Central Perk

miercuri, 6 august 2014

Retaining SEO Value in Syndicated Content and Partnerships

Posted: 05 Aug 2014 05:14 PM PDT

Link exchanges vs. partnerships

Six years ago, Yahoo! was called out (on this very blog!) for buying text links. Being the lone SEO at Yahoo! in the US at the time, training, teaching, guiding and policing all of the people involved in over a dozen Yahoo! Media websites, my heart stopped when I saw this post. The thing is, though, I knew the biz dev team at Yahoo! had absolutely no concept of link exchanges for SEO (that said, I have no idea about Great Schools – those were some nice anchor text links).

While most SEOs work on link relationships, most biz dev folks, especially in mid to larger sized online companies, work on business relationships. Every Yahoo! property had biz dev folks who were actively making deals to work with other sites for things like:

Access to complimentary content that Yahoo! didn't have on the site (like the partnership between Yahoo! Real Estate and Great Schools in that example).
Exchanging content or links in hopes of getting more visibility and traffic, like the links to partners Heavy and Bleacher Report at the bottom of Mandatory.com's site.
Syndicating content to other sites for more visibility, like Eventbrite's events syndicated out to distribution partners, or receiving syndicated content in order to provide more content to the visitors, like mom.me's content from SheKnows or StyleList.

Most biz dev at Yahoo! was done horribly wrong in the SEO sense actually, with links in JavaScript or content in iFrames, or linking out to more SEO-savvy partners who were nofollowing their links back. So I set out to educate Yahoo! biz devs with the powerful opportunities they were missing with this guide to retaining SEO value in partnerships (updated for today's biz devs). I still use it often for the larger companies I work with, and I hope some of you find it useful for your clients or yourselves as well.

Note that it's very important, whether you're an SEO working with biz devs or you're a biz dev working on partnerships, that the things mentioned below are thoroughly considered before writing and signing a contract with a partner, since some of these things will need to be spelled out in the contract, and oftentimes negotiated.

Any additional ideas are gladly welcome in the comments!

The importance of SEO in partnerships

Search engines follow links across the web to discover and classify content. The content and context of pages linking to each other is taken into consideration in classifying content and surfacing it in search results.

Consider these factors that contribute to a site and/or page's ranking:

Links = votes

Links to a site are treated like votes to the site/page. The quality, quantity and context of the links from one page to another are used by search engines in classifying and ranking a page.

Links = relationships

Any pages linking to each other are related to each other. This can include links in articles, in footers, in content modules and in comments among others. This can be helpful when related content links to each other (on the same site or across different sites). This can be damaging when receiving links from low-quality, spammy sites (typical in link-building) or linking to low-quality or spammy sites (typical in UGC comments).

Syndication = content duplication

Any time the same or very similar content populates the majority of more than one page on the internet, there is a good chance that the duplicates will be hidden from search results. The search engine will attempt to pick/choose the best version of the duplicate for searchers and hide the rest so other content options can appears in the search results.

Search engines can't always determine content source

When there is more than one version of the same content, search engines will try to determine the source and provide that in search results. Oftentimes when content is syndicated, the source does not actually rank first, especially if a small or newer site is syndicating out to larger, older and/or more popular sites with more activity.

Best practices for linking to partners

This depends on the nature of the partnership & competition. Consider what should be written into the contract ahead of time.

Options for linking to competitive content on partner sites (you are trying to rank for/drive traffic for the same thing as the partner):
- Don't link: If you don't need to link to the competitive content on the partner site, don't do it.
- Add Nofollow: Adding a nofollow tag on the link (in the code) tells search engines that you may not trust what is on the other end of that link, so you're not officially "voting" for it. Not linking to/voting for the partner content can potentially help in preventing it from outranking yours. This may need to be negotiated, since it's possible both parties will want links without a nofollow on it.
- JavaScript Links: You can link to the partner with the link in JavaScript code. Search engines often pick up on JavaScript links today, but still more often ignore it (so far).
Options for non-competitive content (you are not trying to rank for/drive traffic for the same thing):
- Link freely and naturally, in ways that work best for user experience.

