page from the home page. Let's go even further and say there's no link to that page from the next level of pages (which would be common for a page buried four-directory levels deep). Let's say that people don't generally find that page (when starting at the home page) until they've clicked through from three other levels of the site. That page is pretty hard to find! It's the same for the search engine spiders. Very often they take a really fast crawl through your site and don't bother to fetch pages that are hard to find. Sure, they may get to those pages eventually when they're in the mood for a deep crawl, but it won't happen very often. Now let's take that same page and put a link to it from the home page of the site. It's still physically four directory levels deep, but it only takes one click for a person to find it. With that scenario, the search engine spiders will also be able to easily find it! Now, there are of course exceptions to this rule. If other sites happen to link to your deep page from one of their top-level pages, it can have a similar effect as if you did. But you can't control how others link to you, so don't leave it up to chance! If you have a deep page that changes often, and you want to ensure that the latest version is apt to be spidered and indexed, then make it easy to find. Your best bet to ensure all your content gets spidered is to create a sitemap that lists all your pages, and then link it visibly and directly from the home page of your site. Hope this helps! Jill _______________________________________________Adv. What are the top 10 ranking sites doing that you're not? _______________________________________________ Award-winning IBP Software quickly provides you with the answers. Choose your search engine, plug in your URL and keywords, then sit back while IBP analyzes more than 77 ranking items that the top sites are using and you're not! Follow the easy-to-understand optimization report to place your site at the top of the engines where it belongs! Learn more here: <http://Axandra.com/get-results.htm>. _______________________________________________ ~~~Guest Article~~~ ++Getting Organized with Usability Checklists++ The second part of our "Being Tops with Your Users and the Search Engines" series by Kim Krause has to do with the organization of your site. In order to design a fully functioning site that is highly usable by all, it's got to be organized. To make it easier for us scatterbrained individuals who wouldn't know organization if it smacked us between the eyes, Kim uses the analogy of producing a play! Here's what she recently told me about this: "The way I came to view Quality Assurance User Interface and Usability testing for websites was to visualize each step as if producing a play. There is a plot, set, scenes, characters and audience." So let's sit back and relax while Kim shares her "website design play" and explains how she puts it all together through the magic of checklists! Being Tops with Your Users and the Search Engines Part 2 - Getting Organized With Usability Checklists By Kimberly Kopp Krause The Plot - What Your Site Is About Your plot is the story you want to tell about your business. To create it, take the goals and objectives from your "Business Requirements" document (see Part 1 </issue049.htm#guest>) and write a short paragraph describing what your website is going to be about. Don't be afraid to add some drama to it to make it interesting. Here's an example: "Health Wise Products Inc., well established in Villageplace, Idaho, launched several products and services for its medical practice clients. Due to BigShot Health Company Inc.'s recent decision to move their headquarters to the same town, Health Wise CEO Marvin Smart introduced a new product line for patients. In an extraordinary move, he also added a pet psychic to provide online therapeutic services for pet owners using online software for purchases." This plot hints at long-term goals, target market, competition, target area (local vs. global site), reputation and the need to build an intuitive website to fulfill software requirements for online purchasing. All this is in one tidy paragraph! Brainstorming sessions for developing plots is not only fun, but also it helps everyone to start thinking creatively about the project. The Characters - Developing a User Character A user character is a person you develop and imagine as someone who is likely to use your web site. These user characters help you determine how usable your site because they may use it in ways you may not have thought of when being yourself. Developing user characters is similar to creating the characters for a play. Characters often develop further as the story unfolds. Your user persona will also morph, depending on the tasks to be performed. To come up with a user character you'll need to ask these questions: * What are the demographics of your user (e.g., gender, age, income)? * What is their main role in life (e.g., single parent, student, military, PhD, youth, hermit, CEO)? * Are they computer-literate (e.g., define all expected computer experience levels, including operating systems, browser types, Mac or PC, etc.)