IPRODUCTION SEO Best Practices November 2013 V3 1 iproduction
Contents 1 Introduction... 4 2 Sitemap and Robots.txt... 4 2.1 What is a Sitemap?... 4 2.2 HTML Sitemaps... 4 2.3 XML Sitemaps... 5 2.4 Robots.txt Basics... 7 3 Site Speed... 7 3.1 Ways To Improve Load Time... 9 3.1.1 Images... 9 3.1.2 Use a Content Distribution Network For Fast Local Delivery... 10 3.1.3 Use Image Compression... 10 3.1.4 Specify Image Dimensions that Match the Image Size... 10 3.2 Content Optimization... 11 3.2.1 Defer Parsing of JavaScript... 11 3.2.2 Minify HTML, CSS, & JavaScript... 11 3.2.3 Entering Keyword and URL Keywords in the Article SEO Containers... 11 3.3 Performance Analyzer Resources... 11 3.3.1 Performance Reading Materials... 12 4 Semantic Markup... 12 4.1 Rich Snippets... 12 4.2 How Do You Use Semantic Markup?... 14 4.2.1 News Articles... 15 4.2.2 Blog Postings... 15 4.2.3 Events... 15 4.2.4 Videos... 16 5 Authorship in Search... 16 5.1 Author Rank & SEO... 16 5.2 Why is Authorship Important?... 17 2 iproduction
5.3 Benefits For Our Contributors... 17 5.4 Authorship Process... 18 5.5 Authorship & Verification Process... 18 6 Coding and Tagging Best Practices... 18 6.1 Front End Tagging... 18 6.2 How to Optimize Images... 19 6.3 Image Alt Tags... 19 6.4 Image Title Attributes... 20 6.5 Heading Tags... 20 6.5.1 Home Page Heading Tag Standards... 20 6.5.2 Category Page Heading Tag Standards... 20 6.5.3 Article Page Heading Tag Standards... 21 3 iproduction
1 Introduction Over the past ten years, iproduction has worked with the top SEO firms and participated in SEO audits of many websites. Many of the SEO firms focused on popular trends and many claimed to have the Secret Sauce for ensuring that a publisher s web pages rang high on searches. Recently Google updated it s algorithm to give added weight to content provided by publishers. As the SEO landscape has changed, iproduction has changed with it. The following document contains details of the SEO best practices that are built into the iproduction platform, the implementation process, and what is required of publisher s to take full advantage of SEO. 2 Sitemap and Robots.txt 2.1 What is a Sitemap? A sitemap is a list of the pages on a website that provides links that are accessible to search engine crawlers. Why are Sitemaps Important? From Google Webmaster Central: Sitemaps are a way to tell Google about pages on your site we might not otherwise discover. Creating and submitting a Sitemap helps make sure that Google knows about all the pages on your site, including URLs that may not be discoverable by Google s normal crawling process. 2.2 HTML Sitemaps An HTML Sitemap is a structured site index page which aids search engines in finding and crawling pages on a website. A search engine is unable to use: Search Boxes Drop Downs Selection Functionality Having an alternative method in which a crawler can navigate your website can help with indexation & crawling. Clear linking to the HTML Sitemap from the homepage gives crawlers immediate access to all content. 4 iproduction
Reference: Matt Cutts of Google discussing HTML and XML Sitemaps. http://goo.gl/wicg HTML Sitemap Best Practices Use a visible site hierarchy, properly tagged, and written using plain HTML, Use descriptive anchor text and links, Use <ul></ul> tags so search engines understand it s a list of links and will properly crawl our list, Use the same design as rest of the website, Keep the number of links in the Sitemap reasonable by linking to categories & other important pages. 2.3 XML Sitemaps An XML Sitemap is a dynamically generated list of web pages on your website. Unlike an HTML Sitemap, an XML Sitemap can be automatically updated and will transfer data about your site to search engines. The iproduction platform automatically creates sitemap XML files that identify all of the content on your site and in the archives. Why use an XML Sitemap? An XML Sitemap is extremely useful for helping search engines discover and understand: Dynamic content Hard to find pages Pages with few backlinks Massive archives Relative importance of pages How frequently pages are updated 5 iproduction
XML Sitemap Tags The following tags are used to describe the pages in an XML Sitemap: URLSet: Encloses all information in the set of URLs included in the Sitemap URL: Encloses all information about a specific URL Loc: Specifies the location of the URL Lastmod: Modification date ChangeFreq: Suggests how frequently a page s content changes Priority: Describes the priority of the URL Priority is only relative to other pages on our website XML Sitemap Best Practices An optimal XML Sitemap Should not include 301 redirected URLs Should not contain URLs requiring logins Should not contain outdated URLs Should not contain more than 50,000 URLs per index file Should contain important URLs we want indexed Should only contain URLs with HTTP Status Response Code 200 OK Should be smaller than 10MB when uncompressed Multiple XML Sitemaps can be used for different sections of the site This will allow us to pinpoint errors & crawling issues more easily 6 iproduction
