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Joomla Basics 60 percent of Top 5 Negative Ranking Factors

Filed Under: Joomla Blog, Joomla Optimization, Joomla SEF, Joomla Seo, Search Engines

I was looking at search-ranking-factors at SEOmoz.org and they not only have made a very good list to look for Search Engine Optimization factors.
They also have a list of negative factors and there is a top five of negative factors.

Here is the short list:

  • Server is Often Inaccessible to Bots
  • Content Very Similar or Duplicate of Existing Content in the Index
  • External Links to Low Quality/Spam Sites
  • Duplicate Title/Meta Tags on Many Pages
  • Overuse of Targeted Keywords (Stuffing/Spamming)

Looking at these factors its easy to see where thing go wrong in a standard installation of Joomla (before version 1.5)

Duplicate Content 

First one is the Content similar to Duplicate or Existing in the Index:
This is because in a standard installation there are version in the standard HTML, PDF versions and print versions of each page of your website.

To prevent this, you should disable this functions in your Global Configuration under Content, disable the PDF and Print buttons.

Duplicate Title and or Meta Tags on Many Pages

All tough the Duplicate Title will not that easily happen, the Meta Tags can be a problem.  

If you use the standard Metadata fields in the Global configuration you could really have a problem with this.
These value's are given to each page in your website…
Even if you use the separate Fields of each page to give a separate description and keywords!

You can simple check this if your site is indexed by Google, just do a search in Google like site:www.example.com and see what is in the description fields.. it might surprise you.

The best way to prevent this is to leave your Metadata fields empty and fill your page Descriptions and Keywords.
Even if you don't wont to use that, leave all fields blank and let the search engines take the excerpts from your pages.

Overuse of Targeted Keywords (Stuffing/Spamming)

I wrote a post about this problem a while ago Joomla and Keyword stuffing and its of course related to the same problem as the one above.

The simple solution is to leave the Global Metadata fields blank.
Because Joomla will ADD the meta keywords to the list of keywords in your Global configuration.

You could install the free SEF patch from Joomlatwork.com to overcome some of these problems.

With the solutions used to prevent the above you can overcome some of the Negative Ranking Factors.
All it takes are some simple configuration changes and empty the Global Metadata fields,  so make sure you don't let your website fall into the Top 5 factors… 

The Little Joomla SEO Book now also in Russian

Filed Under: Joomla Blog, Joomla Optimization, Joomla SEF, Joomla Seo, Search Engines

I just received an email telling me that “The Little Joomla SEO Book” just has been translated into Russian…

Now that is what I like about the Internet and sharing Knowledge, so that people can help each other, even in other languages.

If you are Russian, you can go to Russian version of this book available here (translated by Dead Krolik)

At the same time I saw the Images for the SEO Book by Steven from Alledia.
I had the pleasure of proof reading his Joomla SEO Book, and I can highly recommend it if you are ready to make your Joomla site better found in the Search engine's.

So now you have three alternatives:

And of course a big thank you to to Dead Krolik for his translation for the Russian Joomla Community.

Why Do I Blog

Filed Under: Joomla Blog, Joomla Seo

Steve of Alledia.com gave me some homework to do by tagging me to do a “Why Do I Blog” post.

It will be short and simple.

I started out a long time ago Blogging on Blogger.com as it first went into Beta, because I like to try out new stuff on the Internet. (Currently Twitter and its better counter part Jaiku.com)

Then I read a post about the fact that WordPress was such a great Blogging software for SEO Purpose.
So I downloaded, Installed the Software as a sub domain…., did some SEO Stuff to make it even better (couldn't resist :-)) en started Blogging to get my Joomla site up.

And it worked!! But than it hit me….the reason why I am still Blogging…

The real Reasons why I still Blog

It is a great way to share knowledge in a fast way.
It brings you in contact with some great people by letting them comment on you posts.
It is a much faster medium to post to than a standard structured website
People start asking questions that challenges me to find them the right answers, which in turn teaches me how to do things better…

So the main reason for my now is because I like to interact with other people and keep learning and sharing that knowledge again and again in the process, its just like a wheel that keeps spinning and moving forward.

For the rest.. I think Steve has made some clear points why to Blog, that I can related to a well.

Now comes the hard part, because Steve tagged the people I would like to see why they Blog already…
Like Barrie North and Amy Stephen.

So here is my short list:
HarryB of OpensourceCommunity.org because of his Drupal Posts (like to read more)
Casey Lee of Joomlashack because I like to see more posts like this one

And two dutch Bloggers, might be nice…
So the First one is Catharina Bethlehem of www.Kletskous.com
The second one is Karel Geenen from http://www.karelgeenen.nl/

Both are of intrest for the dutch readers that also read my Blog on http://seo-blog.itmentor.nl.

Thanks for the Tag Steve… good to see you as a moderator on the Joomlashack SEO Forum.

Update: To get a Full meme, I am tagging Erno Hannink from http://www.enthousiasmeren.nl/ because of his great work for the Dutch Blogging community.

