Hello SEO experts,
This blog will help you with your SEO problems to an extent.
I stumbled upon a lot of new stuff today and thought it would be important to share it with the outside world of website developers.
Out of the many tools I came across today were:
- SeoSiteCheckup
- AddThis
-
compressnow
All are too damn good for any SEO analyst or a specialist.
Basically I worked on over 2 dozen SEO techniques today and all of them proved to be crucial.
We applied these to our website "unKnown variables" itself.
http://www.unknownvariables.com/
Here is an overview of the techniques I dealt with:
Title
The <title> tag is required in all HTML documents and it defines the title of the document. This tag
displays the page title in browsers toolbar and in the search-engine results (SERPs). It also provides a
title for the page when it is added to favorites. A descriptive <title> tag is important in helping search
engines determine your web page's relevancy for certain keywords.
The title of your page have a length of 17 characters. Most search engines will truncate titles to 70
characters.
Keywords
The meta keywords tag allows you to provide additional text for search engines to index along with
the rest of what you've written on your page. Meta keywords can emphasize a particular word or
phrase in the main body of your text.
Most Common Keywords Test
Check the most common keywords & their usage (number of times used) on your web page.
HOW TO FIX
In order to pass this test, you must optimize the density of your primary keywords displayed
above.
If the density of a specific keyword is below 2% you must increase it and if the density is over 4%
you must decrease it.
Keyword Usage
This describes if your most common keywords are used in your title, meta-description and metakeyword
tags.
Keyword(s) not included in Meta-Title
Keyword(s) included in Meta-Description Tag
Keyword(s) included in Meta-Keywords Tag
HOW TO FIX
First of all, you must make sure that your page is using the title, meta-description and metakeywords
tags.
Second, you must adjust these tags content in order to include some of the primary keywords
displayed above.
<h1> Headings Status
This indicates if any H1 headings are used in your page. H1 headings are HTML tags than can help
emphasize important topics and keywords within a page.
HOW TO FIX
In order to pass this test you must indentify the most important topics from your page and insert
those topics between <h1>...</h1> tags.
Example:
<h1>Important topic goes here</h1>
...
<h1>Another topic</h1>
<h2> Headings Status
This indicates if any H2 headings are used in your page. H2 headings can be helpful for describing the
sub-topics of a page.
Robots.txt Test
Search engines send out tiny programs called spiders or robots to search your site and bring
information back so that your pages can be indexed in the search results and found by web users. If
there are files and directories you do not want indexed by search engines, you can use the "robots.txt"
file to define where the robots should not go.
These files are very simple text files that are placed on the root folder of your website:
www.yourwebsite.com/robots.txt.
There are two important considerations when using "robots.txt":
- the "robots.txt" file is a publicly available file, so anyone can see what sections of your server you
don't want robots to use;
- robots can ignore your "robots.txt", especially malware robots that scan the web for security
vulnerabilities;
Sitemap Test
This test check if your website is using a "sitemap" file: sitemap.xml, sitemap.xml.gz or
sitemapindex.xml.
Sitemaps are an easy way for webmasters to inform search engines about pages on their sites that are
available for crawling. In its simplest form, a sitemap is an XML file that lists URLs for a site along with
additional metadata about each URL (when it was last updated, how often it usually changes, and how
important it is, relative to other URLs in the site) so that search engines can more intelligently crawl
the site.
Favicon Test and Validator
Check if your site is using and correctly implementing a favicon.
Favicons are small icons that appear in your browser's URL navigation bar. They are also saved next to
your URL's title when bookmarking that page. They can help brand your site and make it easy for
users to navigate to your site among a list of bookmarks.
HOW TO FIX
To add a favicon to your site, you need to have your logo created in a 16x16 PNG, GIF or ICO
image and uploaded to your web server.
Then it’s simply a matter of adding the following code into the header of your HTML code for your
web pages:
<head> <link rel="icon" type="image/x-icon" href="url_to_my_favicon" />
<title>My Title</title> </head>
In the example above the "url_to_my_favicon" refers to the actual location of your favicon file.