Sitemap Index Files Sitemap index files are created to help search engines understand multiple sitemaps and saves time by only submitting one sitemap file vs. individual sitemaps. The Sitemap index file uses the following XML tags: <sitemapindex> the parent tag surrounds the file. <sitemap> the parent tag for each Sitemap listed in the file (a child of <sitemapindex>) <loc> the location of the sitemap (a child of <sitemap>) <lastmod> the last modified date of the sitemap (optional) 2.4 Robots.txt Basics Robots.txt Files are used to block search engines from crawling specific portions of a website and from including pages in their indexes. iproduction maintains the Robots.txt file for your site. Robots.txt Files should: Be located at www.{domain}.com/robots.txt Detail the location of the XML sitemap and news sitemap. Commands: Useragent commands allow us to give instructions to specific search engines A * value indicates all robots should follow the commands Disallow commands are used to specify which parts of the site not to crawl. 3 Site Speed Why is Site Speed Important for SEO? On April 9th, 2010 Google announced the addition of page speed as a ranking signal, indicating its overall importance across the web (Google Webmaster Central). On July 11th, 2011 Google announced the creation of a paid Page Speed Service that automatically speeds up the loading of webpages, indicating the increased importance of load time to Google (Page Speed Service) Why is Site Speed Important for Users? Page speed studies over the past few years indicate that every second of page load time can dramatically affect user behavior on a website. 7 iproduction
47% of people expect a web page to load in 2 seconds or less (Akamai) 57% of visitors will abandon a page that takes 3 seconds or more to load (Akamai) 8% of people cite slow loading pages as a key reason for abandoning their purchase (econsultancy) 8 iproduction
3.1 Ways To Improve Load Time 3.1.1 Images Optimizing our images can improve the content download time rendering faster loading pages. Serve Scaled Images Instead of resizing images in HTML or CSS, serving properly scaled images can save many unnecessary bytes of data. If you serve an image that is larger than the dimensions used in all of the markup instances, you are sending unnecessary bytes over the wire. Scale images to match the largest size needed on the page and specify those dimensions in the page as well. This feature is provided automatically through the iproduction Image Upload feature. 9 iproduction
3.1.2 Use a Content Distribution Network For Fast Local Delivery All images should be provided through a CDN (Content Distribution Network). This will cause the image to be cached on a server near the user. This will reduce transfer speed and engage hundreds of additional servers to dispense images. 3.1.3 Use Image Compression Compressing resources with gzip can reduce the number of bytes sent over the network & reduce loading times. iproduction servers are set to automatically compress images. 3.1.4 Specify Image Dimensions that Match the Image Size Specifying a width and height for all images allows for faster rendering by eliminating the need for unnecessary reflows and repaints This can be done directly in the iproduction CMS. More often the image sizes are set in the display template to that the content loader does not need to enter the dimensions. 10 iproduction
3.2 Content Optimization 3.2.1 Defer Parsing of JavaScript In order to load a page, the web browser must parse the contents of all <script> tags, which adds additional time to the page load. Minimizing the amount of JavaScript needed to render the page, and deferring parsing on unneeded JavaScript until it needs to be executed, can reduce the initial load time of the page. 3.2.2 Minify HTML, CSS, & JavaScript Compacting HTML, CSS, and JavaScript files can save many bytes of data and speed up downloading, parsing, and execution time. All CSS file are delivered from the CDN. 3.2.3 Entering Keyword and URL Keywords in the Article SEO Containers The iproduction CMS provides the ability to enter keyword in the URL, meta tag keywords, and meta tag descriptions. These should be entered on all articles, catalog items, events, and web seminars. See the following URL: http://www.iproduction.com/news/posting-news-166-1.html http://www.iproduction.com/tutorials/post-an-article-178-1.html 3.3 Performance Analyzer Resources GTMetrix http://gtmetrix.com/ 11 iproduction
