Onetomarket

It’s very interesting to know in which order Googlebot crawls your website. If you know the order, you can manipulate Google to crawl your most important pages first. Especially on new large content websites, you want Google to crawl the important sections of your site first.

To test this, we took a domain with no history (never registered, no backlinks) and made a page with 250 links on it. Those links refer to pages with also 250 on it (and so on…). The linktext and URL’s were numbered from 1 till 250, In the same order as they appeared in the source code. We submitted the URL via “addurl” and waited.

…lees meer over: Google’s crawl order

Onetomarket was attending the Search Marketing Expo Advanced London conference. SMX Advanced stands for more advanced sessions than you would usually have at regular SMX conferences – diving into many details and looking into more sophisticated ways to have more profit from your online marketing activities.

Some highlights of this SMX Advanced were:

SEO ranking factors 2010, a.o. presented by Rand Fishkin SEOmoz

Recently a patent has been granted to Google about the reasonable surfer model. Rand Fishkin explained this patent and what it meant for SEO. This session was also about the correlation between titles, headings and alt attributes within a website based on facts done by research of SEOmoz. …lees meer over: Summary of SMX Advanced London 2010

Lets just paraphrase this article; link building costs time. Lots of time. Because a lot of people want immediate results I will focus a lot of time and energy on this post to clarify why it is important to have loads of patience. To name a few:

• it takes time to become an authority
• it takes time to do link building for a large set of keywords
• it takes time before Yahoo! Will give us the appropriate information we need
• it takes time before a link is paying off
• it takes time to write good content that is link bait worthy
• it takes time to build a good network
• it takes time to do everything…manually

It takes time to become an authority

When we take a look at the real deal we see that big authorities find it more easy to earn links than sites that are less known. Authorities are more likely to be mentioned when someone has to pick a name in a specific segment. For example; when someone wants to name a bookstore they are more likely to mention Barnes & Noble, Amazon, etc instead of the corner shop running a website.

Authorities also have the advantage to have a good network of followers. An authority posting a research on a specific topic is taken more seriously than a smaller competitor who would have published the same research. These authorities also find it easier to get regional or even global press, often resulting in a link building snowball.

Authority websites usually generate more traffic. The appealing content will be noticed by more people and thus receiving a good inbound link will be more likely to happen. This is something I noticed when I wrote some articles on B2B SEO. The posts that were published as guest posts on authority blogs like Yoast.com received a lot of inbound links, while the one published on Netters (in Dutch) only received a few. Relatively speaking the number of inbound links compared to traffic are the same but the net result is a lot higher on authority blogs.

It takes time to do link building for a large set of keywords

A good link to your website will increase the rankings on all your keywords because your domain is becoming stronger. However in a competitive market you won’t get stunning results with just a few extra links. We all know that good deep links with the right anchor text can really benefit your rankings on your top keywords. I estimate that a website needs about 8 focus keywords (of course this depends per site). This means you will have to do link building for all those 8 keywords phrases.

Branded links

One way to achieve good branding results is to use your business title in anchor texts. You can use a wide variation of keyword combinations including your business title. An example for Onetomarket would be that instead of just using `Onetomarket` as the anchor text it would be wise to use `Onetomarket online marketing`.

Do not ask for links, write your own articles and submit them!

A different way to achieve good quality links with the right anchor text is to write your own articles and submit these to informative websites, blogs, or online magazines in your area of expertise. Most of the times you are allowed to use your own links! Be sure to check in advance if the website that is willing to publish your article is using `nofollow` links. If appropriate you can also use press releases in the same way, but often these don’t include links.

Keyword focused link building always takes time

When you are focusing on 8 keywords and you need about 5 links each, you’ll have to find a numerous amount of websites to help you with your link building. It is important to use every available opportunity (of good quality!). That’s why it is important to invest in your relationships with website owners or PR contacts. Make a phone call instead of resending that email if you feel you are being ignored.