Page Objects
Check the full list of objects requested by your page.
Code To Text Ratio
Check your webpage source code in order to measure the size of text content compared to the
structure (HTML code). This percent is not a direct ranking factor for search engines but there are
other factors that depend on it such as site loading speed and user experience.
HOW TO FIX
In order to pass this test you must increse your text to HTML code ratio. Here are some
tehniques:
move all inline styling rules into a external CSS file
move your JavaScript code into a external JS file
use CSS layout instead of HTML tables
URL SEO Friendly Test
Check if your website URL and all links from inside are SEO friendly
Broken Links Test
Check your website for broken links
Google Analytics Test
Check if your website is connected with google analytics
HOW TO FIX
In order to pass this test you must create an account on Google Analytics site and insert into your
page a small javascript tracking code.
Example:
<!-- Google Analytics -->
<script>
(function(i,s,o,g,r,a,m){i['GoogleAnalyticsObject']=r;i[r]=i[r]||function(){
(i[r].q=i[r].q||[]).push(arguments)},i[r].l=1*new Date();a=s.createElement(o),
m=s.getElementsByTagName(o)[0];a.async=1;a.src=g;m.parentNode.insertBefore(a,m)
})(window,document,'script','//www.google-analytics.com/analytics.js','ga');
ga('create', 'UA-XXXX-Y', 'auto');
ga('send', 'pageview');
</script>
<!-- End Google Analytics -->
Note that you have to change the 'UA-XXXX-Y' with the proper id which you'll find into your
analytics account.
Underscores in Links Test
Check your URL and in-page URLs for underscore characters. The general advise is to use hyphens or
dashes (-) rather than underscores (_). Google treats hyphens as separators between words in a URL –
unlike underscores.
Google PageRank Test
Check Google PageRank for your website.
A Google PageRank (PR) is a measure from 0 - 10 and is determined by a proprietary mathematical
formula that counts every link to a website as a vote. In essence, your website is put up against every
other website with similar content and keywords in a popularity contest. Therefore, it is important for
your website to acquire backlinks from other websites that are essentially giving a vote of confidence
to your site.
With your website already cleaned up and shining with outstanding quality content and internal SEO
methods (keywords, meta tags, etc), you should have a strategy to get your website noticed by
others. Important pages receive a higher PageRank and are more likely to appear at the top of the
search results.
Alexa Page Rank Test
Check Alexa Rank for your website.
Alexa Rank mesure the traffic rate of your domain and is determined by the web information company
Alexa. This company ranks sites based on the amount of traffic (over a period of three months)
recorded from users that have the Alexa Toolbar installed. The lower your rating on Alexa the better.
Meaning if you have a ranking under 100,000 then your website should be producing some good
traffic. The traffic rank depends on the popularity of your website (the number of users who visit your
site and the number of pages from your site viewed by those users).
HOW TO FIX
Some best practices for increase your Alexa Page Rank are listed below:
The most important thing is the content: write useful and qualitative content
Regularly submit fresh and unique content
Increase the traffic on your site
Generate quality backlinks on your website
Connect to social networking sites
Install Alexa Toolbar on your browser and Alexa Rank Widget into your webpage
Verify your website on Alexa.com
Image Alt Test
Check all images from your webpage for alt attributes.
If an image cannot be displayed (wrong src, slow connection, etc), the alt attribute provides
alternative information. Using keywords and human-readable captions in the alt attributes is a good
SEO practice because search engines cannot realy see the images. For images with a decorative role
(bullets, round corners, etc) you are advised to use an empty alt or a CSS background image.
HOW TO FIX
In order to pass this test you must add an alt attribute to every <img> tag used into your webpage.
An image with an alternate text specified is inserted using the following HTML line:
<img src="image.png" alt="text_to_describe_your_image">
Remember that the point of alt text is to provide the same functional information that a visual
user would see.
Learn more about optimizing images for SEO.
Inline CSS Test
Check your webpage HTML tags for inline CSS properties.
