Now, it’s my job to help you understand this patent so here I will do my absolute best to de-construct this new patent and help you understand it in plain English.

In a nutshell, this new patent allows Google to take multiple query paths and associate them so that one URL wins out above the others when it’s related to that same kind of query path.

Here’s what I mean.

And for the record, whenever Google refers to “content items” in their patent, or when I refer to them in this blog post, they (and I) are referring to URLs; whether that URL be a “video and/or audio files, web pages for particular subjects, news articles, etc.”

I’ll use an example that Google used in their patent.

When someone visits Google and does a search, during that search session they’ll revise their queries if they aren’t getting the kinds of results that they want, eventually clicking on a URL after they’re done revising their search.

If a “statistically significant number of users” submit that same set of queries and then end up clicking on the same URL this URL will be considered more relevant and that URL will then get a ranking increase.

In another example, if 55% of searchers using a query path such as apples/bananas/strawberries click on FruitURL1 and 35% of searchers using this same path click on FruitURL2, the search engine can rank FruitURL1 first and FruitURL2 second.  These can also be ranked as #1 and #2 whenever someone searches on apples/bananas or even apples, bananas, or strawberries as long as that path is identified as being related to the original query path that ranked FruitURL1 first and FruitURL2 second.

In other words, if more people click on FruitURL1 whenever they do a similar query that is identified as part of a query path apples -> bananas -> strawberries, then that URL will get a better ranking in the organic search results.

There’s many more examples provided in the patent itself but suffice it to say, that this is quite honestly, a popularity contest.  The more people click through to your website within the organic search results, the more likely you are to have a better ranking.

Think if it like a CTR (click-through-rate) of your website in the natural search results.  Much like your positioning in the Google AdWords program is determined by how well your ad performs, such is the case with this new patent.  If it’s determined that more people searching on apples/oranges/bananas tend to visit FruitURL1, then FruitURL1 will gain a better position in the organic search engine rankings.

What I found interesting however, is this little snippet of text taken from the patent which gives a little bit of insight into exactly how Google ranks pages.

The search results can, for example, be ranked by a quality measure and a relevance measure. For example, a particular web page can have a quality measure derived from the number of other web pages that are linked to the particular web page, and can have an information retrieval score related to the matching the query terms to words in the particular web page. The information retrieval score can be combined with the page rank to give a final rank to the particular web page.

From this little bit of information we can determine a few things that indicate how Google does in fact rank web pages:

• The “quality measure” of a web page is determined by the number of sites linking to that web page (no surprise there).
• The “information retrieval score” is determined by the number of matching query terms on the web page.  Note that this doesn’t mention where on the web page, only that it looks at the web page itself to see if there are matching query terms.
• The “information retrieval score” can be combined with the page rank to give the page a final rank.  Here again is the dreaded PageRank.  Now, to be fair, the term “page rank” is not capitalized nor does it have a trademark symbol associated with it, but one can only assume that PageRank is definitely playing a role in how web pages rank even though Google has recently removed PageRank from the Google Webmaster tools area (and updated PageRank across the board just recently).  Check out this post by Barry Schwartz where he states that “…according to Susan Moskwa from the Google Webmaster Central team “…it [PageRank] was removed [from Google's Webmaster tools] because Google keeps telling webmasters “that they shouldn’t focus on PageRank so much.” They felt it was “silly” to keep telling webmasters that, and at the same time show it in Webmaster Tools. So Google removed it from Webmaster Tools. I think this is a good thing, since I agree it is obsessed over too much, plus what Google showed in Webmaster Tools was not very useful to webmasters.”So, all this said, I wonder then why it’s referred to within the patent?  Since it’s not used in it’s proper form, spelled PageRank, do we then assume that they’re just using the phrase “page rank” as an overall encompassing term, not associated with the actual trademarked PageRank?

  Since they’ve removed it from Google Webmaster tools but then days later updated the PageRank on the Google toolbar across the board for websites, one can only assume that they are referring to actual PageRank.  Never let it be said that Google was transparent.

The bottom line is, this new patent appears as though it will begin ranking web content based upon the number of clicks that an individual URL gets by actual web searchers and the paths that they take to get there.  So my advice to you, as a website owner, is to be sure that people want to click over to your website.

Do you offer compelling reasons to do so?  Are these reasons contained within your web pages’ descriptions?

If not, now might be a good time to get to work on that.