Best practices for getting links from partners

For any inbound links from partners (in articles, content modules, on the site, etc), check how the links will be treated, and make sure the treatment specifications you want are written in the contract. Here are suggested options:

Require a link: Require that the article links back to the original on your site. This can be text link "[Article Title] originally appeared on yoursite.com", with the article title being the hyperlink back to the original article. Make sure the link goes to the original article URL on your site, and not to the home page.
Check the links from their site to yours:
- No nofollow tags on links from the partner site to yours: This may need to be negotiated (for the same reasons as we're saying to add nofollows on links from your site to partner sites above). Nofollow tags typically don't pass value to the destination page.
- No links in JavaScript: Since links in JavaScript typically aren't crawled and/or utilized in ranking by search engines, links to your site from partners that are in JavaScript wouldn't provide the value to your site/page that a regular crawlable text link would.
- No links as images: The best link is a keyword-rich link. A linked image (even if the image is of text), may not be interpreted the same and will often not carry as much weight as a text link. Images may have alt attributes that describe the image (which search engines take into account) but that does not carry as much weight as a regular text link.
- No 302 redirects on links: When Google encounters a 302 redirect it keeps the original page in the index and doesn't pass PageRank onto the destination URL (since a 302 redirect is technically a temporary redirect). Do not allow partners to send the link through a 302 redirect to your site.
- Keywords in links: When possible, try to have partners link to your page(s) using relevant anchor text. The anchor text of a link provides context for search engines and can help a page rank for that text. For example, if a partner is linking to your article about The Best Geeky Books of 2011, make sure they use the title of the article The Best Geeky Books of 2011 (or something similar and relevant) as the link text rather than something vague like click here or visit our partner (that's not what you want to rank for).
- Linking 1:1 relationships: Make sure that links from partner pages go to the most relevant pages on your site. Do not just have them link to your home page. If possible, link to related articles or similar content. This helps provide context for search engines, provides a better experience for users, and can help bring visibility to deeper pages on your site.
Check canonical tags: Check the canonical tag in the head section of the code on the articles you've syndicated to partners. Make sure that canonical points to the article on your site. Otherwise there should ideally be no canonical tag.
Specify linking and redirect rules: Specify rules for what domains should and should not be linking and redirecting to your site. A partner may want to redirect some old domains as part of a package of sites in their network that can send traffic to your site, but this might actually hurt your site's performance in Google. Rankings and traffic should be tested any time a new domain is redirected to the site.

Content sharing/syndication best practices

For content syndicated from your site to a site on another domain or subdomain

Important considerations

Deep linking within your content: When possible (and user-friendly), provide links in your article/blog content to other areas on your site that are referred to in the content. For example, in an article about The San Francisco Giants Suspension of Guillermo Mota on a sports site, link the first mention of Guillermo Mota in the article back to the Guillermo Mota page on your website. Do not overdo it – only provide links where readers might want more information and only the first instance. User experience should always come first.
Absolute URLs: Make sure links in your content that is being syndicated are absolute (full URL) not relative (partial URL). Relative URL links in syndicated content will link back to the partner site, whereas absolute URL links will link back to your site.
No parameters: If possible, do not add parameters onto links in content you're syndicating out. Search engines see parameters as a different URL. If you must use parameters, make sure the correct treatment of parameters is specified in Webmaster Tools.
No link stripping: Make sure the partners are not stripping/removing links that are in your content once it's on their site.

Highly Recommended Considerations (that may need to be negotiated)

Rel=canonical: Require that the partner add the rel=canonical tag to the head of pages specifying the article URL on your site as the canonical. This tells search engines that of these duplicates, the one at your site is the canonical, or primary version.
Publish first: Publish the content you'll be syndicating on your own site before allowing partners to publish it. This can help identify your site as the source (and also generate more links from other sites and social networks).
Limited text syndication: You can allow partners to show a limited amount of text and then have the readers click to view all/more, bringing them to your site. This allows the full article to only live on your site and is also a better traffic driver.
Noindex: Allow the partners to syndicate the content on their site but they must add a noindex tag to the header of those pages on their site. This will allow their site visitors to view and share the content, but the content will not be crawled by search engines.

Links in blog and editorial content being syndicated

Editors: Editors can link straight to the end destination in blog posts and articles (whoever they're linking to has earned it). No special linking rules to follow.
Developers:
- Absolute URLs: Make sure all links in content being syndicated out are absolute URLs (the link is the full URL). This way when the article is picked up in other places the link is not broken, and it links back to your site.
- Parameters: If using parameters on links (not recommended unless necessary), make sure to specify how Google should treat those parameters in Google Webmaster Tools.
- No nofollows: Do not add the nofollow tag to links in content you're syndicating out (if you control the HTML).

Links in user generated content (UGC) on your site

This depends on the nature of the UGC content.

