Current on-page best practices
-
Given all the recent talk about over optimization, when was the last time SEOMoz updated the on-page report card tool?
Rand wrote an excellent piece on Perfect On-Page Optimization (which is great, and thanks) in summer 2009. Is that still best practice 3 years later (and post-Penguin/Panda)? If not, has the SEOMoz on-page report card tool been updated to reflect current thinking for on-page best-practices?
I know the higher level concept is "write for humans, not for bots" but if you can do both (and not create an unreadable seo-frankenpage) then why not? Does getting an "A" grade wreak of over optimization now? Should I use the key phrase at the start of the title, h1, and strong (or bold) elements on a page? Should have an image with file name and alt text equal to (or containing at the start) the key phrase?
-
Great idea! That would make our job a lit easier.
-
Thanks Mike! That's a cool idea. No plans for anything like it as of now, but we'll definitely keep it in mind. Thanks!
-
Ok. Thanks.
Kind of related feature request: For off-page factors, like backlink profile, it would be nice if OSE grouped the anchor text of backlinks into categories to give you a rough % of these:
- exact match
- variations of exact match
- brand
- variations of brand
- url + variations of url
- random (click here, visit, etc)
So we could see at a glance (for a given keyword) if a page had an unnatural looking (over optimized) backlink profile.
You could also integrate this with your Report Card feature... in addition to giving a grade for on-page factors, it would be cool if it could give you a grade for off-page factors. If that's too hard then just put the functionality into OSE.... Thanks.
-
Hi Mike,
We have actually been working on updates to this recently which we plan to add in along with quite a few other updates later this fall. That said, things didn't change too much. We made some updates for clarity of a few issues and the importance of some things has changed a bit, but for the most part I agree with Steve, the fundamentals hold true.
Thanks!
Miranda
-
That stuff is the fundamentals which still hold true in my opinion... the report card never encouraged over-optimization and the stuff within it is still relevant today in my opinion. An A Grade is certainly not over-optimized... really the whole over-optimization thing has been around for a long time it's just there's a lot of buzz about it at the moment, but when it comes down to it, it's still just the same stuff but maybe a little stricter... so as long as your not keyword stuffing, etc... or breaking any of the other old rules from back then, then you're still not breaking them now
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
-
Pages with Duplicate Content Error
Hello, the result of renewed content appeared in the scan results in my Shopify Store. But these products are unique. Why am I getting this error? Can anyone please help to explain why? screenshot-analytics.moz.com-2021.10.28-19_53_09.png
Moz Pro | | gokimedia0 -
Duplicate Content: Marketing Page / Content Page
So I am getting duplicate content warnings on my website for my pages white paper and webinar video pages. Each white paper / webinar video page is behind a marketing form page that must be filled out. I am getting a lot of warnings that the marketing page and the content page are being picked up as duplicated content. In the past, both the marketing page and the content page were given the same title and url, the body content is not similar. My question: Is the URL / Title similarity enough to set off the duplicate content warnings and would changing one or the other solve the issue?
Moz Pro | | AllMedSeo0 -
How to choose the best canonical URL
In a duplicate content situation, and assuming that both rel=canonical and a 301 redirect pass link equity (I know there is still some speculation on this), how should you choose the "best" version of the URL to establish as the redirect target or authoritative URL? For example, we have a series of duplicate pages on our site. Typically we choose the "cleanest" or shortest non-trailing-slash version of the URL as the canonical, but what if those pages are already established and have varying page authority/backlink profiles? The URLs are: example.com/stores/locate/index?parameters=tags - PA = 54, Inbound Links = 259 example.com/stores/locate/index - PA = 60, Inbound Links = 302 example.com/stores/ - This is the version that currently ranks. PA = 42, Inbound Links = 3 example.com/stores - PA = 40, Inbound Links = 8 This might not really even matter, but in the interests of conserving as much SEO value as possible, which would you choose as either the 301 redirect target and/or the canonical version? My gut is to go with the URL that's already ranking (example.com/stores/) but curious if PA, backlinks, and trailing slashes should be considered also. We of course would not 301 the URL with the tracking parameters. 🙂 Thanks for your help!
Moz Pro | | Critical_Mass0 -
"On-Page Report Card"- why is still showing " F grade" after introducing the keyword in page and title.
Hello, "On-Page Report Card"- why is still showing " F grade" after introducing the keyword in page and title. After changing the title and putting the keyword inside the title, in this section, "Exact Keyword Usage in Page Title", it shows the first title, without updating my changes. I have updated several times. In some cases worked, in this case doesn't. For example "online project management software" grades F, and "project management software" grades A, even if I've put the "online" word in title an so on. Now I have the same issue with "stock management software" which grades F. "stock management" grades A, even if i've put exactly "stock management software" thanks.
Moz Pro | | directspark0 -
Multiple Sites/Internal Pages Campaign
Can MOZ do reports/ranks/campaigns separately for each of our sites, then do separate keyword campaigns for specific internal content pages of each of the websites? For a law firm with both a defense and family law sites. We have multiple pages within each site, we will need to do separate and individual campaigns for assault, burglary, traffic tickets, ect. in our defense site. And we'll need other specific campaigns for other specific content in out family law site. Will Moz be able to accommodate our needs with their $99/mo plan or is that service only available for higher packages? (or is it even possible in ANY of their packages???) Thanks.
Moz Pro | | Wallin_Klarich0 -
Sorting Dupe Content Pages
Hi, I'm no excel pro, and I'm having a bit of a challenge interpreting the Crawl Diagnostics export .csv file. I'd like to see at a glance which of my pages (and I have many) are the worst offenders for dupe content – ie. which have the most "Other URLs" associated with them. Thanks, would appreciate any advice on how other people are using this data, and/or how 'Moz recommends to do it. 🙂
Moz Pro | | ntcma0 -
Grade F pages - all first in Google
Any anyone explain what value the Grade pages are if, as in my case, I have 9 Grade F pages of which 4 are in first position on Google, 1 is in second and the rest are 4th! I understand why SEOM might be flagging them as Grade F (keyword use in tags etc), but it seems it must be looking at the wrong clues if it still thinks that its recommendations are the most relevant to improving position. These are not obscure terms (Spy devices, electronic surveillance, spy systems, surveillance systems) for a UK site (www.spycatcheronline.co.uk) I appreciate that the points highlighted may need to be addressed, but clearly the pages/site are doing something right to come first - does this not devalue the whole Grade system on SEOM? Charles.
Moz Pro | | MrFrisbee1 -
Why did SEOMoz only crawl 1 page?
I have multiple campaigns and on a few of them SEOMoz has only crawled one page. I think this may have to do with how I set up the campaign. How do I get SEOMoz to crawl more than one page on these campaigns.
Moz Pro | | HermanAdvertising0