During this talk (which runs around 45 minutes), Matt revealed some very interesting facts and ideas about SEO which I found…well…enlightening as I’m sure you will too.

If you do have the time to watch the entire video for yourself (like I said it runs about 45 minutes); see my notes below the video which gives you plenty of highlights.

In the video Matt States:

• WordPress takes care of 80-90% of the mechanics of SEO. [@3:30]
  • Mechanics = “how crawlable a website is.”
• Plugins Matt uses: [@4:15]
  • Askimet
  • Cookies for Comments
    • Spam prevention.
  • Enforce www. Preference
    • What you prefer (canonical).
  • FeedBurner FeedSmith
  • WP Super Cache
• “We crawl roughly in order of PageRank.  The more PR you have the faster you’re likely to be found, the deeper we’ll crawl, the more often we’ll visit.” [@5:40]
  • PageRank = the number of people that link to you and how important those links are.  (basic SEO).
  • Example:  A web page has a PR of 9 and has three outlinks (links heading out and away from the website) then each of those outlinks gets 3.
  • PageRank starts to “evaporate” each time it goes across a link.
  • Getting backlinks:  You want people to know you and you want them to be reputable.
• Blog posts need to be on-topic and you want to be reputable. [@9:40]
  • How to do this:
    • If you don’t love it, don’t write about it.
      • Write often, write every day.
    • What am I good at doing?
    • What do I have to say?
• Keywords [@12:05]
  • Think about all the different ways someone can describe something. Put those into your blog post naturally.
  • Jargon mis-match:  Translate [jargon] into regular language.
    • what are titles you could type that are “normal”.
  • Use Google Keyword Tool.
  • If you don’t have [a specific word] on your site you probably aren’t going to rank.
• Custom Structure on URLs “/%postname%/ [@19:15]
• Google looks at over 200 things [when determining where to rank you]
  • Things in the title
  • Things in the URL
  • Things that are highlighted like H1 tags and stuff like that.
  • Be sure you put the keywords in the title in some way.
  • Power Tip:  Use variations between the post title itself and within the URL itself [the permalink].  Not spam.  One or two variants.  Use them as separate opportunities to put keywords in.  Now you can rank for both variations of the keywords.
• Use categories that are also good keywords.
• Keywords in URL paths:  example.com/my-keywords
  • Dashes are best
  • Next best is underscores
  • No spaces is worst.
• If you’ve already done your site should you change things?
  • No.
• Don’t overdo [on page SEO]
  • After you mention a term two or three times Google knows what your post is about.
• Gaining a reputation [@25:24]
  • Be interesting. Funny, alternative opinions.
  • Update often.
  • Apply Katamari Philosophy.
    • Start small.  Start in a niche that you can do well.
    • Build up, build up, build up.  Get there gradually.
  • Ways to Get Links [@30:14 in the video]
    • Provide a useful service.
    • Do original research or reporting. Huge!
    • Give great information.
    • Find a creative niche.  One good idea can carry you so, so far.
    • Write some code.  Open source.
    • Live blogging!  Blogging as it happens.
    • Make lists.  People love lists.
    • Create controversy.  Too often sometimes can’t work well.
    • Meet folks on Twitter, Facebook, FriendFeed
• Should you do a podcast?
  • Recommends videos over podcasts.
  • Videos tend to rank relatively well on Google.
• Tools you should know about [@35:55]
  • Webmaster console at http://Google.com/webmasters/
  • Google Analytics
  • FeedBurner:  MyBrand for free feeds.mattcutts.com instead of feeds.feedburner.com.
  • Google website optimizer
  • Custom Search Engine: free site search
  • AdSense
    • Use these tags to mark out the meat of your blog post so that AdSense will only target what’s contained in the tags: (highly recommended)
      • <!–google_ad_section_start–>
      • <!– google_ad_section_end –>
• Google Analytics Tip [@38:12]
  • Click Settings -> top landing pages and will tell you which blog posts get the most visitors.
  • Bounces tell you how often people come to your page and then leave.
  • Simple trick:  Show related posts.
• What NOT to do [@40:19]
  • Avoid paid posts.
• Keep your WordPress updated!
• Power Tip: [@43:57]
  • Add an .htaccess to your /wp-admin
    • This says only these two IP addresses are allowed to use the wp-admin.
    • Search for “protect wp-admin”.  Also on Matt’s blog.
• In WP core 2.8 you don’t have to worry about the rel=canonical tags.  Already included. [@44:50]

Everyone who runs a website has at one point or another worried about whether or not their site is being silently penalized in the search engines for having duplicate content.