Google Developer s PageSpeed Analysis http://developers.google.com/speed/pagespeed/insights/ Yslow http://developer.yahoo.com/yslow WebPage Test http://www.webpagetest.org/ VRTA http://www.microsoft.com/enus/download/details.aspx?displaylang=en&id=21462 nexpert http://www.microsoft.com/enus/download/details.aspx?displaylang=en&id=11729 3.3.1 Performance Reading Materials Website Optimization http://www.websiteoptimization.com/speed/ Get your HEAD in order http://blogs.msdn.com/b/ieinternals/archive/2011/07/18/optimal-html-head-ordering-to-avoidparser-restarts-redownloads-and-improve-performance.aspx Conditional Comments Block Downloads http://www.phpied.com/conditional-comments-block-downloads/ Browser Connection Limits http://www.ajaxperformance.com/2006/12/18/circumventing-browser-connection-limits-for-funand-profit/yui Blog http://yuiblog.com/blog/category/performance 4 Semantic Markup Semantic markup is XHTML that has been written to define the context of content and provide a semantic meaning. New use of semantic markup is being continuously created as new verticals are added to top search engines such as Google & Bing. Search results now include rich snippets which provide more information to users compared to average search listings. 4.1 Rich Snippets Rich snippets can significantly improve click through rates from a search engine results page (SERP) to our website. 12 iproduction
A Virtuous Cycle Indirectly, the rank of a page can increase through more visitors and the links they build to our content. 13 iproduction
4.2 How Do You Use Semantic Markup? Adding specific tags to the HTML of web pages can help describe specific information to search engines. Search engines and other applications can better understand your content and display it in search results in a useful way. Microdata is a set of tags introduced in HTML5 that allows you to do this. What is Schema.org? Schema.org is a joint effort to improve the web by creating a structured data markup schema supported by major search engines. A shared markup vocabulary makes it easier for webmasters to decide on a markup schema, while receiving the maximum benefits. 14 iproduction
Note: There are other types of markup vocabularies we can use but Schema.org is currently the preferred option because it is supported by the major search engines including Google, Bing, Yahoo, and Yandex. Semantic markup will help our content surface more clearly and prominently in search results. Schema.org is a work in progress & is continuously evolving over the years. New kinds of structured data will be identified over time 4.2.1 News Articles Use of the following tags on its news articles: headline ( ---) author ( ---) dateline ( ---) organization ( logo ) articlebody image (where applicable) video (where applicable) 4.2.2 Blog Postings Use the following tags on its blog posts: headline ( ---) author ( ---) dateline ( ---) organization ( logo ) articlebody( ---) articlesection( ---) image (where applicable) video (where applicable) 4.2.3 Events Use the following tags on its event pages: name ( ---) startdate( ---) enddate( ---) location ( ---) url( ---) duration (if applicable) description (if applicable) image (if applicable) video (if applicable) 15 iproduction
http://schema.org/event 4.2.4 Videos Use the following tags on videos: duration ( ---) thumbnail ( ---) embedurl( ---) productioncompany (logo) uploaddate ( ---) description ( ---) title ( ---) transcript (if applicable) caption (if applicable) http://schema.org/videoobject Note: This markup can be applied to video objects on any given page. 5 Authorship in Search We now support markup that enables websites to publicly link within their site from content to author pages. We know that great content comes from great authors, and we re looking closely at ways this markup could help us highlight authors and rank search results. Sites can indicate authorship of articles to Google. Articles from trusted authors will begin to rank higher in SERPs. Google will use Google+ profiles and email verification of authors to assign trust to articles. --Google 5.1 Author Rank & SEO Search engines are using AuthorRank (social graph) signals along with PageRank (link graph) to determine the ranking of a page / site. AuthorRank is determined by a number of factors including: Number of linked social profiles PageRank of authored content Number of influencers on social networks Link Graph Social Graph 16 iproduction
5.2 Why is Authorship Important? Implementing Authorship for our contributors can help us: Strengthen credibility & trust for our content / articles / overall sites Display rich snippet information on SERPs which can improve click- through- rate Status updates on Google+ can improve indexation rate, linking, and relevancy All of these benefits can lead to enhanced visibility & additional traffic to our sites. Unique content, paired with our author s social graphs, can give us a competitive advantage in search results for queries. 5.3 Benefits For Our Contributors Our contributors can see many benefits for authorship, including: Greater exposure for ALL of their content. Content immediately appearing in their friends personalized search results Photo included in SERPs Link to personalized Google+ Page Link to additional pieces of content in SERPs 17 iproduction