Some articles worth reading on this subject are:

Getting the anchor text you want and Using KW research to diversify link profiles

It takes time before Yahoo! Will give us the appropriate information we need

Yahoo! Isn’t always that fast with indexing new links. It could take weeks before Yahoo! Will show those inbounds links, and in some unfortunate cases, never – while they are there. A good way to check is to see if Yahoo! has indexed the specific page.
As this is slowing down the monitoring of your link building it is wise to use different tools as well. Tools to use for example are Mint to see what new link is providing you new traffic. Another tool you can’t miss of course is the Google Webmaster Central.

Yahoo! and 301’s

Aside, Yahoo has the nasty habit to count 301 redirects as backlinks. I’m wondering if Yahoo will ever recognize a 301 as a 301. It surely will take some time before we will see this happen and the garbage being cleaned out of the results.

It takes time before a link is paying off

It is a known fact that old websites with old links rank easily. According to Google this old domain has earned its stripes and thus deserving a higher ranking. It is not just domain age that counts, also the period the old links already exist. Domains that have been parked for years haven’t increased in value a lot over time.

Unfortunately, ‘getting old’ takes a lot of time. Two years is not old. However a website dating back from the nineties with some good links can rank top 10 with little text on the most competitive keywords. Can’t wait that long? Buy a whole website!

Wayback Machine

The Wayback Machine does not seem to be updated or rarely as of February 2008. This means that new domains have age background according to tools that use the Internet archive as their source of information. Note that it is possible that information is being updated, but is only available to some people.

It takes time to write good content that is link bait worthy

I’ve got a strong feeling that link bait nowadays is the magic word for everything and everyone that needs a bit of link building.
Its true, link bait is offering good opportunities to get you a few nice links, but make sure your content stands out of the crowd.
Some background information:

gathering link bait (in Dutch)

differences between link bait and link building (also in Dutch).

The same counts for link bait as mentioned before; if you reach the authority websites first, your project is much likely to succeed.

Cloning behaviour

Lists are always good. But everyone knows that. The Internet is flooded with lists on top 10s, 20s, 30s, 101s. Some are of high quality. Many of them are the result of poorly copy/paste behaviour.

But what makes it attractive to link to such a list? With each new version the list just has to be more complete!

Work half done right. The One Million Dollar Homepage was a good idea and worth linking to (43000 inbound links). But clones of this idea like The Most Expensive Domainname in the World aren’t worth more than a nofollow link.

SO what is good link bait??

Good link bait derives from your Unique Selling Points. Do you have the credibility to bring thorough research? Do so! Are you known as an informal, spontaneous club of people? Cover some gossip! Are you quick, fast and a real sponge? Earn those scoops and benefit from the momentum!

It takes time to build a good network

By building a network I don’t mean building a good linknetwork. Invest in useful contacts and bond with them so you’ll have a good audience who are more likely to spread the word or happily offer their help to reach your set of goals. Sometimes its plainly simple.

1. a woman is more likely to share.
2. someone who is leaving happy or funny comments are more likely to share than people who are just ‘consuming’
3. someone who sends presents now and then is more likely to share than someone that is `just being nice`.

Identify top decision makers in your segment

Invest in site owner relationships for your segment. Take a look at the top 50 of your most important keywords and interact. Give them some food for thought or even real food and invite them for dinner! You’ll soon notice that getting those links will be a lot more easier for you.

Wiep has a nice tip about this on his blog:

Set up a campaign in Google AdWords’ content network, to determine which (relevant) websites generate traffic and conversions. Contact those websites directly and try to get a link.

Authority, authority, authority

If your brand is well known it will be more easy to get things done. Make sure your brand is part of your link building as this will help you in the future.

It takes time to do everything…manually

Lot of the things that have to be done manually take time, lots of time. Keyword reviews, identifying good ranking websites. Analysing and building profiles of competitors, etc. But also engaging in link building. Spreading press releases, optimizing link profiles, cleaning out paid links and things as such.

Another thing that will take a lot of time is changing an organization. Once engaged in link building they will need to ‘think’ link building. Making it clear that this is important with all players involved takes time and lots of patience.

