Welcome to the Q&A Forum

Thanks so much, Miriam! Your response is right where I was thinking. Makes complete sense. Now, to have the conversation with the client to come up with some other solutions. Cheers! - Patrick

Hey Mozzers! I'm working with a client who has 2 websites (different URLs completely), which one is for all parts and the other is for accessories only. They have multiple brick and mortar locations throughout the US and have done a nice job creating Google My Business pages for each and all verified.

Their question is will it benefit them to create and verify another GMB page with same address, but place in "Suite B", a new phone number and apply the other URLs for the accessories site. The business name would also be different, but similar meaning Business 1 = ABC where as Business 2 = ABC Accessories. Their goal would be to try to have both rank or display to improve their local SEO.

In theory it sounds like it will work given NAP would be satisfied within the GMB, but wanted to get the Moz community thoughts on this first before moving forward. Look forward to the replies.

• Patrick

Hey mag777! Happy New Year! Great question and one I'm asked a lot from my business advisory groups, clients and referral partners. It's one that undoubtedly always comes up in conversation when talking about either acquiring new domains or revamping a website... "Should we use the WWW or NON-WWW domain?"

In my 12+ years of web consulting and SEO, it has boiled down to a preference ideology. As mentioned by seoman10 in this thread, it could be seen as a shorter, easier to remember URL. When marketing the domain, you'd always want to confirm the WWW is redirected to the NON-WWW if this is the path you choose to take. And visa versa NON-WWW --> WWW.

As Gaston mentions too, check out your competitors URL structure. It's a quick glimpse up to the address bar while you are already doing your competitive research. Do some searches in Google as well for your website and competitors to see how much of the URL does or could display. Moz.com doesn't use WWW. They could get away with it because it's so short. I on the other hand almost need to with https://whiteboardcreations.com since it's a much longer domain. Keep this in mind for those domains you're working on, too.

From an SEO school of thought and how I now operate, I choose the NON-WWW simply because we can get just a little more of the URL to show in Google SERPs, if we're targeting inner pages to provide a hint more of visual for the searcher. The URL string matches more closely to the Title and Description. That is the way I look at this strategy.

Here is a quick video from Matt Cutts a few years back... should ease your concerns over redirects  
https://youtu.be/Filv4pP-1nw 

Either way, the websites you work on for yourself or your clients will be fine as long as you are consistent for the entire site and redirects are tested and confirmed functional.

Cheers to a successful 2018 for you and everyone else reading!

• Patrick @ Whiteboard Creations (Apex, NC)

Makes perfect sense, Paul! Thank you for the detailed account and what to be aware of. I was already planning something along these lines. The trick is getting people to see the new page once they are redirected. I'll work on this and a header bar or a pop up window may work best. All URLs will be redirected appropriately as well as it's standard practice in shutting down one site to pass authority to another. Thanks again for your insight! - Patrick

Awesome! I was confident I'd get that reply, but wanted to get a 2nd opinion and really appreciate you confirming my initial thoughts.

Thanks, Kevin!

Hi Mozzers,
I have a new client who bought a dental practice from another dentist. The old dentist has a website www.olddentistsite.com (not a real domain, just an example) and the new dentist wants there to be a message on the old dentists website Home page stating how the practice was bought.

My idea just came up... most would do a message on that domain. However, would you recommend I actually create a new page in the new dentists website which the old website domain redirects to

ie: www.olddentistsite.com [redirects to >] www.newdentistsite.com/olddentistsite/ and then on this page we display a nice message about the acquisition, scheduling new patients, new logo, meet the new Dr, a video, better office hours, etc... Is this something the visitors will enjoy or get a good feeling from?

Let me know your thoughts on which option is best to implement. Looking for a few quick replies!! Thanks in advance everyone! - Patrick

Thank you for your valuable input, Laura and Miriam! I have read through all of the links Laura shared and then some more I found on doing other searches on the subject. From the jist of it, it's exactly what you hit on Miriam. I've got some more due diligence on this one and prep work to effectively communicate with my business partners on the most appropriate strategy.

My only challenge with having 1 website that encompasses all the services is that we are then limiting our link building, directory, citation and category output/selection, which drastically limits how we would be able to build any type of authority in one given service area to compete others who are more focused just on that service, ie: carpet cleaning or roofing. Not to mention, receiving valid, real reviews for a specific service.