An inline CSS property is added by using the style attribute for a specific tag. By mixing content with
presentation you might lose some advantages of the style sheets. Is a good practice to move all the
inlines CSS rules into an external file in order to make your page "lighter" in weight and decreasing the
code to text ratio.
HOW TO FIX
Is a good practice to move all the inlines CSS rules into an external file in order to make your
page "lighter" in weight and decreasing the code to text ratio.
check the HTML code of your page and identify all style attribute
for each style attribute found you must proper move all declarations in the external CSS
file and remove the style attribute
For example:
<!--this HTML code with inline CSS rule:-->
<p style="color:red; font-size: 12px">some text here</p>
<!--would became:-->
<p>some text here</p>
<!--and the rule added into your CSS file:-->
p{color:red; font-size: 12px}
Media Print Test
Check if your webpage is using media print CSS property for custom printability.
HOW TO FIX
For printing your webpage in a user-friendly format you can use one of these methods:
1. Use a @media print {...} rule at the end of your CSS file (note that specificity and
precedence rules still apply!)
Example:
@media print {
/* your print styles go here */
#header, #footer, #menu { display: none; }
body { font: 12pt georgia,serif; }
h1 { font-size: 18pt; }
h2 { font-size: 16pt; color: #000; }
}
2. Create and use a print stylesheet:
<link rel="stylesheet" href="print.css" type="text/css" media="print" />
The file, print.css is the print stylesheet, and the media="print" command means that this
CSS file only gets called up when your page is printed. The only CSS rules you need to put
in the print stylesheet are ones to override the CSS rules in the main stylesheet (you don't
need to repeat any colour or branding CSS commands as they'll already be taken from the
main stylesheet).
Google Preview
This allows you to see how your webpage might look into a Google search results page.
A Google search result use your webpage title, url and meta-description in order to display the
information. If these elements are too long, Google will truncate their content. You are advised to set
your webpage title up to 70 characters and your webpage description up to 160 characters.
Keywords Cloud
The Keyword Cloud is a visual representation of keywords used on your website. This will show you
which words are frequently used in the content of your webpage. Keywords having higher density are
presented in larger fonts and displayed in alphabetic order.
Deprecated HTML Tags
Check if your webpage is using old, deprecated HTML tags. These tags will eventually lose browser
support and your web pages will render differently. Check this list with all HTML tags.
HTML Page Size Test
Check your page's HTML size. HTML size is the size of all the HTML code on your web page - this size
does not include images, external javascripts or external CSS files.
HTML Compression/GZIP Test
Check if your page is correctly using HTML compression as it is sent from your server.
HOW TO FIX
Your two options for file compression are Deflate and GZIP.
Deflate is an option which comes automatically with the Apache server and which is
simple to set up.
GZIP on the other hand needs to be installed and requires a bit more work to install.
However, GZIP does achieve a higher compression rate and therefore might be a better
choice if your website uses pages which have a lot of images or large file sizes.
Setting up file compression for your website will depend on which type of server you’re using for
your website. Most likely, you’ll be using Apache, which means you can enable compression by
adding a few deflate codes to your .htaccess file.
# compress text, html, javascript, css, xml:
AddOutputFilterByType DEFLATE text/plain
AddOutputFilterByType DEFLATE text/html
AddOutputFilterByType DEFLATE text/xml
AddOutputFilterByType DEFLATE text/css
AddOutputFilterByType DEFLATE application/xml
AddOutputFilterByType DEFLATE application/xhtml+xml
AddOutputFilterByType DEFLATE application/rss+xml
AddOutputFilterByType DEFLATE application/javascript
AddOutputFilterByType DEFLATE application/x-javascript
For more advanced information regarding deflate you can check this Apache documentation.
Page Cache Test
Check if your site is serving cached pages. Caches reduce server-load (since pages are generated less
often) and speeds up page display (by caching page ouput vs compiling the php-page). Caches also
reduces bandwidth requirements by up to 80%. Caching makes most sense for high traffic pages
whose content does not change on every page view. Common caching methods are Quickcache and
jpcache.
