Back in August we blogged about Google’s Caffeine ‘next-generation infrastructure’ change, and if Caffeine fits the bill for better search. Recently search insiders stated the index is now live on one of Google’s data centers, with a full roll out expected just after the holidays. Many are speculating that this update will be a vast overhaul and your site just may be affected.
So what can you do to prepare? The below 5 website ingredients should seriously be evaluated and with our list of suggested tools you can do most of the evaluating yourself!
1.) Pour in 2 heaping cups of page load speed: At Pubcon this year Matt Cutts explicitly stated that website speed is important to user experience. We all know that generally if it involves user experience Google has, or will, find a way to incorporate it into their algorithm. Test your page speed with one of these resources:
Google Page Speed Firefox/Firebug add-on, or
iWebTool’s Speed Test tool.
2.) Sift out the lumps from the mixture: For several years now Google has maintained their stance on spammy links: they don’t like them and they penalize for them. Check your backlinks, but be forewarned: some low quality sites may not show up in backlink checkers. If and when you do find out about these "lumpy" sites ask the site administrator to take down your links. A few backlink checkers include:
BackLink Watch,
iWebTool’s Backlink Checker,
Smart PageRank, and
Yahoo Site Explorer.
3.) Knead your website to fix broken links: Obvious as it might seem, broken links take away from the online user experience. Surprisingly many don’t fix broken links within their site, as it can be tedious to find them in the first place. Find your broken links with:
Link Checker,
LinkTiger, or
DeadLinks and "knead" them immediately.
4.) Don’t forget to garnish, but not overly so: The quality and presentation of your site is always a factor, but with the Caffeine update its possible the new algorithm will delve deeper. Having just a few ranking factors in place isn’t enough. Optimized content, stellar website design, easy navigation, great inbound links, low bounce rate, and video/photo components will all be important. Our series of
SEO videos can help with a few of these components.
5.) Slice it into edible pieces, and serve it….with a smile: Get active on social networks, bookmarking sites, etc. Having a variety of links back to your site is one element for SEO success, and with the integration of live search into Google there is likely to be an even greater emphasis. So what can you do? Participate in social networks, communicate what your site is all about in bite size chunks (for easier digestion of course!), and work on the overall branding of your site. Look at having profiles on this list of
social networking websites, getting bookmarks on a few of these
125 social bookmarking sites, and if you have to (for time’s sake) submitting your website with social bookmarking tools like
SocialMarking, or
SubmitEdge.
During the holidays spend time with your family, but also don’t forget to spend a little time with your website.
Kaila is a Sr. Account Manager at Vertical Measures. She works directly with clients to evaluate and analyze their overall Internet Marketing needs, creates sales proposals and recommendations. In addition she regularly reports on client rankings, gives SEO advice to brands in a variety of industries and manages client expectations.
Kaila has a background in social media marketing, link building, SEO and content marketing. She’s an active blogger on SearchEngineWatch.com, and an avid social media user (@cliquekaila on Twitter). She brings her experience to the table with new clients and enjoys writing about her experiences as well here on the VM blog and throughout the web.
Website – Twitter – More Posts
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Tags: backlinks, Google, google caffeine, social bookmarking, yahoo site explorer
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on Tuesday, December 22nd, 2009 at 7:32 am and is filed under Search Engine Optimization.
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December 31st, 2009 at 6:14 pm
Thanks for just creating a spam roadmap. This is just silly. 80 million sites all bookarking themselves. How’s that of any help to the engines. FAIL.
December 31st, 2009 at 11:14 am
Thanks for just creating a spam roadmap. This is just silly. 80 million sites all bookarking themselves. How’s that of any help to the engines. FAIL.
January 2nd, 2010 at 12:32 pm
[...] Another change we plan to make this year (beginning in about February) is to really focus on posting current, original Web 2.0 content that other bloggers will want to link to, and increase the number of quality incoming links (back-links). [...]
September 8th, 2011 at 9:27 am
Some truly great articles on this site , thankyou for contribution.