The Joomla Admin Manual from Compassdesigns.net

Filed Under: Joomla Blog, Joomla Optimization, Joomla Seo

Today I received an RSS Feed from Barrie North, one of the best educators on Joomla that I know off.

He brought you earlier the Joomla Template Tutorial and he is a moderator for the Joomla SEO Forum

And now he is Selling his Joomla Admin Manual to you with a discount!
He even tells you why you should buy his book or just use the Joomla Manual for 1.0.11

But let me tell you already, this book is more then just Joomla, it gives you more information on how to work with the system, optimizing it for Search Engines and shows you how to create a better website.

I may not agree or like some off the things he writes about, but he sure knows his Joomla Stuff and how to design Great SEO Templates.
And if you are serious about Building the best website you can for yourself or your customers, then this Joomla Admin Manual is really worth the little money he is asking for it. 

Luckily a Joomla Developer Lied to You

Filed Under: Joomla Blog, Joomla Optimization, Joomla SEF, Joomla Seo

Now how's that for an opening…

Actually I am very happy to see this post today of Jinx telling you about the lie about Joomla 1.5 and Loosing ItemID's in the URL.

Joomla! 1.5 Accessibility – Look Ma no Itemid’s 

Read the post and check the URL examples he provides both with Mod_rewrite on and without!

Looks Joomla 1.5 is going to be the best on SEF yet, so you can focus again on writing great content on your website, but you are already doing that… right?
Because that is what Search Engine Optimization is all about!

How To keep up with Joomla news

Filed Under: Joomla Blog, Search Engines

Here is a Little tool I use to keep up with al the news that comes out on Joomla!, Joomla Components and Blogs…

I hope you already use it, if not, then this post is for you.

It is called Netvibes and it saves me a lot of time… so could you.
You can create an account for free with Netvibes and just try it, it won't cost you a thing, just time (very precious) but in the end it will save you time.

There are lots of things you can do with Netvibes, like organizing your feeds like the Joomla Blogs onto one Tab.

But you can also work with your own favorites, Flickr Foto's, Alexa rankings, Gmail,Yahoo mail, yes even POP3 mail accounts, all on one website, organized with tabs, or however you like it, just drag and drop the content you want in the place you want!!.

Isn't that great, so Web2.0.. and from a Search Engine or Traffic building tool point of view….
Build a tab with all your favorite Joomla Blogs and Websites (including yours) and publish it on the Netvibes EcoSystem to share it with other Netvibes users.

It is one of the best tools I use to keep Informed on-line, and you can access your page from any Internet connected PC, just login!

You could also try the “Personalized Home” pages of Google , or the one from Yahoo or Flake pages, but Netvibes is for me by far the best! Just go ahead and try it out….

P.s. If you want to use Personalize Google pages, Gmail is now free for All !! Just go to www.Gmail.com and sign up.
Even if you don't want to use it for mail, you still need it for the Google Webmaster Tools which are now out of Beta http://googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.com/

Overcoming the Joomla RSS Feed Syndication problem

Filed Under: Joomla Blog, Joomla Optimization, Joomla RSS Feed, Joomla Seo

If your use Joomla as a Blog, or if you just want one section of your site to setup as a Blog, you might have run into some trouble.
You want a feed to go with your Blog… but the standard Syndication Component of Joomla is to limited….

The Standard RSS Feed problem of Joomla

No, I don't mean the integration of Feed content into Joomla pages, there are several components that can do that very well.
That's a topic to write about some other time.

We are now facing a bigger problem, and that is getting your content out of your Joomla Blog section into a Feed reader.
And possible with all the layout of your page, including pictures, hyperlinks and paragraph layout.

If you use the standard Syndicate Component, you can set some parameters, but you can only syndicate the front page.
And all off your nicely placed page layout is stripped of all HTML coding one the Feed is created :-(
Leaving you with one big blop of text in the feed that you provide to your readers….

Joomla RSS Feed with Layout and other then the Frontpage

Is it possible? Keeping your post – page layout and using another part of the site for the Feed?

Yes, it can be done, with a special component.
There are two components that let you create a feed other then the Frontpage.

The first on is from Run-Digital and is called RSS Feed manager, and is an easy to use component if you limit the feed content to just a number of introduction words and then the link to the whole page.

The other one is much lesser known… probably because most people just syndicate the Intro.
But what if you want to Feed the whole post content? and with all the layout and stuff…

I that case you need DS-Syndicate from www.joomlafun.com !!

This Component lest you choose if you want a categorie content, or several ones to go into the feed, or just the Frontpage, or both.

But the best part is… the complete layout is still there !! No HTML stripping, just as you wrote it it gets it's way into the Feed.

Now you can create and use your Joomla based Blog with an RSS Feed the way you alway wanted.

And if you still are not ready to use this feature of Joomla, then I suggest you read my post on seo4joomla.wordpress.com

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