.. -*- coding: utf-8; -*-
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WEB SEO (search engine optimisation)
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.. contents::
:local:
General search engines
======================
Major search engines are:
* https://google.com from Google Co.
* https://bing.com from Microsoft Co.
* https://yahoo.com or https://search.yahoo.com/ from Yahoo Co and it uses Bing
engine.
Major local search engine are:
* https://yandex.com from Yandex Co that have large market on Russia, Ukraine, Belarus.
Search engine webmaster tools
=============================
https://www.google.com/webmasters/tools/home
Google webmaster tools.
https://www.bing.com/webmaster/
Bind webmaster tools.
https://webmaster.yandex.ru/
Yandex webmaster tools.
SEO tips
========
* Use pain text rather than images, CSS, JavaScript, Flash, SilverLite or other
technologies for important content.
* Make sure your site work without with CSS, JavaScript, Flash, Java, etc
disabled. Check your site with screen reader or text browser (lynx, w3m).
* Build valid HTML pages. Validate against W3C and other tools. Make site mobile
friendly and use the mobile friendly test.
* Avoid HTML frames and iframes.
* Market your site so other sites link to yours. The more valuable and relevant
site point to you the more rank you get!
* Tend to focus on single topic per page.
* Avoid cryptic URLs. Craft human attractive URLs as URL words directly can be
indexed. Use dashes instead of spaces.
* Avoid duplication. Shutdown mirrors. Use ``<link rel="canonical" ...>`` tag to
point to page on main version from mirrors or page variants. Avoid page
variants (like embedding sid into URL). Use::
<link rel="prev" ...>
<link rel="next" ...>
to gather paginated content.
* Tags ``title``, ``h1`` / ``h2`` / ``h3`` and::
<meta name="description" content="...">
<meta name="keywords" content="...">
have great impact. As usual make sure them have unique content across the web
and your pages.
* Use keywrds for internal ``a`` links.
* Add ``rel="nofollow"`` to spam or money making links.
* Mark up site using microformats: ARIA, schema.org.
* Keep navigational structure (global and hierarchical) easy to crawl.
* Submit sitemap to search engine webmaster tools.
* Ensure a fast load time and absent of HTTP errors.
* Make site sharable across social media.
* Use redirects when changes site structure. This usually move page value to new
page.
* Produce new content frequently. That make crawlers visit your site more
frequently.
https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/40349
Steps to a Google-friendly site.
https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/139066
Use canonical URLs
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canonical_link_element
Wiki article.
https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/1663744
Indicate paginated content.
https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/76329
Keep a simple URL structure.
https://www.bing.com/webmaster/help/webmaster-guidelines-30fba23a
Bing Webmaster Guidelines.
https://yandex.ru/support/webmaster/recommendations/intro.xml
Рекомендации по созданию сайтов от Yandex.
https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/35769
Google Webmaster Guidelines.
http://webmasters.stackexchange.com/questions/22877/seo-where-do-i-start/
http://webmasters.stackexchange.com/questions/10281/seo-tips-and-tricks-for-web-developers
http://webmasters.stackexchange.com/questions/2/what-are-the-best-ways-to-increase-a-sites-position-in-google
http://webmasters.stackexchange.com/questions/237/basic-seo-optimization
SERP structure
==============
All popular search providers use ``title`` tag content as text for main link to
result entry and ``meta name="description"`` or relevant page piece for
description.
Also ``title`` is used in browser window title bar and as bookmark title.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Search_engine_results_page
Wikiperia article.
https://www.w3.org/QA/Tips/good-titles.html
<title>: the most important element of a quality Web page.
https://www.w3.org/QA/Tips/Use_h1_for_Title
Use <h1> for top-level heading.
Informing search engine about site structure
============================================
::
http://www.example.org/sitemap.xml
http://www.example.org/robots.txt
robots.txt
==========
Start line with ``#`` to commet it out.
Disable all robots (that respect ``robots.txt``)::
User-agent: *
Disallow: /
To allow all robots complete access::
User-agent: *
Disallow:
To allow a single robot::
User-agent: Google
Disallow:
User-agent: *
Disallow: /
All valuable search engines support ``Allow`` and ``Sitemap`` tags::
User-agent: *
Allow: /
Sitemap: http://example.com/sitemap1.xml
Sitemap: http://example.com/my_sitemap2.xml
The longer path the higher priority of ``Allow`` and ``Disallow`` tags.
http://www.robotstxt.org/orig.html
Original specification. Only ``User-agent`` and ``Disallow`` tags supported.
http://robotstxt.org.ru/
Russian followup to http://www.robotstxt.org
https://developers.google.com/webmasters/control-crawl-index/docs/robots_txt
Google extension specification.
https://yandex.ru/support/webmaster/controlling-robot/robots-txt.xml
Yandex extension specification.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robots.txt
Wiki article.
meta robots
===========
Instruction to not index current page::
<meta name="robots" content="noindex">
Instruction to not follow links on current page::
<meta name="robots" content="nofollow">
Pair combinations::
<meta name="robots" content="noindex, nofollow">
<meta name="robots" content="noindex, follow">
<meta name="robots" content="index, nofollow">
<meta name="robots" content="index, follow">
https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/93710
Block search indexing with meta tags.
http://www.robotstxt.org/meta.html
About the Robots ``<META>`` tag.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noindex
Wikiperia article.
rel nofollow attribute in link
==============================
To prevent spam on forums and blogs or to including commertial links::
<a href="http://spam.com/sale/20-off" rel="nofollow">You win 100$!!</a>
https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/96569
Use rel="nofollow" for specific links.
https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/81749
Ways to Prevent Comment Spam.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nofollow
Wiki article.
https://codex.wordpress.org/Nofollow
Wordpress suggestions.
sitemap
=======
* http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sitemaps
* http://www.sitemaps.org/
Alexa.
======
Statistics (most useful Top Search Queries)::
http://www.alexa.com/siteinfo/DOMAIN
Google.
=======
* http://www.google.com/trends
Yahoo.
======
Give backlink (this page redirect to siteexplorer.search.yahoo.com)::
linkdomain:DOMAIN -site:DOMAIN