Category: Google

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Footer and Link Use Google Penalizes

Red Flag Warning
Red Flag Warning

In the changing world of earning placement on Google.com, Google has been fairly forthright in regards to what it now does not like and will actually penalize a website for doing. What is important to understand is that what Google does not now like was a mainstream SEO and commonly used tactic.When you see a site that has things like this in the footer:

lemon lawyer Columbus Ohio, lemon lawyer Cleveland Ohio, lemon lawyer Akron Ohio, lemon lawyer Dayton Ohio, lemon lawyer Dublin Ohio, lemon lawyer Wabash Ohio, lemon lawyer Siteville Ohio, lemon lawyer Cincinnati Ohio, lemon lawyer Hamilton Ohio, lemon lawyer Arlington Ohio

AND each one of those phrases is linked to a page on that topic which has very little unique content other than a city location change in the content. You should know that Google has specifically said they DO NOT LIKE content or links formatted or used in this way.

Here is a site to review that is using this type of tactic as an illustration of what not to do.

Google is not penalizing for navigational links in your footer that look like this:

Home | About Us | Web Visibility | Google AdWords Services | Blog Writing

Google understands that you may need to repeat your navigation at the bottom to aid readers to travel your site, but it is the repetitive use of keywords, locations and search phrases that Google is disavowing and penalizing websites for using.

Here are a few sites that I have found that are really bending the rules on Google and may already be receiving a penalty for over optimization:

Make sure to read this great article over at SiteProNews for other great examples of what NOT to do.

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Don’t let Things Get Lost in Translation

Reach a wider market with translation services.
Reach a wider market with translation services.

Any business that is operating on the web has to find ways to expand their customer base. One way to do that can be to appeal to those living in other countries. This is something that can certainly be considered but there may be something that is currently holding you back.This is where it helps to spend some time and money on a translation management system. There are some businesses that may be able to try crowd sourcing for a one time translation project for a specific product or as a way to enter only one market at a time. You could also consider choosing a vendor; evaluating them by checking references, looking at their client list and experience and making sure that translation management is at the heart of their business.

You may even want to try some free translation tools first before you pay to have your whole website translated and localized. I like to use Google Translate. You can click the icons in my left sidebar to automatically translate this blog post. Although automated tools don’t always give the best translation, using them allows you to test at a very low cost to see if website translation is a workable approach for your needs.

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What I Like About Google AdWords Enhanced Campaigns

McCord Web Services is an AdWords Certified Partner.
McCord Web Services is an AdWords Certified Partner.

I’ve been busy doing and early migration for our AdWords clients into Enhanced Campaigns. Through extensive testing on AdWords rollout last month, I found that there was no downside to migration and that there were actually some nice benefits.Here’s Why You Should Upgrade to Enhanced Campaigns Early

1. If you are getting phone calls and have a under one dollar cost per click, moving to Enhanced Campaigns will lower your expenses. Phone calls to desktops and tablets will be free and from mobile phones will only cost you a click instead of the previously default minimum $1 bid. For one of my clients whose typical cost per click was $.21 to go from $1 a call to $.21 per call based on their typical call volume was a huge dollar savings.

2. Records phone calls as conversions based on your needs. We know for a fact that AdWords drives phone call activity and this for many clients is growing in importance. With Enhanced Campaigns, the client and I can decide the number of seconds for a call to be recorded as a lead conversion. And on top of that I can now even specify when the phone number will show. I will typically set the time to be 60 seconds and set the phone number to show during their office hours only. I can schedule the time of day as well as the day of the week.

3. AdWords Enhanced Campaigns offer very granular location targeting and the ability to bid up or down by location. By drawing radius settings around the addresses (even multiple addresses) that are listed as location extensions, you can bid up for better ad placement. For example, I manage a number of AdWords programs for dentists. I will routinely map out a radius of 2 miles, 5 miles, and 10 miles and then bid up 10 to 20% up by location proximity working to get more location specific traffic for my dental office clients.

4. I can now see activity and clicks by actual site link. This information is very helpful in regards to understanding what is important for a client. I can also now add up to 20 site links instead of 10, and change them at will. Now longer are site links tied together as a group, they are individual for the account and you click to add them by either ad group or campaign. The ability to specify site links at the ad group level for some accounts is a welcome enhancement.

5. I can craft smartphone specific ads that fit correctly on a typical smartphone sized screen and choose to serve this ad specifically to smartphone users. This is a very nice feature. I typically will use click to call in the ad text.

These are just a few of the things I personally like about AdWords Enhanced Campaigns and are using for clients. If you are looking for a knowledgeable AdWords account manager for your own program and one that know Enhanced Campaigns, I invite you to visit our AdWords services page for more information and account set up and management pricing.

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Looking for an Alternative to Google Reader or iGoogle?

If you’ve used and loved iGoogle or Google Reader, be aware that Google is retiring this service on July 1, 2013. Not to worry though, you’ll want to check out MyMSN as your need feed reader platform and guess what I know that you’ll like it better!

I’ve been using www.My.MSN.com preferentially as my RSS/XML feed aggregator for years. This simple and easy to use interface is fully customizable. I watch 30 news feeds in my control panel and even have feeds for stocks and weather. It is easy to add a new feed when you find it by clicking Add Content on the top right and then you paste in your feed URL or you can select from preset MSN news modules.

I like My.MSN.com much better than the Yahoo version as I have mine set up to show three columns per page, have very little advertising and I have lots of customization options.

So if you are bemoaning the fact that iGoogle or Google Reader is going away, switch now and check out My.MSN.com. I personally think that you will like it better and will drop iGoogle before July 1st.