? * What motivates them in life and what will motivate them on your website (e.g., if they're a purchasing agent, what does your site provide to make their online bargain hunting easier)? * What are the main tasks they will perform on your site? * What are their goals? * Do they have special needs? * Are they more apt to research via search engines or through print? (e.g., are they brand-conscious, can they spell, do they know how to search with keywords to get good results?) User characters can be highly specific, all the way down to what they had for breakfast, if they missed their train that day and whether they are multi-task oriented or suffer from Attention Deficit Disorder. If you compile a number of personality types they can actually "tell" you what they need and want from your site if you take a moment to get into their heads. The Setting - Where It All Takes Place This is where you decide the look and feel of your website. You may think this is the easiest part, but in fact, this area demands strict attention to detail and draws from many related fields. You'll need search engine optimization, graphics, programming, HTML, marketing and security skills, as well as knowledge of hardware and software, the Internet, design standards, copywriting and even a bit of Internet law. To review your website's setting, you'll need a checklist of areas to inspect: * Stickiness: what attracts users and keeps them coming back? * Content: is it authentic, credible and readable? * User interface: what are the heuristics, colors, fonts and design elements? * Customer service: is there a place for feedback? Are there incentives? Are pages printable? * Security: is the data and the server secure? Is there a privacy policy in place? * Form design: can international users fill out all form fields? * Accessibility: can special-needs visitors access all parts of the site? * CYA (Cover Your Asset): Is the product one that won't crash the users' computers? Is the name trademarked and are patents registered? Design your test cases based on your "business and functional requirements" to make sure each of them were met. Scenes - Navigation Every story has certain shared elements, such as a preface, introduction, climax and conclusion -- with scenes that twist and turn in between. With your website, the story is told by navigational links that take the user to what they need to know and do. You can create your scenes by designing hubs at the top level, such as "About Us" and "Products and Services." Templates that change depending on the different category themes designate a new "scene" in your layout. In a play, each scene has acts; so do the hubs of your website. For the "About Us" hub, Act One might be "Press Releases," Act Two might be "White Papers" and so on. The scene doesn't change but the topic switches and your character (the user) is sucked deeper into your story (the website). Diagramming your navigation through storyboards or even just on paper will help you stay organized and focused. The Audience - Who Is Paying the Bill The audience includes the owner of the website, the stakeholders, along with competitors, search engines, and other sites that may want to link to yours. Well-run companies don't proceed on projects until their stakeholders sign off on the business and functional requirements at each stage of the development cycle. If you're a solo designer or small team, try to use that same strict focus on organization, planning and attention to detail -- and you will be rewarded with a dream website that sells! Here are some free checklists: Directory submission, homepage elements and website promotion checklists: <http://www.cre8pc.com/webrescue.html>. User Character (Persona) Checklists: * Designing for the Multiple Personalities of Users <http://www.uie.com/Articles/multiple_personalities.htm>, * Personas: Matching a Design to the Users' Goals <http://world.std.com/~uieweb/Articles/personas.htm>, and * Perfecting Your Personas by Kim Goodwin, Director of Design <http://www.cooper.com/newsletters/2001_07/perfecting_your_personas.ht m>. Next Week - How To Obtain User Feedback Kimberly Kopp Krause Cre8pc: http://www.cre8pc.com Cre8asite Forums: http://www.cre8asiteforums.com _______________________________________________ "Keywords in your visible page copy are the KEY to High Rankings!" _______________________________________________ You can stick 'em in the Title tag and in the Meta tags. You can even stick 'em in the Alt tags and hyperlinks. But you won't see high rankings unless you stick 'em in the copy. Find out how in Jill's "Nitty-gritty of Writing for the Search Engines" </seo-writing.htm>. _______________________________________________ ~~~Other SEO News~~~ ++Jill's Half-day Atlanta SEO Basics Seminar++ Register here: </register.htm>. Okay guys, we're getting close to the cut-off point for the early-bird $50 off registration. If you want to meet me in Atlanta on May 16 and hear me spill my guts on everything that is SEO, it's time to register. After April 16th the price is set to go up to $299. I know I'm worth that extra $50, but why not save it for something else? The special $89 hotel rate also expires on April 16. Let's put it this way. There are not many ways to learn everything there is to know about search engine optimization for only $249. There just aren't. Even a one-hour phone consultation with me runs up to $600, and I can't cover everything on the phone in an hour. There's just no way. But I do cover *everything* in this seminar. I know it seems hard to believe, but if you