[Tutorial] Website Optimization

There is a lot of website optimization tutorials, but i would like to share my, with a bit diffrent info.

Most important for me is to have a fast loading website. To check how your website performs in terms of its speed go to :

Code:

https://developers.google.com/speed/pagespeed/insights.

To say that your website is properly optimized
for G you need to have score of more than 90. What G likes is a website that loads fast so users ( customers) don't
need to wait to long for a load and i believe big B ranks higher such websites. ( doesn't apply to huge, authority websites- they cna be slow cows)

So lets focus on speed first:
most common issues i see with this tool are:

- gzip compression (mod deflate)
what is it all about you can read here :
Code:

https://developers.google.com/speed/docs/best-practices/payload#GzipCompression

to fix this and speed up our website add this piece of code at the bottom of your .htaccess file:

Code:

AddOutputFilterByType DEFLATE text/html text/plain application/javascript text/css text/xml

this one is quite common mistake but now- bam, 1:nil for us.

Next common mistake is not using cache for static resources such as css, and images. here is g tutorial:
Code:

https://developers.google.com/speed/docs/best-practices/caching#LeverageBrowserCaching

if we fix this we will score higher in speed tool and here is a solution for this:

Code:

ExpiresActive On
ExpiresByType image/gif A604800
ExpiresByType image/png A604800
ExpiresByType image/jpg A604800
ExpiresByType image/jpeg A604800
ExpiresByType image/x-icon A604800
ExpiresByType text/css A604800

this code needs to be added in .htaccess file ( i've got it above the previous one) this will set expiration date for resources such as icons, images and css for a week (A604800- this is how many seconds you have in a week- wow, what a knowledge!). basically if someone return to your website all this stuff (gif,png,jpg,css) will be served from his hard-drive and not taken from your site and using your bandwith. 2:nil for us

another thing are images that are often too heavy. try to upload only light pictures so your website will load fast. before you upload pictures to your website use this little tool from yahoo which will do some savings for you:
Code:

http://www.smushit.com/ysmush.it/

with so light pictures your website will perform very fast. 3:nil for us.

Those are common issues that are always high priority for pagespeed tool. We fixed them, lower priorities you can check on your own
but if you are above 90 you are good to go. I should also mention that our website should be on fast and reliable server, causing problems for gbot because our website is down or server is slwo and shit won't help us.

Internal linking:

this is also important topic, because we can rank for some kws just thanks to this ( do not expect to rank for viagra or casino online thanks to only this:P)
i will not cover here how to do it for big site- just remember to link to other parts of your website with anchor text which should be relevant and not spammy
what i also usually do i add rel=nofollow to pages like login, register, contact, site TOS if i have links from home page-
there is no need to lose pr juice to unimportant pages of your website. If you have external links make sure you
do not have too many ********s because you loosing pr.

Basics:

Title- put here most important keyword- if you spam it with a lot of kws and have a nasty competitor who will send spam report you will be penalised.
H1- header tag. important for g, good to put a kw there. its good to do it right- instead of NYC SEO write SEO services in NYC- gbot will understand what you really want.
Meta description- everyone is saying it doesnt have impact on seo but it surely impacts your ctr. use keywords and call to actio or interesting description (shouldnt be longer than 160 chars sa far as i remember)
Meta keywords- same as above but can't see any reason not to add 3 or 5 in this tag

You want to have all of them on every page of your website (meta keywords you can only do once in index). You should have all of them unique for every page of your website. you do it one time and you can forget it but you should do it to call your website optimized.

Extra tips:

- if you run blogs it is good to add noindex tag for categories and tags to avoid duplicate content
- if you are on wordpress try to not use admin as a login and have secure password. there are many bored twats
who like to hack people's website and by using your name or your something instead of admin it will make it harder for them to hack your site.
if you are skilled enough change your login url
- always keep your plugins and cms version up to date

Last trick:

very often ranking for keywords around a city i.e. plumber nashville or something can be easier with..........
schema.org what is schema you can check by yourself. below is my trick that helps me rank local kws:


Code:

<div itemtype="http://schema.org/LocalBusiness" itemscope="">
<h6>
<span itemprop="name">your company</span>
</h6>
<p>
<span itemprop="description">put kw here that you want to rank locally</span>
</p>
<div itemtype="http://schema.org/PostalAddress" itemscope="" itemprop="address">
<p>
<span itemprop="streetAddress">street Address</span>
</p>
<p>
<span itemprop="addressLocality">your town</span>
</p>
<p>
<span itemprop="addressRegion">your region </span>
</p>
<p>
Tel.
<span itemprop="telephone">surprise- phone number </span>

Paste this html in your source. things like this:
Code:

<p>
<span itemprop="addressLocality">

won't be visible so don't worry. Very often for local keywords you dont need a lot of links and with this markup it is easier to rank.
Important: this markup must appear on every single page of your website, to work good for you- i usually keep it in a footer as a fast contact.

