Deconstructing 4Networking.biz: Some More Advanced SEO Tips

Hi All, 

I've prepared a couple of videos of me running through the 4Networking site (below) and identifying any potential SEO barriers and a few problems here and there (if there's any problem with me doing this Brad, please take it down). 

The main reason I've chosen 4Networking is simply because we're all familiar with the site, we all know how it works and we all use it and trust is a resource. 

The videos below will give you a good indication and a few pointers of what you should look for on your own sites, which is really the whole point of the tutorial. 

N.B. I'm typically paid to take a critical approach to SEO, which means the tone in this video may seem critical. However, that's really not the case, it's more just a case study than anything else -- I've come across quite a bit of good stuff in terms of SEO on 4Networking, too. 

Nice post and first glance SEO review of the 4Networking site Gareth, thanks.

I'd like to add one thing that has to be said when SEO reviewing a forum website. You mentioned about a 120 maximum recommendation of links per page (which I kind of agree with, even forgetting about SEO, since I'm a fan of keeping things simple). Forum websites, not just 4networking but most forums (including those based on popular forum packages like vbulletin) are quite notorious in being links per page heavy. A typical forum page on this site, e.g. this Business 4Networking page which lists topics, contains around 200 links (view source and count the number of <a link instances). A typical topic page on this site, e.g. a topic in this forum which goes over 15 replies (1 page), can have around 300 links! This number of links can be detrimental to seo (in terms of pagerank, complexity/confusion and determining importance of the site structure), so IMO any way that redundant (or just nice to have rather must have) links could be removed to simplify the site would be a good thing.

The good thing with the developers of this site is that they do pay attention to feedback.

So, to a SEO simpleton Paul, are you saying 4N posting can be ( depending on the popularity of the topic and page) be irrelevant to SEO, or possibly detrimental?

I'm definitely NOT saying that a business posting to this forum is detrimental to the SEO of that business.

Optimising is about improving things, or removing/reducing/simplifying the bad things that make a situation worse (the detrimental things). I'm just saying that if unnecesary links were reduced it would be an improvement to the 4networking site's SEO.

Thanks, Paul. 

Yeah, I think that's fair, however I would add a bit to that: 

• Google obviously utilises Page Segmentation (for anyone unaware this basically means Google has the ability to break up a page into component chunks e.g. this is the bottom or footer of the page, this is the header or top of the page, this is the side or sidebar of the page and this is the content body or content section of the page). Different links, depending on their position on the page, will thus be apportioned different weighting by Google. 
• Google will discount the second instance of a link on a page and to the same page e.g. if there are two links to "Clickwork Media" on a page, then there is the chance that the second link will be discounted from contributing value. 
• Additional site-wide links are not likely to contribute as much value e.g. the value of any additional site wide links will slide on a relative scale. For example, the first instance of a link may be valued, the second instance not as much, the third instance less so and so on. It's obviously better to try and source links from different root domains rather than obtaining all of your links from one site. 
• The PageRank on a given page isn't always passed in full -- each page is assigned a certain amount of "passable" PageRank. 

That's the problem with SEO, there are lots and lots of variables...!

Again, as I noted in the video it's very far from being a comprehensive revie of 4Networking, but hopefully it's useful for giving 4Networker's a bit of insight into what to look for.  

Useful, thank you.

Hi Gareth. I haven't watched your videos fully yet - but what a great way to promote your expertise!

I think all 4N consultants selling their skills here should put up similar videos. From an architect to a voice coach - put up some videos showing us how you go about helping clients. But especially consultants like internet marketing guys, general business consultants, life coaches, etc because of all the "snake-oil sellers" out there. 

And you could embed your videos in your signature. And if you embed a Youtube video, the visitor could go up to Youtube and find links to more of your videos.

Thanks for the tip, David (and the compliment). As you will see, my signature has been updated with a few of my latest vids (wasn't actually aware we were allowed to embed YouTube videos in our signature, if I'd know I would have done it a lot earlier so thanks again ;)). 

