Category

Technical SEO

Technical search engine optimization refers to the structure and organization of a site for maximum search engine visibility. Our coverage addresses structured data (Schema.org), website hierarchy, menus, categories, page speed, bot crawlers (including Googlebot), domain names, and more.

Technical SEO
For Redesigns, Protect SEO with 301 Redirect Strategy

January 10, 2014 • Jill Kocher Brown

In most website redesigns, search engine optimization relies on an accurate, complete, and flawlessly executed 301 redirect strategy. An ironclad 301 redirect strategy preserves as much as 85 percent of the link authority that the current site has earned over its lifetime and funnels it into the new site to
Technical SEO
SEO: Managing Faceted Search

December 13, 2013 • Jill Kocher Brown

Faceted site search can help ecommerce shoppers quickly find the products they are looking for. But faceted search can shatter your search engine optimization efforts. What can you do, therefore,
Technical SEO
SEO: 5 Ways to Avoid Indexation

October 25, 2013 • Jill Kocher Brown

It sounds counterintuitive, but sometimes the goal of search engine optimization is avoiding indexation. Consider the following scenarios. Faceted navigation spews out thousands of pages of duplicate or low value content. Email landing ...
Technical SEO
SEO: Google’s Hummingbird Changes the Ecommerce Game

October 11, 2013 • Jill Kocher Brown

Google released its Hummingbird search algorithm under the radar in August. Hummingbird reportedly impacts 90 percent of all search queries. So how does Hummingbird change the game for ecommerce sites? With ...
Technical SEO
SEO Traffic Changes When URLs Change

September 6, 2013 • Jill Kocher Brown

You may have noticed that we recently updated Practical Ecommerce with a fresh, new design. Behind the scenes, a lot of things changed as we moved to a new platform,
Technical SEO
10 Free Website Speed Tests

May 13, 2013 • Sig Ueland

Before your customers enter your ecommerce store, they’re waiting for it to load. Page load time is the lapsed time between the moment a user requests a new page and when that page is fully rendered by the browser. Reducing page load times can reduce bounce rates and increase conversion...
Technical SEO
SEO Audits: What to Expect

March 15, 2013 • Jill Kocher Brown

One of the challenges that plagues the search marketing industry is a lack of standards around the quality and scope of work. Different agencies and consultants will use similar words to describe very different deliverables and processes. One of the most abused of these is the SEO Audit...
Technical SEO
SEO: Impact of Ecommerce Catalog Structure

March 1, 2013 • Jill Kocher Brown

Information architecture and search engine optimization are both critical aspects of developing an ecommerce site. During the process, early decisions made about the structure of a site and its product catalog can have surprising ramifications for SEO. Which product types and attribute...
Technical SEO
SEO: Optimal Ecommerce URLs

February 1, 2013 • Jill Kocher Brown

The ecommerce platform that hosts a site determines the URL structure, which in turn can have an impact on the site’s search engine optimization. Each platform creates URLs according to its own rules, but nearly all can be modified for greater SEO and brand recognition. In years past, ...
Technical SEO
SEO: When Product Facets and Filters Fail

December 21, 2012 • Jill Kocher Brown

Ecommerce sites rely on filtered or faceted navigation to make their product catalogs more easily digestible for customers. Depending on how filters and facets are implemented, however, they can either be fantastic for search engine optimization or a big failure. SEO is based on three ...
Technical SEO
SEO: Working Around a Redesign

December 14, 2012 • Jill Kocher Brown

When a redesign or platform change looms in your site’s future, it’s easy to turn off all search-engine-optimization work and focus on planning the new site. After all, why bother making changes that will just be overwritten when you launch the new site? Focusing on a few key areas will...
Technical SEO
4 Fast Ways to Kill Your SEO

November 9, 2012 • Jill Kocher Brown

Search engine optimization experts usually focus on what you should do to improve your site’s organic search rankings. In this post, I'm asking the opposite question: What are the fastest ways to destroy your site’s SEO performance? Here's a list of my top four mistakes. Mistake 1: Lau...
Technical SEO
SEO: Putting Navigation to Work

September 28, 2012 • Jill Kocher Brown

Navigation does more than shuttling customers around your site. In addition to its obvious usability and design functions, navigation can be optimized to improve organic search traffic. Well-optimized navigation strengthens the flow of link popularity throughout your site while sending ...
Technical SEO
Using Meta Tags for Search Engine Visibility

September 25, 2012 • Lorrie Thomas Ross

Search engine optimization continually evolves to include new tactics. But classics like meta tags are still important. Making the most of your meta tags can be a small step that can make a large difference in your overall web marketing.
Technical SEO
SEO: Avoiding Penguins and Pandas

September 7, 2012 • Jill Kocher Brown

Google’s recent penchant for naming major algorithmic updates after animals has the world of search engine optimization sounding more like a zookeeper’s dilemma. But with rumors of an impending Penguin update — see this article from Search Engine Roundtable — right around the corner, e...
Technical SEO
SEO: Launching a Redesigned Site