[Tutorial] Keyword Density in 2014

Keyword Density in 2014

What does Google say about Keyword Density?

They advise against "Loading pages with irrelevant words" (aka keyword stuffing).

Often these keywords appear in a list or group, or out of context (not as natural prose).

[Source:https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/66358]

In 2011 Matt C***s explained that keyword value is measured on a normative distribution curve; mention a word too few or too many times and it won't register. AKA there is an optimum density value!
[Source: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rk4qgQdp2UA]

At the end of 2013, the Hummingbird Update placed emphasis on "Conversational Search", i.e. extracting meaning from a whole sentence, not just a few words. So how does that affect keyword density in 2014?

What do the SERPs show us?

Let's look at some of the top-ranking sites for the popular term "payday loans". This is a good phrase to test out because Google has already applied extra spam filters to the niche.
[Source: http://searchengineland.com/google-pay-day-loan-algorithm-google-search-algorithm-update-to-target-spammy-queries-162941]

Google.com Top 5 Results for "payday loans" (note: I am in the UK so results may differ)

#1 Repeats 36, Word Count 4033, Density 1.69%
#2 Repeats 97, Word Count 3632, Density 5.41%
#3 Repeats 15, Word Count 1689, Density 1.78%
#4 Repeats 15, Word Count 1474, Density 2.04%
#5 Repeats 66, Word Count 11,771, Density 1.12%

Result #2 stands out with a keyword density of over 5%.

The above figures take into account TEXT DENSITY. 

I'll crunch the numbers again but this time taking into account all content (text, alt tags, links, meta data etc)

#1 Density 2.36%
#2 Density 3.25%
#3 Density 2.69%
#4 Density 1.57%
#5 Density 1.35%

Now Result #2 has a more reasonable keyword density of 3.25%

Tentative conclusion: Google evaluates total keyword density over just text density.

Based on this tiny sample, a total density between 2 and 3% seems preferable.

Now onto a completely different niche:

Google.com Top 6 Results for "learn to swim"

Total keyword density

#1 Density 3.28%
#2 Density 0.24%
#3 Density 0.04%
#4 Density 0%
#5 Density 0%
#6 Density 0.73%

Aside from result #1 (a YouTube video) all pages have a total keyword density well below 1%, and two pages never mention the phrase at all.

Why is the keyword density so low?

While the density for the exact phrase "learn to swim" is low or non-existent, the Hummingbird effect can be seen at work here.
[Source: http://www.searchenginepeople.com/blog/detailed-analysis-of-semantic-search-and-its-role-in-hummingbird-algorithm.html]

Results are automatically picked (and highlighted) for the phrase "learning to swim" too:

Results also show for the word "swimming".

The most commonly found words on the top-ranking pages are:

swimming, water, pool, training, swimmer, swim

and phrases:

how to swim, in the pool, in the water, learned to swim

Between the Top 6 results, the phrases "in the water" and "how to swim" occurred much more frequently than the exact phrase "learn to swim". 

This is evidence of Latent Semantic Indexing (LSI) at work. 

How does Latent Semantic Indexing work?

A massive volume of texts are scanned and a mathematical algorithm then calculates patterns and trends between words. This is how we know interesting facts like "the" is the most used word in the English language.

Google use LSI as one of their many search algorithms. Using the above example, Google's LSI formula has determined that articles about "learn to swim" must also explain how to get "in the water" and teach us "how to swim". 

It's a form of artificial intelligence that looks set to get more sophisticated based on the $Billions Google is spending on acquiring AI technology. [Source:http://techcrunch.com/2014/01/26/google-deepmind/]

LSI Further Reading: http://www.seobook.com/lsi/lsa_definition.htm

What does this mean for Keyword Density in 2014?

Here are some informed suggestions for creating top-ranking content and good on-page SEO in 2014:

TIP #1:Evaluate total keyword density (not just visible text).

HOW? Paste your site in one of the tools given below in the Resources list. 

WHAT PERCENTAGE? 1-3% still seems like a safe bet, but perform some competition analysis to double-check. Ultimately, it will depend on your keyword because the principles of LSI determine that your optimum keyword density is related to the density of other sites that use your keyword!

TIP #2:Use long sentences, especially when including your "keyword".

HOW? See the difference:

BAD: Used cars are cheaper than new cars. People on a budget can benefit from used cars.

GOOD: There are over 250 million used cars registered in the US, making the second-hand car market one of the largest in the country.

TIP #3:Find and include terms related to your niche. 

HOW? There is a link to a free LSI generator tool in the Resources list. It also pays to analyse (again, with the tools given below) the top 5-10 results manually for extra ideas. 

Resources:

Calculate text density using SEOquake (firefox plugin):

http://www.seoquake.com/

Calculate total keyword density:

http://tools.seobook.com/general/keyword-density/

LSI Generator:

http://lsikeywords.com/