If anyone else wants me to do a quick review of their site and post the results for all to learn from in this thread, please just let just submit the URL in this thread and I will get round to it ASAP.

www.siriusbusinesslaw.co.uk

We can't even get the developer to tell us what they have and haven't done.

I suspect nil/very little. Independent evidence would be great.

Please remember I'm not a techie and my friends are even worse so please apply KISS when responding.

Hi Chris, 

As noted in the PM, I will have the video up later today (I will also include a brief summary at the bottom of the video, for anyone who doesn't want to run through the whole thing). 

Hi Christopher, 

Please see the videos and a quick summary below. 

The first thing I would address is the qualification of what it means to have done "SEO". 

SEO is broadly split up into threeyword component parts: on-site SEO, on-page SEO and off-site SEO. 

I would apportion the extent of the work as follows: 

On-Site SEO: 15-20%
On-Page SEO: 15-20%
Off-Site SEO: 70%

This distribution depends on many factors, including: 

• The competitiveness of the niche. 
• The extent of any on-site problems. 
• The SEO work done to date. 
• And lots more.

I would say some SEO work has certainly been done on-site and on-page, however in terms of off-site SEO, very little has been done or achieved to date. 

Quick Action Summary: 

• Keyword Research: I mentioned above how I typically distribute workload etween components, however the set-up phase of a campaign should really be another section, and the keyword research element in that campaign should be its biggest objective. A keyword research document should take upwards of 10 hours to complete, even longer, depending on the extent of the niche. It's the foundation of any and every SEO campaign. 
• Page Titles: The page title is one of the more important on-page ranking factors. The page titles on Sirius Business Law could benefit from being more keyword focused. A page title should ideally include a target keyword and be no longer than 65 chars. in length (inc. whitespace). You should also try and maximise the amount of available space by avoiding term repetition e.g. rather than "Commercial Law and Property Law" try "Commercial & Property Law). 
• Internal Linking: This is something which hasn't really been covered in the video (with the exception of the footer section of the site), however internal linking between relevant pages on Sirius Business Law can aid the flow and distribution of authority between those pages (it essentially means deeper pages can become more powerful and more capable of ranking for their target terms). 
• Sitemap: I would recommend uploading a fresh XMLSitemap and submitting this to Google via Google Webmaster Tools. This document is utilised by Google as a reference point to all the pages listed or available on a given website. It can improve indexation of content (there is currently an XML sitemap available, however I recommend linking to this from the footer section of the site). 
• Backlinks: This is the main issue and one that really needs to be worked. Ideally you want to acquire links from authoritative, trusted, important and relevant resources and these links should obviously point back to Sirius Business Law utilising keyword focused anchor text (anchor text is the text you see in a link and search engines utilise it to determine the relevance of a linked to page to specific keywords). Some Sirius Business Law's main competitors have thousands of backlinks pointing into their websites (some of which are high quality links) -- Sirius Business Law currently has only 11 links pointing in (or which have been picked up to date, at least). 
• Canonicalisation: I would recommend 301 redirecting non-WWW URLs to their WWW counterparts using .htaccess. I would recommend redirecting http://www.siriusbusinesslaw.co.uk/index.html to http://www.siriusbusinesslaw.co.uk/
• 404 Error Page: This is just a page a user lands on whenever they click on a broken link or type in a malformed URL -- this page should include a list of links to the most important pages on your site. 

Again Christopher, this Audit is just a brief overview (a typical technical audit takes hours to complete) however hopefully it gives you (and everyone else reading in) a bit of an overview on some of the main points to look at one a site. 

Hi Guys, 

If anyone else wants a quick video audit of their site (minus the "ems" and "ums") please just let me know...

Hi All,

We've got another tutorial today, this time for an e-commerce site: NewLook.com. 