This is going to be tricky, but an overall great exercise and case study!

• Patrick

Alex,
I agree with EGOL. Many of those domain extensions aren't being used or promoted at this time. They may in the future, however, they are very new to the marketing world and people may get confused or think they are spammy. I'd stick with a .com, .co, .net at this time, if available.

On the otherhand, there have been many case studies on this very topic. Even a post here on Moz. See them below as they are highlighting many valid points. In short, Google doesn't really care what domain you are using, so long as you are creating value on the web for their searchers and building authority for the domain and its pages. It's yours and your client's call to pursue that "builders" extension or not. I'd recommend a strategy to back it up, in order to justify the efforts needed.

• http://searchengineland.com/google-explains-how-they-handle-the-new-top-level-domains-tlds-225671
• https://searchenginewatch.com/sew/study/2433834/case-study-will-new-domain-extensions-provide-an-seo-boost
• https://moz.com/ugc/an-seos-guide-to-acquiring-new-gtlds
• https://www.entrepreneur.com/article/253408
• https://ceo.xyz/rank-in-google/

Hope this was helpful! - Patrick

Hi Mozzers! I have a lot of knowledge in local search, G+ page setup/optimization, etc, etc... However, I'm about to begin a business based around "home services". The brand will be ABC Home Services as the umbrella. Then under it will be the individual services like "ABC Carpet Cleaning" "ABC Roofing", etc... Each service will have it's own website for optimization purposes and local search authority building as well as the services will be developed over the course of a couple years ie: carpet cleaning would go up 1st, then the next service and so on...

I have purchased all of the domains I want for the services to focus on. What do you recommend I do in terms of setting up Gmail accounts/G+ accounts? Individual service related Gmail accounts and have a main "ABC Home Services" Google account and then add in the service G+ pages over time?

I'm open to any questions, but trying to make this the most efficient for me and my team and also the best if can be for local optimization goals and criteria. Thank you! - Patrick

Thanks so much for the response, Kane.

She is very particular in the content placed on her website. I didn't work with her on her website or her existing pages, navigation, and content, so I'm coming in fresh and from what I know, she was tough to deal with on the content portions.

Adding more pages about her services probably isn't realistic as she doesn't dive into her "services" on the website nor does she want to. She has this false sense that her clients KNOW what she does and will search for her "method". Yet, when you Google her "method", nothing shows.

This led me to talk with her about and be very honest with her, that her name, her method and her book need to be the focal point. So, when people do hear about her, and then Google her, they will get the bigger picture vs just searching for a service keyword and her showing up.

Another challenge is, her budget is low. It will increase, but have to prove it works. I explained this is a limiting factor, but will see where it goes.

We will focus on blog articles, a few press releases, a couple SlideShare presentations about her method and book outline and wish we could do videos, but she will never do a video, but she enjoys and does do speaking engagements.

We also discussed getting her to do more podcast type interviews and try to get her in front of bloggers or podcasters as she speaks very well and would be comfortable doing that.

This will make for an interesting case study if it all works out the way I want it to. One thing I won't allow is for it to ruin or soil my reputation or our mutual brand consultant's image.

Thanks again, Kane! I do appreciate your input. - Patrick

I'm getting ready to take on a new client for SEO, but she is having a hard time understanding I'd like to rank her for "Her" and her new book, rather than keywords for her ambiguous keywords which show very little to no search volume from Keyword Planner data.

• Her website and domain name are only 4 months old
• Her book launches sometime in December (most likely January 2016)
• Her services (she's a consultant) provide little keyword volume
• She is persuaded she needs to rank for her service keywords
• I feel strongly we need to get her name, her method/approach and her book optimized
• She is seemingly difficult to work with, but once I build trust in SEO for her, so will be a great, long client
• Her consulting services are based on Change and Transition for wealthy individuals going through career change, divorce, pay increase, pay decrease, depression, children, etc... targeting Executives, C-Level Execs

In this situation, what would you all do? How would this website or person even be optimized? Blog articles? Press releases? Guest blogging? Video blogs? Podcasts? It's a tricky one and hoping the Moz community can lend some ideas as this type of SEO would be new for me, yet I'm up for the challenge!