HOW TO FIX
In order to pass this test you are advised to use a caching mechanism for your pages. There are
three methods which can be used to caching your web pages:
1. Alternative PHP caching
- Alternative PHP Cache (APC) is an open source framework which caches data using
intermediate PHP code. Most web programmers who are familiar with the PHP
programming language can easily set up Alternative PHP Cache for your site.
2. Quickcache
- Quickcache is a lightweight page caching solution which was formerly known as jpcache.
Quickcache caches the page output rather than compiling the PHP page, making it a
superior version of page caching to the Alternative PHP caching. Quickcache can be
quickly downloaded from their website and can reduce your page load time up to 80%.
3. WP Super Cache
- If you have a Wordpress website, WP Super Cache can be installed within seconds and
without no programming knowledge.
Flash Test
Test if your website is using flash objects.
Nested Tables Test
Check if your site is using nested tables, which can slow down page rendering in the user's browser.
Image Expires Tag Test
Checks if your page is using an image expires tag, which specifies a future expiration date for your
images. Browsers will see this tag and caches the image in the user's browser until the specified date
(so that it does not keep re-fetching the unchanged image from your server). This speeds up your site
the next time that user visits your site and requires the same image.
HOW TO FIX
In order to reduce the number of HTTP requests, you can use the HTTP Expires header to set an
expiration time for your images or any other content type. You can add the following lines into
your .htaccess file:
<IfModule mod_expires.c>
ExpiresActive on
ExpiresByType image/jpg "access plus 1 month"
ExpiresByType image/jpeg "access plus 1 month"
ExpiresByType image/gif "access plus 1 month"
ExpiresByType image/png "access plus 1 month"
</IfModule>
Doctype Test
Check for doctype declaration. A document type declaration, or DOCTYPE, defines which version of
(X)HTML your webpage is actually using and this is essential to a proper rendering and functioning of
web documents in compliant browsers.
Frameset Test
Check if your website use frames. Frames are used by programmers to display a number of HTML
documents at the same time. The user gets to see a complete web page, but visiting spiders just see a
bunch of unrelated pages.
Site Loading Speed Test
It calculates the total load time of your site.
HOW TO FIX
In order to resolve this problem you are advised to:
reduce the number of your HTTP resources
use gzip compression
use HTTP caching
move all CSS style rules into a single, external and minified CSS file
minify all JS files and,if possible, try combine them into a single external JS file
include external CSS files before external JS files
place your JS scripts at the bottom of your page
optimize your web graphics
JS and CSS Minification Test
Check if your externals JS and CSS files are minified.
Minification is the process of removing all unnecessary characters from source code without changing
its functionality. These unnecessary characters usually include white space characters, new line
characters, comments, and sometimes block delimiters, which are used to add readability to the code
but are not required for it to execute. Removing those characters and compacting files can save many
bytes of data and speed up downloading, parsing, and execution time.
The compressed code may be harder to debug because it is bunched together, usually, on one line.
This is why we always recommend keeping a backup copy of your JS or CSS script to use in times
where debugging is required.
It's important to send as few bytes of CSS and JS markup down the wire as possible. It's not just about
size, though, it's also about the number of requests to get the bits. In fact, that's often more of a
problem then file size.
JS Minification Test
This checks if any of external javascript files used in your page is minified
URL Canonicalization Test
Test your site for potential URL canonicalization issues. Canonicalization describes how a site can use
slightly different URLs for the same page (for example, if http://www.example.com and
http://example.com displays the same page but do not resolve to the same URL). If this happens,
search engines may be unsure as to which URL is the correct one to index. Learn more about
canonicalization issues.
HOW TO FIX
In order to pass this test you must consider using a 301 re-write rule in your .htaccess file so that
both addresses (http://example.com and http://www.example.com) resolve to the same URL.
- If you want to redirect http://www.example.com to http://example.com, you can use this:
RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} ^www\.example\.com$
RewriteRule ^/?$ "http\:\/\/example\.com\/" [R=301,L]
- If you want to redirect http://example.com to http://www.example.com, you can use this:
RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} !^www.example.com$ [NC]
RewriteRule ^(.*)$ http://www.example.com/$1 [L,R=301]
Note that you must put the above lines somewhere after RewriteEngine On line.