Just to be sure everyone’s on the same page let’s first define what duplicate content REALLY is.

When you have two pages that are identical to one another on your own website, this is considered duplicate content.  And chances are you likely have duplicate content but you just don’t know it.

Here’s why that would happen…

Let’s say that you have a website located at http://www.Example.com.

You create a new web page on your site and have a few people link to that page.

• Person #1 links to you using http://www.Example.com.
• Person #2 links to you using http://Example.com (notice the lack of the “www”).
• Person #3 links to you using http://www.Example.com/ (notice the trailing slash).
• And Person #4 links to you using http://www.Example.com/index.html (notice the “index.html).

To YOU and to the people visiting your site, this is all the same page.

To the SEARCH ENGINES however, these are all different URLs. Surprised?

So as far as the search engines are concerned you have 4 pages on your site that all contain the same exact content – hence, the duplicate content issue.

You see, search engines can’t tell that these are the same URLs (I’m shaking my head as I say that because it’s still beyond me), but, the fact remains, that this is in fact, very true.

So how do you fix this issue?  Well, thankfully, there’s a few ways to fix this issue.

1. When you link internally, that is, link to other pages within your own website, consistently use the same URL.  ALWAYS use http://www.Example.com or http://Example.com -whichever one is your preferred way of linking, choose one and stick with it.
2. Additionally you can also use a 301 redirect to point to your preferred way of linking to your URL.  For example, if you prefer http://www.Example.com then set up a 301 redirect on http://Example.com, http://www.Example.com/, http://www.Example.com/index.html, etc.  (I’ve listed below the most common ways people would link to your site).
3. Within your Google webmaster tools area you can TELL Google what you’re preferred way of linking is.
4. Be sure that when you submit a sitemap for your website that within that sitemap, all of the URLs are using your preferred way of linking.

Some potential issues are:

1. If you don’t have direct control over the webhost that administers your files, you’ll have to have someone else place that 301 redirect on the URLs you want.
2. A lot of free web hosts don’t let you create a 301 redirect.
3. Session IDs on a website can create a huge duplicate content issue.  Since each page may be accessed with a different session ID in the URL, that page may be indexed multiple times; even though it’s the same page.

Now if all else fails and you simply can’t implement a 301 redirect to your preferred way of linking, then consider placing the canonical link element on the individual page.

In the head of the individual web page you’d place the following:

<head>
<link rel=”canonical” href=”http://www.Example.com/page.html” />
</head>

Note the trailing slash after “page.html”.  This is very important to include.

The bottom line is, using the canonical link element on your website is EXTREMELY beneficial to you.  But first and foremost, use the methods listed in the first four items at the top and if those fail, then use the canonical link element.

This information has summarized what Matt Cutts said in his 20-minute presentation; but if you want more information, here’s a few more places you can check out:

• The Matt Cutts video.
• The blog post at Google webmaster central.
• Yahoo’s blog post.
• Microsoft

And, as promised, here’s a list of URLs that are all different in the search engines eyes and that might cause duplicate content issues:

• www.Example.com
• Example.com
• www.Example.com/
• example.com/
• www.example.com/index.html
• example.com/index.html
• www.example.com/Home.aspx
• example.com/Home.aspx

Today I’ve decided to give you some pretty darn important information about SEO straight from Google’s own Matt Cutts.  The information you’ll find in this blog post are the important points to take away from Matt’s videos on the YouTube Google Webmaster Help Channel.  I highly suggest that you subscribe to this channel as it almost always contains information that’s important for you to know if you’re optimizing your own site.

That said, here are the points that you should take away from these videos.

From “Should I tweak my titles and descriptions to improve my CTR?”

• SEO is not all about position in the search engines.  It’s also about getting those visitors to come to your site.
• Title and description tags absolutely can increase your CTR (click through rate).
• The description should entice people to visit your site.

From “More than one H1 on a page:  good or bad?“

• If you have multiple sections on your web page, it’s not a bad idea to have those separated into different H1 (header) tags.
• Do not use an entire H1 on your page and then modify with CSS.

From “Should I use underscores or hyphens in URLs?“

• Use dashes or hyphens if you can.
• Dashes or hyphens are considered as separators and underscores are not.