Thank you in advance and look forward to your replies! - Patrick

Hey! Yes, we made the switch to SSL and everything went smooth. We set up our 301 redirects and submitted to Google right away. No real loss in traffic and our rankings for the 100+ keywords we monitor either remained the same or increased a little over the first couple months. So, that was pleasant to see and experience.

The real test is when we finish and launch the new design, however, we will be working to keep our URL structure the same, but will be adding many more pages to the site focused on more educational/SEO friendly content. Not really caring if searchers stumble across it in their browsing, but moreso that Google indexes the content for our targeted keywords those pages are designed to capture and rank for (inner landing pages).

As long as we're keeping our authoritative pages un-drastically changed, the URL remains the same and the content is about the same, we shouldn't experience much loss in rankings of traffic. If anything, we should see new keywords ranking very well in a short amount of time and our traffic increasing. We'll see come end of 2015, into 2016!

Hi Kane,

Actually, that is exactly what happened. One of our developers added an | exclusion at the end of their sole Spam Bot Filter and it in turn, shut down collection of data. So, I worked with the Google Adwords support team and they determined that was the cause.

We removed it, I picked up some new, great pointers from them, and all are back up and running. They advised to always have a Master Analytics View which collects ALL data (even the spammers), then another called Filtered View, which eliminates the spammers and then a Test View to play with new filters.

It is something so simple to implement and now I know moving forward with all new clients/accounts and have been spending time updating all current accounts to have these 3 views in Analytics.

• Patrick

Hi Alick,

Correct, none of the affected 14 sites were or have been penalized by Google for any of their reasons (malware, spammy links, etc). Actually most are just your standard brochure type informational website and only 2 are actively doing any SEO/PPC campaigns.

We checked Real Time and saw they were not working. We also confirmed the notices in GA for the tracking code not working any more. I got that tip from you, so thank you very much for that.

I have re-entered all the GA codes and/or plugins for the WP sites and will monitor more today and over the weekend. It was a completely random event which doesn't make any sense.

• Patrick

Hi Dirk,

Thanks for the tip on installing the Tag Assistant. I have done that now and will toy around with it today/this weekend. I confirmed that all the tracking codes were properly set up, however, in the GA profiles, you visit > Admin > Tracking Info > Tracking Code > and I saw notices from each of the 14 affected sites that the code wasn't being recognized.

I believe I have corrected the issue, but still doesn't explain why for years there was no issues, no hosting changes, no WP changes (as it would've affected so many more sites, and not just mine or my clients, but 1,000's around the world from a plugin update or something), not isolated to just WP sites as I had HTML sites affected.

I will be monitoring and checking these sites and all the others just in case. Never seen anything like this before. Thanks for your reply!

• Patrick

Thanks for the reply, David.

What is weird is of the 80+ accounts I can see and manage, 14 in total were affected once I got through checking all site profiles. On Aug 2nd, the 14 sites go to zero.

The odd part is some are WordPress sites and 5 are static HTML sites. Some are hosted in GoDaddy. Some are not. Some sites I haven't even logged into for months (especially the HTML sites). They track everything up to Aug 1st as normal.

• I checked all front end source code for the GA code = confirmed positive
• I checked for duplicate GA code = confirmed negative
• I checked the WP sites for combating GA plugins = confirmed negative (some were using Google Analyticator and some just the normal Google Analytics and some using Yoast or All In One SEO, but none of them had 2 GA plugins)
• I checked the Filters as some have Filters, others don't. The one's that have the Filters are using the same ones to block referral spam as my 3 company sites, and pretty much all of the others I manage, so it can't be Filters
• I checked for spacing in the code as suggested above = confirmed negative

What I've had to do is remove whatever plugin they were using. Then installed another and authenticated. I will know by morning if that worked as the "Tracking Code" is not showing errors and is showing that is is actively tracking data. The Real Time is as well, so I assume my trick worked, but want to make sure it remains.

• Patrick

Hi Moz Community,

I have about 10 sites, static HTML sites and WordPress sites, which ALL stopped tracking Google Analytics on August 2nd. They go to a flat-line! Dead! No data!