Comment links: Links are ideally not allowed in comments because of the potential for comment spam. If they are allowed they should always have a nofollow tag (placed on the link in the code).
Options for profiles and other UGC content:
- If content is not moderated, allow links as text only (not hyperlinked) or not at all.
- If content is moderated, links should be ok, but moderators should be trained in how to recognize and combat link spam, as it can easily look like natural linking.

For more information

Cross-domain canonical tags:
http://googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.com/2009/12/handling-legitimate-cross-domain.html

Nofollow tags:
http://support.google.com/webmasters/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=96569

Absolute vs. Relative URLs:

What they are: http://webdesign.about.com/od/beginningtutorials/a/aa040502a.htm
In SEO: http://www.seroundtable.com/archives/017338.html
NoIndex and x-robots tags: https://developers.google.com/webmasters/control-crawl-index/docs/robots_meta_tag

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Video: "A Good Partner, an Equal Partner, and a Partner for the Long Term"

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"A Good Partner, an Equal Partner, and a Partner for the Long Term"

Yesterday, President Obama spoke to a crowd that included 50 African leaders, at the U.S.-Africa Business Forum in Washington, D.C. The Business Forum was part of the historic three-day U.S.-Africa Leaders Summit -- the largest event any U.S. President has held with African heads of state and government.

The President highlighted Africa's impressive economic growth, and made clear that America will be a partner in its success -- "a good partner, an equal partner, and a partner for the long term."

Watch the President's remarks, and see how the U.S. is boosting economic ties with Africa.

Seth's Blog : Analytics without action

Analytics without action

Don't measure anything unless the data helps you make a better decision or change your actions.

If you're not prepared to change your diet or your workouts, don't get on the scale.

• Email to a friend •

marți, 5 august 2014

Mish's Global Economic Trend Analysis

Housing Insanity Japanese Style: Record Number of Vacant Homes in Japan, Abe Wants to Stimulate Home Building
Household Demographics 2003 vs. 2013: Spotlight on Age of Head of Household
Russia Ponders Russian Airspace No-Fly Zone for EU Commercial and Passenger Jets
China Services PMI Lowest Since 2005 as Housing Slumps; Manufacturing Expands

Housing Insanity Japanese Style: Record Number of Vacant Homes in Japan, Abe Wants to Stimulate Home Building

Posted: 05 Aug 2014 10:28 PM PDT

Thanks to a rapidly aging population, record numbers of Japanese homes sit vacant according to the July 30, 2014 Asian Review report Vacant Homes in Japan Reach Record as Outlying Population Shrinks.

A record 13.5% of all homes in Japan were unoccupied as of last October, reflecting an exodus from outlying regions of the country and a general aversion to used homes.

Preliminary figures for a study on homes and land, conducted once every five years, were released on Tuesday by the Internal Affairs Ministry. The vacancy rate rose 0.4 percentage point from the previous survey. The number of empty homes grew by 630,000 to a record 8.2 million, and there were a record 60.63 million homes in all, an increase of 3.05 million.

Yamanashi Prefecture had the highest vacancy rate at 22%, largely due to a population outflow to Tokyo and other large cities. Nagano and Wakayama prefectures followed at 19.8% and 18.1%, with the four prefectures in Shikoku all at the 17% level.

The concept of renovating homes to make them last longer is not firmly established in Japan, according to a ministry official. Real estate companies do not actively handle used homes because they are considered to have lower value than new homes.

An outdated tax system meant to promote construction of residences on farmland during Japan's high-growth era decades ago has been another obstacle. Landowners that tear down homes would see their fixed-asset taxes for that land roughly quadruple because a tax break would no longer apply. This has prompted many landowners to leave unoccupied homes as is.

Holes in Abenomics' Push for Housing

As is typical with Japanese economic absurdities, Abenomics is in the spotlight.

Flashback September 2013: Vacant Japan Homes Show Holes in Abenomics' Push for Housing

Broken wood pieces dangle and sway like autumn leaves from the window frames of vacant homes in Inariyato, part of Yokosuka in the greater-Tokyo urban area, where taped-over mailbox slots tell a story of abandonment.

More than 50 houses and apartments, almost 20 percent of the quaint residential neighborhood of narrow streets and stairway paths leading into green hills, are empty here, an hour's train ride south of Tokyo and 1,000 yards (900 meters) from the Yokosuka naval base, home of the U.S. Seventh Fleet. That hasn't stopped developers from building at least eight new apartment blocks in the same city in the past two years.

Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's plan to boost the economy in part by reviving the housing market and encouraging new home construction is in conflict with Japan's demographics. Rural, suburban and less-desirable urban areas are becoming littered with empty homes as younger people moving to cities combines with one of the world's fastest-aging populations. At the same time, tax breaks on mortgages favoring new-home purchases, recently extended to 2017 and increased to 50 million yen from 30 million yen, are spurring demand for new properties.

"Even when the number of vacant homes is on the rise, more and more new homes are being built," said Hidetaka Yoneyama, a senior researcher at Fujitsu Research Institute in Tokyo who has written at least five books on Japan's housing market. "That's absurd."

Absurdities

"That's Absurd" is a huge understatement, and not just for Japanese housing, but for Abenomics in general.

Mike "Mish" Shedlock
http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com

Household Demographics 2003 vs. 2013: Spotlight on Age of Head of Household

Posted: 05 Aug 2014 02:22 PM PDT

Here's a look at some interesting demographics, comparing 2003 vs. 2013.

Number of Households by Age of Head of Household 2013 vs. 2003

The next chart shows the change in number (in thousands), in the age of the head of household.

Change in Households by Age Group (2013 Minus 2003)

click on any chart for sharper view

I created the above charts from spreadsheet data reader Tim Wallace sent. The data is from the Census Department 213-page PDF 2013 Annual Social and Economic (ASEC) Supplement.

Two Key Points

3,516,000 more heads of households in age group 60-64 than in 2003
3,989,000 more heads of households in age group 65-74 than in 2003

And those are just heads-of-households, not individuals. The individual total would be much higher.

Aging boomers accounts for much but not all of the decline in labor force and participation rate. The recession made matters worse.

Finally, some of the semi-retired, only want to work part-time, explaining part of the surge in part-time employees.

We will have more charts of education levels, household wealth, and other items shortly.

Mike "Mish" Shedlock
http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com

Russia Ponders Russian Airspace No-Fly Zone for EU Commercial and Passenger Jets

Posted: 05 Aug 2014 11:01 AM PDT

The sanctions retaliation game took another big leap forward today with the EU in the spotlight:
Moscow May Force European Airlines to Fly Around Russia.

Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev threatened on Tuesday to retaliate for the grounding of a subsidiary of national airline Aeroflot because of EU sanctions, with one newspaper reporting that European flights to Asia over Siberia could be banned.

Low-cost carrier Dobrolyot, operated by Aeroflot, suspended all flights last week after its airline leasing agreement was cancelled under European Union sanctions because it flies to Crimea, a region Russia annexed from Ukraine in March.

The business daily Vedomosti reported that Russia may restrict or ban European airlines from flying over Siberia on Asian routes, a move that would impose costs on European carriers by making flights take longer and require more fuel.

Vedomosti quoted unnamed sources as saying the foreign and transport ministries were discussing the action, which would put European carriers at a disadvantage to Asian rivals but would also cost Russia money it collects in overflight fees.

At the height of the Cold War, most Western airlines were barred from flying through Russian airspace to Asian cities, and instead had to operate via the Gulf or the U.S. airport of Anchorage, Alaska on the polar route.

However, European carriers now fly over Siberia on their rapidly growing routes to countries such as China, Japan and South Korea, paying the fees which have been subject to a long dispute between Brussels and Moscow.

The daily quoted one source as saying a ban could cost carriers including Lufthansa, British Airways and Air France 1 billion euros ($1.3 billion) over three months.

However, state-controlled Aeroflot would also be hurt if it lost the fees. Aeroflot was the worst performing stock in Moscow on Tuesday, closing down 5.9 pct compared with a 1.4 percent drop on the broad index.

Lufthansa said it operates about 180 flights a week through Siberian airspace but declined further comment, as did British Airways.

Estimated Losses

Greek tourism expects the move to cost $400 million.
Travel from Ukraine down 50%
Lufthansa, British Airways and Air France expect 1 billion euros ($1.3 billion) over three months
Russian controlled Aeroflot would lose $300 million in flight fees it collects for flights over Russia

Lose-Lose Game

The nature of this lose-lose game is to inflict more damage on the other side than it costs your side.

Take that! No, you take that! Sanctions and retaliations are much like children pushing and shoving, and calling each other names on a school play lot.

Last week Russia struck at Poland, banning fruit and vegetable sales from that country. Russians will pay more for fruit, but Poland is the largest apple producer in the world, and 50% of that crop goes to Russia.