August 31, 2012 • Jill Kocher Brown

Editor's Note: This is part two of a two-part series on identifying, assessing, and mitigating the risk of site redesigns on organic search traffic. Part one, "SEO: Identifying the Impact of a Site Redesign," we published last week. Launching a redesigned site is filled with potentiall...
Technical SEO
SEO: Identifying the Impact of a Site Redesign

August 24, 2012 • Jill Kocher Brown

Editor's Note: This is part one of a two-part series on identifying, assessing, and mitigating the risk of site redesigns on organic search traffic. Part two, "Launching a Redesigned Site," we will publish next week. Site redesigns can create a period of intense instability for organi...
Technical SEO
5 SEO Shortcuts to Avoid

July 12, 2012 • Jill Kocher Brown

Search engines are programmed to reward relevance and popularity, and are striving to algorithmically determine quality as well. Ecommerce sites are programmed to sell product to customers as efficiently as possible while offering a positive brand experience. Ecommerce sites often striv...
Technical SEO
SEO: Understanding XML Sitemaps

June 29, 2012 • Jill Kocher Brown

XML sitemaps serve a very niche purpose in search engine optimization: facilitating indexation. Posting an XML sitemap is kind of like rolling out the red carpet for search engines and giving them a roadmap of the preferred routes through the site. It’s the site owner’s chance to tell c...
Technical SEO
SEO Site Migration Checklist

May 18, 2012 • Jill Kocher Brown

Migrating a site to a new platform or domain, or implementing a major redesign, is one of the most stressful situations in search engine optimization. The potential for massively impacting organic search traffic and sales is higher during these launches than at any other time. But with ...
Technical SEO
Google’s Over-Optimization Penalty an Evolution, Not Revolution

April 27, 2012 • Jill Kocher Brown

Google’s much discussed over-optimization penalty turned out to be a moderate evolutionary step in Google’s site quality crusade. Launched April 24, Google wrote in a blog post of its update, “The change will decrease rankings for sites that we believe are violating Google’s quality gui...
Technical SEO
Google’s Secure Search Squeezes SEO Planning and Reporting

March 30, 2012 • Jill Kocher Brown

Google's secure SSL search protects users' search results and the keywords they searched on. Unfortunately, it also poses a growing threat to data-driven search engine optimization. Firefox recently joined Google Chrome — and Google.com, for logged-in users — in defaulting to secure sea...
Technical SEO
Google Plans SEO Over-Optimization Penalty

March 22, 2012 • Jill Kocher Brown

Google’s head spam cop Matt Cutts announced the impending launch of a new over-optimization penalty to “level the playing ground.” The disclosure came earlier this month at the South By ...
Technical SEO
SEO Benefits of Responsive Web Design

March 1, 2012 • Jill Kocher Brown

Site owners have many competing needs when developing mobile sites. Different devices, different capabilities, different screen sizes and resolutions, all have an impact on designing and developing mobile sites today. According to Mongoose Metrics, a tracking and analysis firm, only 9...
Technical SEO
SEO: Letting Customers Generate Long Tail Search Terms

November 23, 2011 • Jill Kocher Brown

Search engine optimization typically focuses on the trophy terms, the high-volume keyword phrases, because marketers need to drive the highest value with the lowest effort. Unfortunately, those juicy trophy terms are great for brand recognition and customers' initial awareness, but they...
Technical SEO
Navigation: Your Biggest On-Site SEO Asset

October 28, 2011 • Jill Kocher Brown

A site's navigational links can help its search engine optimization. Links pass "link popularity," little votes of value, from the linking page to the destination page. In addition, the link's anchor text — the visible text portion of the link — passes a relevance signal. Relevance and...
Technical SEO
How to Increase Page Speed and Help Search-Engine Rankings

May 11, 2011 • Michael Stearns

In the spring of 2010, Google announced it would factor page speed more heavily into its search ranking algorithm. "Faster sites create happy users," Google stated in the blog post describing the algorithm change. Your ability — as an ecommerce merchant — to improve your site's speed d...
Technical SEO
SEO Case Study: Improving the Site’s Architecture

March 25, 2011 • Jill Kocher Brown

Editor's Note: This is the second installment of a search-engine-optimization case study from contributor Jill Kocher on the SEO travails of The Motor Bookstore, a retailer of automotive manuals. Like most ecommerce businesses, The Motorbook Store relies heavily on traffic from search ...
Technical SEO
SEO: Understanding Advanced Search Operators

September 30, 2010 • Jill Kocher Brown

Let’s face it, the engines control search. They may keep tight-lipped control of their algorithmic secrets, but they also provide their users with tools that SEO practitioners can use to understand how the engines see their sites. These advanced operators offer a peek behind the curtain...
Technical SEO
SEO: Unique Content Good for Search Engines, Good for Consumers

September 3, 2010 • Jill Kocher Brown

Unique, valuable content is a critical part of a successful SEO strategy. That is especially the case for ecommerce sites that utilize non-unique stock product descriptions from the manufacturer’s database. But, I’m often asked if there’s a faster, cheaper, free way to generate content....

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