Has anyone else experienced this either currently or before? I have confirmed all code is correct as it's been tracking these sites for years. One site gets 5,000+ visits a month and they are sitting at only 1,500 now and will be a fun conversation to have with the client.

If all code is correct, what should I do? How do I overcome this without having to re-create another account/tracking ID?

Never dealt with something like this before and there is not much on the web or in other forums. Would appreciate any help or advice or tips! - Patrick

Andy, great tip on the WP image URLs!! Honestly, that never crossed our mind and will be sifting through to find them and update them all.

I really appreciate the feedback on the rank increase. I would enjoy seeing that for some of the other keywords we see lingering on the top of Page 2... hopefully see those get a little push to Page 1.

We installed the DV SSL yesterday and working through the redirects. We should be finished tomorrow and have all testing completed and verified by end of the week.

All in all, a great new experience for an older domain with some good authority built up. Thanks again!

• Patrick

Thanks, Chris! Yes, we are working through the force redirects as the SSL just went through yesterday. A great learning experience and hopefully will have it all resolved soon. Working closely with WP Engine tech guys has been a breath of fresh air too. - Patrick

Thanks for your input, Patrick! I actually referenced your post for another client, so I'm glad it is applicable to a HTTPS update as well.

Hey Mozzers!
We're going to be moving are main company site from http://whiteboardcreations.com > https://whiteboardcreations.com and wanted to get some of your quick tips for items we need to consider. We are working on a new web redesign now and keeping in WordPress. A couple facts for your info... We have read a lot about it, but wanted to get some quick tips we need to take into account from your points of view.

1. March 2010 domain age
2. Ranks very well locally for our targeted keywords around web design, WordPress, SEO, social media, blog writing, web maintenance
3. Not many of our competitors, especially the SEO competitors, have moved to HTTPS
4. Site is hosted at WP Engine
5. Going to be purchasing a Domain Validated SSL... Is there any advantage to an Extended Validated SSL in Google's eye/mind?
6. Should we expect rank decrease or increase?
7. Anything else we should expect or prepare for from your experiences?

Thank you!
Patrick

EGOL, I agree!

I have no idea what the original question that was posted, which Patrick replied to, but, his response still helped me out. He actually linked to this thread from my question I posted a few days ago.

I'll be sure to keep from deleting my question so others can find it potentially useful

• (the other) Patrick

Thank you, Patrick! I'll check all of these out and share all aspects with the clients so they know what potentially lies ahead in terms of rebranding and using a new, different domain name.

Really appreciate the article references too. - Patrick McCoy

Great feedback here, Patrick! And thank you for pointing me to this thread from my question.

• Patrick McCoy

Hey Mozzers,
I received a call on Friday from a 6 attorney law office who have been my client for a long time. They have an established brand/domain in their market which isn't very big, but has a lot of competition.

2 of the attorneys are leaving to start their own firm and they want to remove a letter from their name abbreviation, thus their domain name as well. So, the other partners want to change the domain to reflect this.

They want to buy a EMD [city]lawyers.com for about $1,600 along with some others to protect their new brand and name.

I have a good idea as to what I need to do, BUT would love to hear advice from the community for this type of drastic change. 301 redirects? New Google Analytics code or same just different profile? Webmasters verifications? Content from old site? Old domain forwarding or keep active for a little bit? Is not the time to get them an SSL?

Also, what should I prepare them for in terms of website traffic expectations and Google authority drops or remains the same? I know their Moz DA/PA will drop to 1/1, but anything else to look out for?

Thank you in advance!
Fellow Pro Member - Patrick

Michael,

Another avenue you could consider is to create and print out a simple business card sized instruction note (cheap from VistaPrint). You keep these at your counter/front desk and when a customer is checking out, you can simply provide that to them and ask after they check out. We have worked with dentists and a party rental shop with 4 locations who had some decent success with this strategy.