5.4 Authorship Process Google needs to complete a circuit of verified trust between it and an author s published content. In order to participate, there are two requirements: Google+ Profile Published content must reference the author & link back to Google+ 5.5 Authorship & Verification Process 1. Add oneself as a contributor on their Google+ profile page 2. Place a rel= me tag on the Author biography page pointing to their Google+ page 3. Place a rel= author tag on all of their articles pointing to their author biography page. 6 Coding and Tagging Best Practices The manner in which a webpage is coded determines how search engines understand the content on the page. SEO-optimized front end tagging of a site includes highlighting the most important, keyword relevant pieces of content & ensuring that these elements are visible to search engine crawlers. In doing so, search engines can accurately rank our pages for the keywords we are targeting. Pages that do not highlight the appropriate keywords through the use of front end tagging could see their pages fail to rank for terms they should be bringing in traffic for. 6.1 Front End Tagging iproduction includes the following front end tagging is designs/implementatins that are coded by iproduction: Paragraph tags highlight vast, textual content, in which keywords are likely to exist List tags group important keywords together, creating contextual relevance (unordered & ordered) Image optimization give the images on our site textual meaning that search engines can interpret Heading tags outline our page so that search engines can understand the most important topics Paragraph Tags Paragraph tags make it easier for search engine crawlers to understand our content This tag allows crawlers to easily identify where textual content is located All paragraphs should begin with <p> and end with </p> List Tags The <ul> tag defines an unordered (bulleted) list, the <ol> tag defines an ordered (numbered) list, and the <li> tag is used for each item in a list 18 iproduction
When implemented correctly, lists can help crawlers gain a better understanding of the group of content & assign keyword relevancy Image Optimization Images can play a role in generating traffic to a website via Universal search results or search verticals like Google Images. Search engines cannot interpret multimedia assets (images, videos, etc.) like human s can; instead, they look to other elements to help understand the topic SEO & User Benefits Take up additional shelf space on SERPs Improve rankings in Google Images Strengthen page trust for targeted keywords Image tagging can assist vision impaired users 6.2 How to Optimize Images Image File Names The filename we use to save images is also used as the path to source the image on to a webpage. Using descriptive keywords in the filename is an opportunity to specify the subject of the image. When saving images, it is best to choose from the following formats, in order from most to least favorable: PNG, JPG, GIF. Writing Tips: Include relevant keywords in filename Use hyphens instead of spaces to separate keywords Append numeric values to the end of the filename if applicable 6.3 Image Alt Tags Image alt tags are alternative text that the browser can display when a website visitor cannot view an image. As search engines are unable to interpret image files, crawlers rely on other elements (image alt text, surrounding text, image captions, file names, etc.) to understand what an image is about. By using descriptive image alt tags for all images on our site, we will help our pages and our images appear in search results. Writing Tips Try not to exceed 5-7 keywords Do not stuff with keywords instead, Accurately describe the image 19 iproduction
6.4 Image Title Attributes Search engine crawlers can view the keywords used in image titles to further decipher what an image is about Image titles can also provide additional information for crawlers. The title attribute pops up when a user s mouse cursor hovers over an image. The image title should not be used as an opportunity to keyword stuff ; thus, you should avoid using the exact same keywords as image alt tag. Writing Tips Try not to exceed 5-7 keywords Accurately describe the image Use different keywords or a different keyword order for unique image title 6.5 Heading Tags Heading tags, or <h> tags, are used to outline the content on a webpage <h> tags should wrap around headings and subheadings that contain targeted keywords; as search engines place more ranking power on these tags The most page specific heading should be wrapped in <h1> tags (one per page), while less important titles should be wrapped in <h2> to <h6> tags Using heading tags allows us to establish a content hierarchy, which helps search engines understand what is the most important content on a page. 6.5.1 Home Page Heading Tag Standards H1: Brand Logo H2: Category Headings H3: Category Sub-headings H4: More Departments (no change) H5: Sidebar Headings Image Tags: Add & Opt 6.5.2 Category Page Heading Tag Standards H1: Category Name H2: Add Subheading H3: Article Titles H4: Brand Logo H5: Sidebar Headings Image Tags: Add & Optimize 20 iproduction
6.5.3 Article Page Heading Tag Standards H1: Article Title H2: Article Sub-headings (if relevant) H4: Brand Logo H5: Sidebar Headings Image Tags: Add & Optimize 21 iproduction