Welcome to a somewhat unusual Friday review. Every Friday, I usually look for a website that's a bit of a fixer-upper and I suggest how to make it better. This week, as usual, I opened my Google Chrome browser in incognito mode and ran a search for "jewelry stores in Cairo GA."
There are certain search phrases that trigger specific search results formats, and normally when you search for a "jewelers in _____" or "jewelry stores in ____" Google activates the local results version of the SERP, but today it didn't.
Do you have a question about your own online marketing situation or feel perplexed about something specific on the internet? Send it to me and I'll answer it as a future Daily Golden Nugget if I can.
Shortly after posting my Friday website review on the morning of April 24, 2015, one of my email readers asked me a really viable question about the SERP results from that day's review. You can read the review VIEW FULL GOLD NUGGET
In this edition of #ThrowbackThursday, I'm jumping back to the topic of "thin content" that I first explained back in September 2011.
Thin Content Explained
In simple terms, thin content refers to a web page that has very few words on it. Google likes to refer to this content as pages "with little or... VIEW FULL GOLD NUGGET
The word "organic" is used to indicate something happening naturally in its environment, without outside influence that is deemed to be artificial or controlled. A quick look at the organic page on Wikipedia and you'll see that there are 28 different phrases for organic used in the English language.
All of the phrases refer to some type of natural growth or living thing that is grown according to certain standards. Orga... VIEW FULL GOLD NUGGET
According to Wikipedia, uptime "is a measure of the time a machine, typically a computer, has been working and available."
Interestingly enough, the Wikipedia page only explains Uptime in relation to the physical computer servers that run just about everything in the world now, but not about websites.
The day has finally come when you've decided to upgrade your website to the latest and greatest content management system and website design. It's a big decision to make that leap considering how much time it will take and the cost to do it. It might be months before the new site is live.
You're going to have a lot of things to worry about during the process of setting up the new site. Difficult design issues, photography concerns, ... VIEW FULL GOLD NUGGET
I was recently reviewing the "Links to Your Site" inside Google Webmaster Tools (WMT). You can find this report in your own Webmaster Tools account by clicki... VIEW FULL GOLD NUGGET
You might have noticed that yesterday a lot of very important (English) websites were blacked out or on strike. At last count there were 137 very large websites on strike with thousands of other smaller sites joining in. They were blocking their content to support the protest the internet censorship bills, SOPA and PIPA. More information is here: http://fightforthefuture.org/pipa
Whether you support SOPA/PIPA or not, it's the website blackouts that we'd like to call your attention to in this Daily Golden Nugget.
On January 16, 2011, just two days before the planned blackout, many website owners realized that turning off their website would be detrimental for their SEO. The blackout was planned for the full 24 hours of January 18, 2011.
Can a blacked out website harm your SEO, even if only for 24 hours?
The return on investment (ROI) of your website is difficult to measure without direct website selling. Without those online sales, it's difficult to determine how effective your website, and overall online marketing strategy is. One way to measure your ROI is to have a web form to request more information.
Online forms are limited only by your imagination and can have fields to request any tidbit of information you desire. Some jewelers will ask for a birthday and anniversary; some will ask for your favorite precious metal or gemstone; then of course you have the basic contact form that only asks for a name, email and to fill out a comments box.
It all depends on your needs but once the person fills out the form you might reward them with more information, or a downloadable newsletter, or perhaps access into a protected ... VIEW FULL GOLD NUGGET
Every day, the team over at Google's headquarters makes advances in Search Engine technology. A few years ago they announced the ability to read Flash websites, and then last year they further announced the ability to read deeper inside Flash websites.
Unfortunately, Flash websites still suffer from lower ranking than normal HTML websites.
In 2010, Google admitted that they have trouble reading websites that rely on JavaScript or AJAX. The Googlebot spider is not able to provide the user input needed to display website information that to us would be very simple to interact with.
The result is that websites with heavy JavaScript and AJAX programming are penalized similar to Flash websites. A simple home page rotating image is nothing to worry about, but you should worry if all the menus on your website rely on Java... VIEW FULL GOLD NUGGET
"...articles are easy to follow and seem to have information one can use right away." -Ann, Gallery 4, Hamden CT
"...serious kudos to you. We love your straight talk, pertinent information and plain language. I don't know how many industries have something of jWAG's caliber available, but I learn from the emails every day. Really, really nice work, and very appreciated." -Cheryl Herrick, Global Pathways Jewelry
