December 9,
2004
In
This Issue:
1. More SEO Teachings from Yahoo
2. In the News - Google Domains, Yahoo at Home
3. More News Headlines
4. This Week's Q&A - Using competitor names in keywords
5. Wrapping It Up
_________________
More SEO Teachings from Yahoo
Last week we talked in this space about a handful of excellent
PowerPoint presentations related to web development and SEO that
Yahoo made available for anyone to read. They're at it again this
week with still more good information about the same issues. This
time it's in the form of an interview with Tim Converse, an engineering
manager at Yahoo whose job is to "make search results more
relevant." In other words, this guy is right there at the
forefront of the algorithm Yahoo uses to rank web pages. So when
he talks, it's worth listening.
The Yahoo Search blog just completed a 2-part interview/profile
with Tim, which includes a couple nuggets I'll pull out for the
newsletter.
First, "RCFP." In discussing how Yahoo separates the
good pages from the spam, Tim shares this:
"...the challenge is identifying and appropriately ranking
it all.
The big things for us are "relevance," "comprehensiveness," "freshness," and "presentation." That's "RCFP" and
it's kind of our mantra. I'm much more focused on the "R" part
of the relevance, although we have a whole group of scientists
and modelers who are totally devoted to relevance too. My buddies
in my group who work on crawling and indexing are focused on
comprehensiveness and freshness as well."
So right there is a 4-part guide to what will rank well in Yahoo.
It mirrors what we've talked about in this newsletter and on
OWTweb.com in the past -- keep your web site updated regularly
("fresh")
with quality ("comprehensive"), relevant content.
The second thing Tim discusses that I want to mention here offers
more specifics about keeping a web page updated with fresh content.
It's a question we discuss often with clients, many of whom ask
if they can get away with just changing a picture or two, or
maybe rewriting the first paragraph to make a page look "fresh." The
answer? No.
"YQ: When you're looking for things that are changing
on the page, what are you specifically talking about? I'm sure
it's
not enough
to just change a hidden date stamp in a footer.
A: Yes, It's more than that. Most of the web is just static
even without there being date stamps. We do have a more nuanced
notion
of what it means to change so we can detect a trivial change
from a significant one. We can tell a major change from a
trivial one."
The whole interview is worth a read, although it's not all blood-and-guts
about Yahoo's ranking methods.
Part 1: Interview with Tim Converse
Part 2: Interview with Tim Converse _________________
In The News
Google's New Domains
While Google competes against Yahoo in search, and is going after
Microsoft on the desktop, it looks like they may also have their
sights set on a fight with Amazon.com in the shopping arena, too.
On December 1st, Google registered three new domains:
googleshoppinglist.com
googlereviews.com
googlewishlist.com
You can imagine them adding wish list and review features right
into their Froogle shopping search engine, which would make
it a much more Amazon-like piece of the web.
Yahoo at Home (Google, too)
If you love Yahoo, here's one right up your alley: Yahoo-branded
DVD players and home electronics. Yahoo is extending its
brand into your home with a line of electronics that carries
that
Yahoo logo. If Google is more your style, they've been
selling Google-branded
products for a while now. But instead of home electronics,
you'll have to settle for umbrellas, wristwatches, and
even boxer shorts.
How soon until Christmas?
Yahoo Licensed Products
Google Store
_________________
More News Headlines
Here are a few news headlines worth your time to read.
These are just some of the headlines we've posted
to OWTweb.com in recent
days.
Search marketing: Cart? Horse?
December 06, 2004 - Net Imperative
Conversion rates for both shopping carts and search marketing
December 03, 2004 - Internet Retailer
Is Google PageRank for real?
December 02, 2004 - Search Engine Guide
Industry watchers and professional search engine marketers have
believed for quite some time that the PageRank displayed
within the Google toolbar was not the most accurate representation
of a site's link popularity. More headlines: http://www.owtweb.com/news/
_________________
This Week's Q&A
Hi Matt,
I know the "keywords" meta tag isn't very important anymore,
but we still use it on our site to be safe. I'm wondering if it's
okay to include the names of our competitors in our keywords meta
tag. Chris
Hi Chris --
I'd recommend against doing this more so because of potential
legal issues than because of search engine issues. There
have been several
meta tag trademark infringement lawsuits brought over the
years, and you might be risking one, too. I'm no legal expert,
but
from what I understand the courts tend to examine the intent
behind
the use of another company's trademarked name in your meta
tags. If the intent is to deceive or mislead web searchers,
you could
be in a lot of trouble.
On the other hand, if you have a page on your site devoted
to comparing your red widgets to your competitions' red
widgets, and you name
your competitors on the page the public sees, it would
make sense
to include the company names in your meta tags for that
page. My guess is that a use like that would be okay, but you should
see
an attorney who understands internet law to be sure. (Have a question? Email questions@owtweb.com)
_________________
Wrapping it Up
We're a day late on the newsletter this week thanks to me playing
Mr. Mom Wednesday with a sick child. I'm going to try to stick
to the regular publishing schedule, but with the holidays coming
up (and the fact that the McGee kids get sick a lot in winter),
we may be hit and miss for a while.
Thanks for reading,
Matt McGee
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