Now, I've got no association whatsoever with this brand (I have managed similar sized brands in the past and while working for an Agency, however) and I've only chosen NewLook.com because there's a number of inherent SEO problems on their site.

Please see the videos below and post any questions you may have. Please also get in touch if you would like me to do a quick Video Audit of your website - don't be shy! 

http://www.dailymotion.com/video/xiilxc_video-audit-new-look-part-i-clickwork-media_webcam

http://www.dailymotion.com/video/xiim6h_video-audit-new-look-part-ii-clickwork-media_webcam

(NOT POSSIBLE TO EMBED WITH DAILY MOTION, SORRY)

Video Audit: Mr Green Homes 

http://www.mrgreenhomes.co.uk

Clickwork Media

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Hi All, 

Another video audit for a 4N member, this time Simon Ward of Mr Green Homes (http://www.mrgreenhomes.co.uk). 

POINTS FOR SIMON: 

We're currently preparing a new version of our site build guidelines, so Simon I will be happy to send these over to you free of charge once they are completed -- it will basically run you through all of the main SEO factors you need to address when building a new site (and the considerations you need to make). 

I have also picked up a few more technical issues on your site (particularly involving crawlability), so if you're looking to maintain this website build as is it may be beneficial for me to get in touch with your web developer Estate Solutions to have a bit of a "chat" (free of charge and providing you are happy for me or a member of my team to do so of course). 

POINTS FOR SIMON AND EVERYONE ELSE TOO: 

Ok, here's a quick overview on what we've picked up, this isn't everything but it's a quick look for people who don't want to go through the whole video (again, this is far from being a comprehensive audit -- we would take a far more in-depth look at a site before starting an SEO Campaign): 

• Hidden Links: I'm not sure if you're aware, but there's hidden links on your homepage pointing to rolex and power tool websites (I've included more details in the video - again, this is definitely not recommended for reasons outlined in the video). 
• JavaScript: There are a few instances of avaScript being implemented on the site, which will cause crawl problems (this is something I could "chat" with your web developer about). 
• Canonicalisation: non-WWW, default page (MrGreen.aspx) and lower case/capitalisation redirects should all be implemented. Simple 301 Redirects via .htaccess for all. HTTPs currently displays a website designed by Estate Solutions. 
• Duplicate Content: I recommend creating post excerpts on the the main blog page, category page etc. This can be achieved by searching for the term "the_content" in specific page templates and replacing it with "the_excerpt" - DO NOT do this for your post template (please get in touch for more info). I also recommend avoiding duplicating content on external sites. 
• 404 Error Page: Simple implementation of a 404 Error Page. 
• RSS Feed: I would recommend hosting this through FeedBurner and utilising My Brand to host ithe feed on your own site. I would also recommend increasing the prominence of the RSS button http://www.insertwebsitehere.net/2011/04/25/where-is-your-rss-button/
• Blog: I would recommend linking to the homepage from the blog. 
• Image Based Navigation: I would recommend creating plain text static HTML links in your navigation menu (these are currently image-based). I would also link to the property search page from the navigation menu. Finally, I would make sure that all images are hosted on your own site (as opposed to hotlinking from your web developers site). 
• Page Titles and Meta Descriptions: Page Titles could benefit from being a lot more keyword-focused (and unique) -- they should also be a maximum of 65 characters in length (inc. whitespace). Meta Descriptions should also be unique and should sell the page -- the maximum length for a Meta Description should be 165 characters (inc. whitespace). 
• Sitemap: I recommend generating an XML Sitemap and linking to it to from the footer section of the site. 

That's a bit of a brief summary of what's included in the videos, but there is quite a bit more in there so they're definitely worth watching. 

If you have any more questions please do get in touch Simon, again I will be more than happy to speak to your Web developer fere of charge and on your behalf. 

WOULD YOU LIKE A VIDEO REVIEW OF YOUR WEBSITE?

If anyone else would like for either me or a member of my team to do a quick video audit of your site, please just get in touch. We can typically turn something around within 24 hours.