1. What is linkbait?

what is linkbait? According to Darren Rowse of Problogger.net, the term “linkbait” stands for a variety of practices, which are all searching for a way to generate incoming links to a website or blog from other sites. Linkbait is content on a website which is specifically aimed at an audience that is willing to link thru.

Rand Fishkin of SEOmoz – a large American SEO Company – distinguishes two types of linkbait:

1. The first is to create content with the aim to launch it through a platform which sees value in the content.
2. The second concerns the collection of links by controversy.

Is linkbait Viral Marketing?
Opinions differ about the question if linkbait is a form of viral marketing. According to Rand Fishkin linkbait combines the practice of Viral Marketing with popular technical trends.
According to Todd Mali Coat of Stuntdubl link baiting is not the same as viral marketing, because the goal is different. The purpose of linkbait is link building, while viral marketing is designed to generate exposure and branding. Of course this goes together often.

Where does linkbait come from?
The article that the concept of linkbait probably be the first called in is written by Nick Wilson and dates from 2005.

The term “bait” ( “aas” in Dutch) is already used in a textbook on copywriting from 1933, the “Robert Collier Letter Book”:

Hundreds of books have doubtless been written about the fine art of fishing, but the whole idea is contained in that one sentence: “What bait will they bite on?” Thousands of articles have been written about the way to use [sales] letters to bring you what you want, but the meat of them all can be compressed into two sentences: “What is the bait that will tempt your reader? How can you tie up that thing you have to offer with that bait?

Where can you find linkbait?
Linkbait is often placed on so-called social media sites. These are sites where you can post links to news articles. If enough people vote for the message, the article floats upwards and it will be more in the picture.

• Social news sites like Digg, eKudos or NuJij
• Social bookmarking sites like Del.icio.us, Tagmos or watvindenwijover.nl
• Meme trackers like Techmeme or Blognicient

Of course, the linkbait can also be found on the site that has placed the linkbait on other blogs. Like the previously mentioned SEOmoz, they brought out a SEO quiz, which was publicized through the RSS readers of SEOmoz.  Subsequently, many bloggers wrote about this quiz and the linkbait showed to be successful. Currently, the quiz has returned more than 1,500 backlinks.

Is linkbait good or bad?
Linkbait as a concept has a negative tone for some and linkbait actions may come close to spam sometimes. For others it is a consequence of good quality content. Matt Cutts, someone who often acts as spokesman for Google, reports on his blog that he does welcomes linkbait.

The goal of linkbait
The main goal of linkbait is obviously gaining backlinks. A way to achieve this is to relate your subject to the needs of linkerati, for example, people who often express their opinions online.  Linkbait does not have to correspond 100% to your product, but in a way that it seems justified. Linkbait is the way to save huge amounts of  money on link authority. For a small amount  of money you can  use linkbait to realize link building. Most linkbait is not mend to obtain links from experts and authorities, but rather to speak with people with a certain interest in the topic and to get references from them.

1.1 linkbait Types

It is important to distinguish the possible hooks. A hook is a sort of perspective on which you would trigger your people to link to your site. There are several articles that deal with this and the possible hooks are:

News Hook

• Make sure you are the first who brings the news
• A compilation of news
• Unmask fraud or serious errors

Contentious Hook

• Enter a recalcitrant opinion in your niche. If the majority likes something, explain why you do not like it.
• ” Make posts as “Why <enter name> is wrong about ….”

Attacking Hook

• Like the contentious hook, only sharper!

Shocking Hook

• Try to shock through language
• Extreme views
• Contentious / tantalizing images or videos

Reference Hook

• A comprehensive list of blogs in your niche (assuming links  generate incoming links)
• A “How to” based on your niche (also eg .. Tips, Tutorials, etc.)
• Or rather a “how not to”
• A compilation of news articles on a particular theme (with analysis)

Tools Hook

• A practical, useful or just a funny tool for your niche

Humour Hook

• Look at flickr or elsewhere for a bizarre picture of your subject
• Post “10 things I hate …”
• ” Post “You are a <fill in> if you …”

Quiz Hook

• A quiz or test is always good, especially if the design is good

Contest Hook

• Organize a contest in which people can participate
• Care for funny, good prices that are worthwhile

Award Hook

• At the beginning and end of each year in the blog circuit a lot of awards are granted; make your own. You get the links of the nominees anyway.