From “Two questions about nofollow“

• Google does not follow links from Wikipedia.

From “Does the position of keywords in the URL affect ranking?“

• Example:  example.com/keyword/London better than example.com/London/keyword?
• Helps a little bit to have keywords in your URL.
• 4 or 5 keywords might work well.
• On his blog he’ll take the first 2-5 words related to his post and use that as the URL.
• Don’t worry about where the keywords are in the URL.

From “Why does Google index blogs faster than other sites?“

• Google does not guarantee that if you submit a sitemap, they’ll go crawl it.
• There’s a difference between indexing and crawling.  A ping will cause Google Blog search to crawl you.
• If you do show up you’ll show up in the “Blog search corpus” not the “index corpus”.

I suggest that to get the most out of the information Google does provide to you to take a moment and watch these videos (as well as the others that are there).  They’re short and to the point.

Highlights

1. Google trends discovers the search volume differences between keyword phrases as well as using Google Trends for websites to see what the search volumes look like for a set of websites.  It will also show you related sites so if you typed in MattCutts.com then you’d see a list of sites that people also went to (latent sites).
2. Google Ad Manager – allows you to manage all of the ads on your site including whatever third party ads you want to have.
3. Google Ad Planner – let’s you choose demographic areas.
4. Google has introduced OCR (Optical Character Recognition) in some PDFs.  Some PDFs only contain a snapshot of what the page would look like.  With Google’s OCR they can take those pictures of text, run the OCR program and then index those just like regular text.
5. Better crawling of Flash.  Always good to have static HTML in addition to flash.
6. Better processing of JavaScript.
7. Better at keyword spam.
8. Show URLS that link to the 404 pages on your site.
9. Custom 404 pages.  Using 14 lines of JavaScript in your 404 template so the JS will run and suggest other pages on your site that would be useful.  Find within Google Webmaster Central Blog.
10. Advanced segmentation introduced in Google Analytics.
11. On-demand indexing for Google Custom Searches.  You can request that Google index a certain page “on-demand” and “usually within 24 hours”.  Note that this does not affect search results as a whole but will affect Google Custom Searches.
12. Webmaster Communication with Google.  Including webmaster chats.  Many times there will be a Q&A at the end.
13. If you register for Google Webmaster central they will hold all of your messages for you.
14. Identified sites that are hackable.  The message center will notify you if they believe your site falls into this category.
15. Produced a 22-page PDF talking about SEO.  “Google does not hate SEO.”  They use internally and those outside of Google can also use this as well.  “A good SEO can help you put your best foot forward.”
16. They see a continuation of Black Hat trends.  People grabbing expired domains and put p0_rn on it.  You’ll also see it get more vicious.  It will be more common to see your site hacked.  Mainly due to the openings on a web host provider.  Blackhat moves to the outright illegal.  Using DNS subdomain hijacking.  You try to take control of another persons sub-domain.  They’ll also use and take advantage of a cross-site scripting flaw and then try to install malware on your machine.  “If this is what it takes to compete in the black hat SEO world, is it worth it?

The question was:

What this person ran into was nothing more than a simple error that can be easily fixed but to someone who is unfamiliar with submitting sitemaps it can be a very intimidating and scary message.

When you first visit Google’s Webmaster Tools  the very first thing that you’ll need to do is add your website so that Google can give you various reports.  One item within the Google Webmaster Tools area that’s very important to make use of is their “Sitemap submission”.

The sitemap area within Google’s Webmaster Tools allows you to enter the URL where your sitemap resides on your site so that Google can then update their records with all of the pages that you’ve included within your sitemap.

However, if the path for your website that you initially submitted and the path for your sitemap are different you’ll receive the error that the person received above.

Notice that the difference between the two URLs in the message above is nothing more than a missing “www” in the sitemap link that was submitted.

All that this means is that when you initially added your website to Google’s Webmaster Tools area you added a different URL (either containing the “www” or not) than the URL your sitemap resided on.

An easy fix to this is to first check and see what the URL is to your sitemap file (either http://www.SomeSite.com/GoogleSitemap.xml or http://SomeSite.com/GoogleSitemap.xml and then when you are ready to add your site, be sure that the URL to your site is the same as what your sitemap URL is, either with a “www” or without.

That’s all for today – we’ll talk soon,

Kristine