_EDIT: You can also create the same card and offer an incentive on there for their next trip into the store or office, sort of what Jed was getting at above. _

You are merely asking them for a review and handing them a card with some simple instructions to follow at their leisure from the phone or computer. You also avoid any potential "red flags" which a large email blast could generate with lots of people simultaneously leaving reviews on a given day or week. Google sees this as "solicitation" in their terms for receiving reviews. Google wants you to EARN reviews, so stick with more natural approaches to this process and you'll see results and steer clear of any Google mishaps

Hope this was helpful!! - Patrick

Great tips as well, Miriam! Enjoy seeing you chime in when it comes to localized SEO

Happy 2015! - Patrick

Great question and something I bet a lot of other SEO's deal with, but don't always know what to do, nor ask the appropriate people for their take. Kudos to you for looking out for your client's best interests.

That being said, I agree with Ryan. Hit on your Google tools and G+ page to mention those geo-specific keywords. Also, there is nothing wrong with working to optimize a business which resides/operates out of one location while focusing their marketing in another location.

Two examples of this...

• 1st, our company is located in Cary NC, a smaller, but fast growing town outside of Raleigh, which is the major metropolis around here. However, we target a lot of SEO and keyword research at Raleigh. We've got a great presence for lots of terms relating to Cary, so Raleigh was our next goal and some of the smaller towns around us. It is possible, when done correctly, even for a highly competitive service like "SEO" and "Web Design" and "WordPress" in any major city. Burlington for you, would be nothing less.
• 2nd, we're about to work with another small carpet cleaning business who operates outside of his home yet travels to about 25 mile radius to service customers. Yes, his address on his website and G+ pages and his listings will be in Wake Forest NC, but that doesn't mean we can't go after organic searches/results in Cary, Durham, Raleigh, and the like. He is actually pretty exited to potentially get traffic and customers from all over the area.

Take 1 well written and optimized blog article targeting a specific keyword and going for a smaller market, we'll say Youngsville NC with little to no competition for my client, we see we could gain him a few customers a month potentially when that blog article ranks.

Incorporate a blog and article writing into your campaign and I'm sure you'll see success for your client.

Hope Ryan's, Miriam's and my responses were good and helpful! - Patrick

I missed MozCon 2014 due to getting married in August, but plan to go for 2015 and can't wait! Also, looking into SearchLove... As I type all of this sitting here at the Internet Summit 2014 conference where we're located in Raleigh NC. - Patrick

No real resolution. Spoke with someone from India and they told me to follow the search business angle and I informed them the business was not showing to be clicked on, in order to "Request Admin Rights". Then waited for 10 min on the phone for them to come back and tell me that there is nothing else they can do. I was on the phone for 35 min to get nowhere and will call back again to hopefully speak with another person who can escalate to a more technical person. It is the strangest thing... oh, and frustrating!

Nevermind, in the guide there is a link for Google Support, where they call you. On hold with them now and will update this based on what I find out.

Oleg,

Thanks for the response and link to the guide and your quick notes. Unfortunately, the verified business name doesn't appear in their search results when trying to create new page. I did find a support/feedback form, so I submitted my question to Google in hopes they reply soon.

Do you have a Google Local support #?

We are working with a client and their marketing consultant who set up a Local Listing service to help local citations, Yahoo, Google+, etc, etc... We have their G+ business page and it is verified, however, as we are new to helping them out, we don't have access to the page to make edits. Here's the catch, neither does the client, or the consultant or the listing company/people.

Question: How can we go about claiming this as "our" page in order to help the client out, get it edited/optimized and then keep record of it so this doesn't happen again?

PS - Typically, there is an option for a business page to "Is this your page?" or "Manage this page?" at the bottom, but I don't see one of those buttons.

Any help or advice would be appreciated.

• Patrick

Masbro, sounds like a bait and switch tactic, which stinks. However, you can now approach it from 2 additional angles for your client: 1) Have them pay for 1 month of cPanel access at that $45 rate, then get in there, take a complete back up of the website files and database file (if a CMS like WordPress) and then create a new web hosting account in HostGator or GoDaddy or anywhere feasible to your client and a server you're used to working in. Or 2) Just request from that company a full, most recent backup copy of the website files and DB and then you can upload those files to a new host as noted above, then change the DNS records for the domain to point to the new server. I'd find out that cost and see which is the cheaper alternative, however, either way, I would get your client away from them and cancel any monthly fees. Move on and with you by their side!

NOTE: Careful with the email hosting. So make sure you know where their email is hosted if using the same domain. If setting up a new host with their backup copy, then you can figure out the Mail settings/MX records as needed to make any modifications necessary.