are a beginner or advanced beginner trying to get high rankings for your site, then you seriously need to come to this seminar. Don't worry about being overwhelmed. That's why I'm keeping it to just a half-day. It's long enough to cover everything you really need to know, but not so long as to confuse you. I'm extremely confident that if you live within driving distance of Atlanta, you will absolutely, positively get your money's worth from this seminar. (And even if you gotta fly in, it's still gonna be worth it!) You can learn what's on the agenda here: </seminar>. Plus, don't forget about lunch! We still have spots left for the exclusive luncheon after the seminar. That's where you can ask me all questions you weren't able to ask in the class itself for whatever reason, and just have fun chatting with me and your peers. Oh yeah, and here's a little secret I've been saving. I've got some special guest stars who will be on hand. By now, you've all heard about my friend and SEO copywriter, Karon Thackston. Well, she's gonna be there, and I'm sure I can convince her to answer your copywriting questions if I ask her nicely. Plus, my other friend and link building specialist, Debra Mastaler, also just happens to be coming. I imagine we could eek out a few link-building tips from her too, if you're really good! I'm a bit behind schedule in lining up sponsors for the event, but you can most likely count on some search engine and/or product reps to be available also. I'll get back to you with more on that next week. Here's that registration link again: </register.htm>. ++New Yahoo Search++ Have you fooled around with the new "Yahoo! Search" yet? What d'ya think? Before discussing the particulars of Yahoo's changes, let me answer the question we've all been waiting months to find out, i.e., is Yahoo gonna dump Google now that they've purchased Inktomi? And the answer -- straight from the horse's mouth (to me in a phone conversation) -- is that they have no immediate plans to get rid of Google. They *are* working on ways to integrate Inktomi into various aspects of Yahoo, though. I was one of the lucky few who got a sneak preview last week, but I had to keep my mouth shut until now because it was under "embargo" till this week. I have to admit that I cheated. I told my husband about some of the features on Sunday cuz I was so excited! Shhhhh...don't tell Yahoo or I won't be on their A-list anymore! If you're one of those millions of people who have a Yahoo ID (is there anyone left who doesn't?), you probably spend some of your day at Yahoo already. I imagine that most of you use some of their many features such as their email or their news or perhaps like me you play their games or check the local weather. Do you then switch to Google when you need to search for something, or do you stick with Yahoo? I used to switch to Google most of the time. I like their cache feature and I really can't stand Yahoo's spammy directory results. But now, they've actually added the missing cache feature, plus a whole bunch of other cool stuff! Take the weather, for instance. Every time I wanted to check my local weather before, I had to search through the links at the top of Yahoo to find the one that said "weather." (I know, I could have bookmarked the specific weather page, but I don't check the weather all *that* much and it seemed like too much trouble.) Now, if I want to check the weather, I just type into the search box "weather ashland ma" and up pops the day's weather forecast! Pretty neat. I love shortcuts like that. Do you have a Yahoo email account? Just type in "mail!" (with the exclamation point as that's their shortcut symbol), and bingo -- you're brought directly to your email page. Want to play a nice game of "Dynomite"? Type in "games!" and you'll be brought to their main games page. (I tried "dynomite!" but it didn't bring me directly to the game.) They've got a brand-new search page to go along with all of this. You can go directly to it here: <http://search.yahoo.com>. It's very sparse (a good thing) and simply gives you a search box, plus the choice of Web, Directory, News, Yellow Pages, Images and Maps. If you haven't checked it out yet, you may want to take their grand tour here: <http://search.yahoo.com/tour>. To learn about the various shortcuts available, check out this page: <http://help.yahoo.com/help/us/ysearch/tips/tips-01.html>. The dictionary one is really cool too! ~~~This Week's Sound Advice~~~ ++Misconceptions About Google PageRank++ <http://www.whatsworking.biz/gfx/audio/sa-search.asx?hra> Don't forget, you can still purchase my audio CD of the entire "Sound Advice on Search Engine Optimization" series for the introductory price of only $29.95 (includes the bonus written transcript in a PDF file). Visit the Sound Advice site here: </soundadvice> for more info. ~~~Advisor Wrap-up~~~ Okay...now I know that things are crazy -- we've got snow again! Remember back in October I told you we had snow and even took a photo of our prettily colored fall trees covered with snow? </fallsnow.jpg> Well, it hasn't stopped since then! October-April. Sheesh. At this rate, it will be snowing on my birthday, July 4th. Now *that* will be a first! For my parents and sister, who live in Hawaii, I'm blowing a giant raspberry at you! Catch you next time! - Jill    |
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