Directory Browsing Test
Check if your server allows directory browsing. If directory browsing is disabled, visitors will not be
able to browse your directory by accessing the directory directly (if there is no index.html file). This
will protect your files from being exposed to the public. Apache web server allows directory browsing
by default. Disabling directory browsing is generally a good idea from a security standpoint.
Libwww-perl Access Test
Check if your server allows access from User-agent Libwww-perl. Botnet scripts that automatically look
for vulnerabilities in your software are sometimes identified as User-Agent libwww-perl. By blocking
access from libwww-perl you can eliminate many simpler attacks.
HOW TO FIX
In order to pass this test you must block the libwww-perl user-agent in your .htaccess file.
If your site is running on apache server, you could put these lines in your .htaccess after
RewriteEngine on line:
RewriteCond %{HTTP_USER_AGENT} libwww-perl.*
RewriteRule .* – [F,L]
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Server Signature Test
Check if your server signature is on. Turning off your server signature is generally a good idea from a
security standpoint.
Plaintext Emails Test
Check your webpage for plaintext email addresses. Any e-mail address posted in public is likely to be
automatically collected by computer software used by bulk emailers (a process known as e-mail
address harvesting). A spam harvester can read through the pages in your site and extract email
addresses which are then added to bulk marketing databases and the result is more spam in your
inbox.
HOW TO FIX
In order to pass this test you must make your email addresses invisible to email spiders. Note
that the best option is to replace your entire contact mechanism with a contact form and using
the POST method while submitting the form. Other solutions are listed below:
replace the at (@) and dot (.) characters
replace text with images
use email obfuscators
hide email addresses using JavaScript or CSS trick
Website IP Check
Check the IP address of your website.
IP Canonicalization Test
Test your site for potential IP canonicalization issues. Canonicalization describes how a site can use
slightly different URLs for the same page (for example, if your site’s IP address and domain name
display the same page but do not resolve to the same URL). If this happens, search engines may be
unsure as to which URL is the correct one to index. Learn more about canonicalization issues.
HOW TO FIX
In order to pass this test you must consider using a 301 re-write rule in your .htaccess file so that
your site's IP points to your domain name.
If your site is running on apache server, you could put these lines in your .htaccess after
RewriteEngine on line:
RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} ^XXX\.XXX\.XXX\.XXX
RewriteRule (.*) http://www.yourdomain.com/$1 [R=301,L]
Note that you must proper format the first line using your IP (replace X characters with proper
digits from your IP) and the second line using your domain name.
Safe Browsing Test
Check if your website is listed with malware or phishing activity.
Media Query Responsive Test
Test if your website implements responsive design functionalities using media query technique
Social Media Check
Test if your website connects to at least one of the most important social networks.
HOW TO FIX
To do that, you must insert into your page some social networks plugins: Facebook Like Button,
Facebook Share Button, Facebook Comments, Twitter Button, Google +1 Button, Pinterest Button or AddThis Widget
Social Media Activity
Check the activity on social media networks of your website or URL. This activity is measured in total
number of shares, likes, comments, tweets, plusOnes and pins and this activity covers only your URL
and not social media accounts linked with your webpage.
HOW TO FIX
In order to increase the social media activity for your site you are advised to use some social
networks plugins within your page:
Facebook Like Button, Facebook Share Button, Facebook Comments, Twitter Button, Google +1 Button,
Pinterest Button or AddThis Widget
All these techniques are a good way to start with your website SEO initially.
These will definitely help you put your website on the search engines with an increase with your SERP's and PageRank for sure.
So implement them, give it a few weeks until Google crawls your website, see the difference and let me know.
In the mean while I will keep blogging a few more tricks and techniques along the way.
Cheers.
And as always
Contact us for Valuable Discounts:and Offers for website development and website designing services
Mob: +91 9637 536 536