Hope you get things resolved! It sounds like they are willing to play ball, so that's a huge plus for you and the client.

• Patrick

Thanks for the link, Bryan!

Thanks for sharing this link. I had a question today about this very topic and was pointed to your response here. My questions is answered

• Patrick

Hey Moz Community,

Can anyone explain why a website would have a PR4 Home page and most inner pages PR3 with only a DA12 and PA14 from OSE?

The website in question is my Rotary club http://carymacgregorrotary.org.

Thank you.
Patrick

To answer your question bluntly. Nope!

For $10K, you could get a lot more for your money and would be a longer term investment. Your link on that PR9 site wouldn't be on the Home page the whole time, which I assume carries the highest PageRank. You would eventually fall into an inner page carrying much lower PageRank OR, worse, you get bumped from the site altogether.

Better ways to invest that same amount in organic SEO efforts. Fun question to start my day!

• Patrick

Masbro,

We run into this issue all the time working with small business owners. They have a friend's cousin's nephew from down the street get them a website and don't tell them anything about what really is going on with their domain purchase/renewals, where they bought the domain, where they bought the hosting, the login for hosting, where they are hosting email, or logins to WordPress/Drupal/etc if using a CMS. The list goes on.

Unfortunately for us, we have to figure all of that out for them. Although, fortunately, we also get to build a great rapport with the client and educate them on making sure they maintain control over all of their property. I would educate them about all you know for consolidating their domain, hosting and email if you wanted and make sure you keep a login record and you share that with them as well. If they lose it, then you have it.

Now, to answer your question. Many folks are very hesitant to provide direct cPanel access because they may be in a shared environment with many other domains and websites being hosted. So, once they give you login, then you may be able to see ALL of their clients or websites and, to me, that is a big security vulnerability. I'd never allow just anyone into our shared server.

They may also just want to validate who you are in representing your mutual client on their behalf. Usually a phone call to them, with the client on the line is a good starting point, or an email from the client to the host provider.

It really all depends on the level of work you have to do. If it's minor, then you can ask them to provide FTP or SFTP login OR if it's something major or a brand new website, then another alternative you could request is for them to simply provide you a full backup of the website/database files (if any) and you can move the hosting to another provider where you have a little more control.

I believe they are simply looking at this from a security viewpoint. Allowing you access, wouldn't be beneficial to their other clients in the server, putting them at risk potentially.

Again, there are several ways to get to the end point based on your goals and needs for the client. We see it all the time and sometimes it goes smoothly, and others, it can be a long-drawn out nightmare. I hope it's not that latter for you And I hope this was a helpful answer!

• Patrick

Hey Ruben,

In all the 4.0 updates done for our sites and client sites, we haven't seen an increase. We're doing our main site update on Monday, which has a lot more content and pages than most of our other sites, so I'll be curious to see if anything changes that we don't already know about.

We're going through a mess with the 4.0 updates across a bunch of websites we did using the All In One Events Calendar with customized coding for display purposes on the front end and we've been cleaning up that mess. The AIO Calendar was giving each site a "fatal error" when switching from the List view we designed to their Calendar view. But as far as any other update bugs, we have been fortunate not to have any other issues.

Hope Abe can find something out for you and it may just be a temporary glitch of some sort. - Patrick

Thanks for your input, Martijn. This is exactly what I was thinking after reading up more about it. Small business wouldn't benefit from this type of software, nor do I think they could afford it.

• Patrick

Some additional resources:

http://siliconangle.com/blog/2014/09/19/the-state-of-hadoop-2014-whos-using-it-and-why/

http://www.sas.com/en_us/insights/big-data/hadoop.html

Hey Moz Community,

We received an interesting email this morning from a client's marketing manager asking if we knew about or have ever used "Hadoop software" because "[Business owner name] says it’s supposed to help us see how people use our website and more."

I've never heard of this software and upon looking around on the web, it says it can do a lot, but my client is a small law firm who average 800-1,000 visitors per month, mainly from their 2 local office cities/markets.

Anyone have any thoughts on this or ever use this software? Thanks in advance.

