Content optimized for old keywords and G Updates
-
Hi,
We've got some old content, about 50 pages worth in an Ecommerce site, that is optimized for keywords that aren't the subject of the page - these keywords occur about 8 times (2 keywords per page) in the old content.
We are going through these 50 pages and changing the title, H1, and meta description tag to match the exact subject of the page - so that we will increase in rankings again - the updates have been lowering our rankings.
Do we need to completely rewrite the content for these 50 pages, or can we just sprinkle it with any needed additions of the one keyword that is the subject of the page?
The reason I'm asking is that our rankings keep dropping and these 50 pages seem to be part of the problem. We're in the process of updating these 50 pages
Thanks.
-
Maybe it's the repetition of keywords in the titles and H1 that are causing the drop in ranking, like a title structured (just for example)
brown shoes, athletic shoes | sportsauthority.com
where "shoes" is repeated.
-
I am not completely convinced that updates are killing your rankings just because of the page that is optimized for keywords that aren’t the subject of the page. In a way, we can also say that the page is optimized for wrong keywords.
So, will Google kill your rankings just because you have a content that is optimized for wrong keywords? IMHO, not really!
I would suggest you to fix it for right kind of keywords and update! But I personally don’t think, it is affecting your rankings as a whole you should look in to other areas like links, website structure and other to see if there is a problem and fix it accordingly!
Hope this helps!
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Am I Syndicating Content Correctly?
My question is about how to syndicate content correctly. Our site has professionally written content aimed toward our readers, not search engines. As a result, we have other related websites who are looking to syndicate our content. I have read the Google duplicate content guidelines (https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/66359?hl=en), canonical recommendations (https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/139066?hl=en&ref_topic=2371375), and no index recommendation (https://developers.google.com/webmasters/control-crawl-index/docs/robots_meta_tag) offered by Google, but am still a little confused about how to proceed. The pros in our opinion are as follows:#1 We can gain exposure to a new audience as well as help grow our brand #2 We figure its also a good way to help build up credible links and help our rankings in GoogleOur initial reaction is to have them use a "canonical link" to assign the content back to us, but also implement a "no index, follow" tag to help avoid duplicate content issues. Are we doing this correctly, or are we potentially in threat of violating some sort of Google Quality Guideline?Thanks!
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | Dirving4Success0 -
Website slipped for particular keyword this year
www.schupepetents.co.nz I am webmaster for this site which slipped in rankings around 18/1/13. It was doing really well for keyword "marquee hire" ranking 6-8 for google.co.nz. It is now ranked about 30. Background. It has been ranked well for keyword for about 3 years. From what I can see there was a few websites that tumbled around this time. The website has been completely redone to a wordpress site this was in December last year. The switch was done before putting in 301 re directs to preserve internal page rank. As a result the internal page rank of pages has had to start again! Three things from online research into what has potentially affected this:
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | chopchop
1. Lack of website substance. As website has been redone it has lost Google "esteem" (lack of internal pages PR). But the time that it dropped was a long time after the site redesign.
2. Possible penalty for too high proportion of links from directory websites. Heard some whispers from forums that this had happened. But links are not just from directories.
3. Too many links with specific keyword (marquee hire) for junk sites. This is possibly true but why the drop at that time when no one else experienced this. Also we hired a company mid last year who link bombed using "marquee hire" and a couple other keywords. Moz seems to be very happy with the website!! Good link scores and on-page optimisation is great. Wondering what has happened?!0 -
Duplicate content or not? If you're using abstracts from external sources you link to
I was wondering if a page (a blog post, for example) that offers links to external web pages along with abstracts from these pages would be considered duplicate content page and therefore penalized by Google. For example, I have a page that has very little original content (just two or three sentences that summarize or sometimes frame the topic) followed by five references to different external sources. Each reference contains a title, which is a link, and a short abstract, which basically is the first few sentences copied from the page it links to. So, except from a few sentences in the beginning everything is copied from other pages. Such a page would be very helpful for people interested in the topic as the sources it links to had been analyzed before, handpicked and were placed there to enhance user experience. But will this format be considered duplicate or near-duplicate content?
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | romanbond0 -
Multiple domains different content same keywords
what would you advice on my case: It is bad for google if i have the four domains. I dont link between them as i dont want no association, or loss in rakings in branded page. Is bad if i link between them or the non branded to them branded domain. Is bad if i have all on my webmaster tools, i just have the branded My google page is all about the new non penalized domain. altough google gave a unique domain +propdental to the one that he manually penalized. (doesn't make sense) So. What are the thinks that i should not do with my domain to follow and respect google guidelines. As i want a white hat and do not do something that is wrong without knowledge
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | maestrosonrisas0 -
Best use of domains with keywords
I own a domain with just the company name in it (no keywords) that I use as main domain. I also own some other domain with keywords inside that right now I redirect all to the main domain with a 301 redirect. What is the best use for these domains? Should I use them when I do link building or is better to use just the main domain? Can they be useful to increase the main domain link juice/page rank? If yes, how? Thanks
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | darkanweb0 -
Tricky Decision to make regarding duplicate content (that seems to be working!)
I have a really tricky decision to make concerning one of our clients. Their site to date was developed by someone else. They have a successful eCommerce website, and the strength of their Search Engine performance lies in their product category pages. In their case, a product category is an audience niche: their gender and age. In this hypothetical example my client sells lawnmowers: http://www.example.com/lawnmowers/men/age-34 http://www.example.com/lawnmowers/men/age-33 http://www.example.com/lawnmowers/women/age-25 http://www.example.com/lawnmowers/women/age-3 For all searches pertaining to lawnmowers, the gender of the buyer and their age (for which there are a lot for the 'real' store), these results come up number one for every combination they have a page for. The issue is the specific product pages, which take the form of the following: http://www.example.com/lawnmowers/men/age-34/fancy-blue-lawnmower This same product, with the same content (save a reference to the gender and age on the page) can also be found at a few other gender / age combinations the product is targeted at. For instance: http://www.example.com/lawnmowers/women/age-34/fancy-blue-lawnmower http://www.example.com/lawnmowers/men/age-33/fancy-blue-lawnmower http://www.example.com/lawnmowers/women/age-32/fancy-blue-lawnmower So, duplicate content. As they are currently doing so well I am agonising over this - I dislike viewing the same content on multiple URLs, and though it wasn't a malicious effort on the previous developers part, think it a little dangerous in terms of SEO. On the other hand, if I change it I'll reduce the website size, and severely reduce the number of pages that are contextually relevant to the gender/age category pages. In short, I don't want to sabotage the performance of the category pages, by cutting off all their on-site relevant content. My options as I see them are: Stick with the duplicate content model, but add some unique content to each gender/age page. This will differentiate the product category page content a little. Move products to single distinct URLs. Whilst this could boost individual product SEO performance, this isn't an objective, and it carries the risks I perceive above. What are your thoughts? Many thanks, Tom
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | SoundinTheory0 -
User comments with page content or as a separate page?
With the latest Google updates in both cracking down on useless pages and concentrating on high quality content, would it be beneficial to include user posted comments on the same page as the content or a separate page? Having a separate page with enough comments on it would he worth warranting, especially as extra pages add extra pagerank but would it be better to include them with the original article/post? Your ideas and suggestions are greatly appreciated.
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | Peter2640