See How About Them Apples? for further discussion.

One would hope that bureaucrats would see the folly of sanctions, but EU bureaucrats egged on by president Obama are likely to do even stupider stuff than we have seen so far.

Russia may very well shut off natural gas to Europe this winter if sanction madness escalates out of control.

Simple Proposal

Isn't it time to have serious cease-fire discussions with all sides at the table instead of war, killing, and sanctions?

Mike "Mish" Shedlock
http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com

China Services PMI Lowest Since 2005 as Housing Slumps; Manufacturing Expands

Posted: 05 Aug 2014 01:00 AM PDT

An interesting divergence is underway in China with manufacturing in expansion while the service sector is at the lowest reading since November 2005 according to HSBC China Composite PMI

HSBC China Composite PMI™ data (which covers both manufacturing and services) signalled a third consecutive monthly expansion of Chinese business activity in July. That said, the rate of increase eased from June‟s 15-month high and was moderate overall. This was signalled by the HSBC Composite Output Index posting at 51.6 in July, down from 52.4 in the previous month. The latest expansion of composite output was led by manufacturers, as business activity at service providers was unchanged from the previous month. Furthermore, it was the strongest expansion of manufacturing output in 16 months. This contrasted with a stagnation of services activity, which was signalled by the HSBC China Services Business Activity Index posting at the no-change mark of 50.0 in July. This was down from 53.1 in June and the lowest index reading in the near nine-year series history.

Comment Commenting on the China Services and Composite PMI™ data, Hongbin Qu, Chief Economist, China & Co-Head of Asian Economic Research at HSBC said: "The headline HSBC China Services PMI came in at 50.0 in July, the lowest reading since the series began in November 2005. Both the new business and outstanding business indices declined from their levels in June. The weakness in the headline number likely reflects the impact of the ongoing property slowdown in many cities as property related activity, such as agencies and residential services, see less business. Meanwhile, the employment and business sentiment indices remain stable. In the coming months, we think the service sector may get some support from the recovery in investment. But today's data points to the need of continued policy support to offset the drag from the property correction and consolidate the economic recovery."

Clamoring for "Policy Support"

It's amusing to hear the continuous parade of chants for "policy support" that have fueled asset bubbles worldwide.

In China, the primary asset bubble is real estate, in the US, the primary asset bubbles are equities and junk bonds.

When the bubbles burst, people will want central banks to "do something".

Unfortunately, they already did, multiple times, which is precisely why the world has witnessed serial asset boom-bust bubbles of increasing amplitude in the last decade

Mike "Mish" Shedlock
http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com.

Why You Should Avoid Numbers in Your URL Graywolf's SEO Blog

Why You Should Avoid Numbers in Your URL

Posted: 05 Aug 2014 06:47 AM PDT

While linkbait posts aren’t as popular as they once were, top 10 lists have been popular ever since Moses came down from the mount with his top 10 list of “thou shalt nots.” Magazines like Rolling Stone will always have top 500 playlists and AFI will always publish top 100 movies lists. However, as a responsible publisher, marketer, and SEO ... [Continue reading Why You Should Avoid Numbers in Your URL]

The post Why You Should Avoid Numbers in Your URL appeared first on Graywolf's SEO Blog.

"A Legend at the White House"

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"A Legend at the White House"

Yesterday, former White House Press Secretary James Brady passed away in Alexandria, Virginia at the age of 73.

After being shot and almost killed in an assassination attempt on President Ronald Reagan in 1981, Brady recovered and became a symbol of the ongoing fight against gun violence. In a statement yesterday afternoon, President Obama expressed his condolences to Brady's family, calling him a "legend at the White House."

The Vice President also released a statement -- and later in the afternoon, current Press Secretary Josh Earnest and 11 of his predecessors penned a joint statement on the passing of James Brady.

Read the statements, and find out more about the passing of a White House legend.

President Barack Obama stops by Press Secretary Jay Carney's meeting with James Brady in Carney's West Wing office at the White House, March 30, 2011. Brady was former President Ronald Reagan's press secretary during the assassination attempt on President Reagan thirty years ago. Brady's wife Sarah, right, and son Scott, center, joined him for the meeting. (Official White House Photo by Pete Souza)

miercuri, 6 august 2014

Retaining SEO Value in Syndicated Content and Partnerships

Retaining SEO Value in Syndicated Content and Partnerships

Link exchanges vs. partnerships