Patrick

No worries and good idea to toss the question of concern out to the Moz community. In the future, if it's anything having to do with Google or any new "up and coming" solution or search criteria change, then check with Google first, then check the Blogs here at Moz or elsewhere because I'm sure content writers would LOVE to be the first to hit on a new idea for how to rank in Google.

Hopefully you can put your clients at ease

• Patrick

Rachel,

The gimmicks I've heard are countless. The clients feared into buying a product/service are countless. Yet, this is a new one I haven't heard about. I'll put it this way, if you are promoting a service which is "KILLER" and "WILL GET RESULTS" then you had better just show up for the service name in Google, at the very least, right? I wouldn't worry about this "company" and/or "service" and be upfront with your clients about how these types of solicitations will be frequent and annoying.

I'm sure you already did this, but I wanted to do it also and share with the community. First, begin typing in "Autocomplete Engagement" into Google. You can clearly see you have to type out the whole phrase and yet you don't get one single "Instant" result in the drop down menu. Unfortunately, I already entered and searched the whole phrase, so that's why you see it in my search history AND also this post in my screenshot. No results for their SUPERIOR SEO TRICK

Second, when you do search the entire phrase, you get nothing about any mention of an SEO service. Hell, this question is already ranked on 1st page for that term. Scratching my head. Show this to your clients and then let them know it's just another scare tactic to get them to spend some money... I mean waste money.

Hope this was a helpful response! - Patrick

lKZTj8b

Hi bchilders22,

Great question and hope I can add to the discussion points. I'd like to approach from 2 angles:

1. To answer your question directly, assuming your goal is to optimize the website (no matter the industry), then yes your SEO ranking will suffer with a lack of content on the Home page. Just like everyone else has stated. If your goal is to optimize the site for other keywords outside of the brand/company name, then the content on the Home page becomes extremely important. If you are seeking to optimize the brand, then you may not be in so much trouble. BUT, if that is your goal, then I would recommend a couple minor items to implement to help. Create a paragraph on the Home page which hits the branded name, maybe placed just above the Footer under the Slider. Use that as your foundation and then create your Title and Description to be relevant to that content, again tagging/referencing your brand and location to coincide with your Schema markup. If you want to hit more keywords, then you'll need more content and maybe focus to section off the content. For example, if this is a restaurant, then hit on sections of the menu or meal time frames ie: Breakfast, Lunch, Dinner, Drinks, etc. Then link to those inner pages.

2. I'm only stating this because we have several clients with ZERO content on the Home page. It's exactly as you mentioned. Social media buttons, logo, large slider, address and navigation tabs. This is all great because these clients do not care a thing about SEO and investing in SEO. They are shopping centers and their brand is very strong, so keeping the Home page clean and simple and directing their visitors to their Directory and Map and Events is their main focus.

In conclusion, it's all about what your client wants. If they want to rank, then get some good, original content on the Home page and tagged appropriately. If they are focusing their efforts on having a cool Home page to highlight their logo/brand and some nice images, then having content may be "too much clutter" for their tastes. Looking at it from both perspectives, it's asking those questions upfront before the design and development begin are highly important.

Hope this was helpful! - Patrick

James, sorry for any confusion. I'm certainly not going to discourage you from checking out the article, but, the article is an outline from how to set up the tracking URLs in Analytics at that time (Oct 2012). As we know, GA has transformed their setup significantly. The nice thing for us is that GA still continues to track those URLs we set up as individual "Goals" so that saved us and many clients from having to redo or modify anything as GA evolved.

The Google link Lynn referenced is your best bet for setting up now

• Patrick

Hey James! Yes, you can certainly track clicks from your email as Lynn explained and that Google link helps for the walk-through! I wrote an article almost 2 years ago about this very topic (http://whiteboardcreations.com/google-analytics-email-signature-click-tracking/), which we helped coach our clients on and we also implemented. It is very cool and you'll be surprised at the clicks you actually get from your email signature!

Great question and glad you're thinking outside the box. Many people literally forget the power of email and an imformative email signature with calls to action! All the best in your tracking!

• Patrick

Thank you for the explanation, Prestashop. I'll have to look into this ASAP. We thought we had set all of that up, but now seeing something went awry.

Thanks, Keri. I suspected that.