List Hook

• top 5, top 10 top 20, etc. lists work well. They are quick to scan, concise, look neat, are easily able to link to and they give a good overview. Moreover, they are convincing – Number results!

Awareness Hook

• Use the name of a greatness to raise your story ” For example, use the title “Why Bush is right with his vision …” Then explain your vision on the basis of  Bush’s vision.

Design Hook

• For example, a theme or template for Wordpress

Huff and bluster Hook

• A well-written document that sets something passionately gives a thrill to people. If you write a rant, know that people will react both positive and negative.

Research & Statistics Hook

• Examination of a useful and popular topic
• Show statistics in which many people are interested

Give something away Hook

• Giving gifts may cause a buzz. For example, Oprah, it yielded a huge buzz when she gave away free cars a few years ago.

Many of the above Hooks should be useful and / or ‘cool’:

Usability
The more your site content is useful, the faster it will be passed through. Examples of usability are:

• Show how you do something
• The transmission of knowledge
• Improve their lives
• Be better at something

Cool factor
If something is not immediately “usable” make it “cool”!

2. Advantages and Disadvantages

2.1 Benefits of linkbait:

Linkbait is relatively easy to spread. It is usually quick to imagine, but it takes a little longer to implement.

Linkbait provides immediate and direct traffic
The most rapid advantage of an incoming link is the direct traffic that the link brings you. This first traffic growth can lead to some consequences:

• Increased income (earnings) to a commercial site
• New subscribers (RSS and / or newsletter)
• New loyal readers (thru bookmarks)
• Secondary traffic (After you received a link from a site, you’ll see a secondary round from links from others, who are coming out of the first links and have their own sites. In their turn, they send traffic and so on.)

Linkbait is a search engine booster
A long-term benefit of incoming links (after the first ‘avalanche’ of traffic) is that these links will ensure that your search engine rankings will increase.

Even though there are many factors that contribute to the ranking of a web page, the number of links that refer to it remains one of the most important ranking factors.
Most linkbait techniques are very good for SEO, because the links are not reciprocal and because the links usually contain a good link text. It also concerns links which not have been purchased but are obtained in a natural manner. Links which are obtained by linkbait are often related to the topic of your site, so that the link will be more valuable.

2.2 Disadvantages of linkbait:

Permissible time
Some types of linkbait can be time consuming, such as the news hook and the reference hook.

Damage to reputation
Some types of linkbait can affect the reputation (This is where Search Engine Reputation Management looks around the corner), for example in the controversial hook, or the attack hook.

3. How To’s

3.1 Content & Presentation:

Make good titles and make a good formulation
A good presentation is important. Build the presentation in a way that people can identify and connect with it. Think about human emotions and develop a sense of empathy.

Another point in determining your title and URL is the fact that this is probably the anchor texts of backlinks. Here you want to fill in relevant keywords as much as possible

Brainstorm on good content
A good tool is the roadmap of SEOmoz:

• Write up everything, no censorship, how bizarre or stupid it may seem.
• If you have clear ideas, is it a good thing to make an overview and to determine the concept (the form) of each idea and content (subject). So what is the concept of the proposed linkbait (tool, widget, top ten list, how to, blog post, etc.) versus the subject (content) of the proposed linkbait (eg Wiki, iPod, PPC ads, pigs, etc .).
• Evaluate the content. Ignore your concept list, and look critically at your content list. Are they labour intensive, Do they cost a lot of time, should it wait or is it a relevant piece of news? Are there any ideas you really want to write about? Are there ideas that you can store, and expand later?
• Mix and match. Once you’ve added priorities to the content list, mix and match them with the draft list. No story / content should have been kept to the original format like you had brainstormed it. Is your story something for Digg?
• What concepts are doing well?: top ten, how to … the best .., etc. By linking the best subjects to the best concepts you will achieve the best effect.

Content structure
The most of what you write is excessive, because much of what you write should be shorten.
By creating an ordered lists with facts an incomplete story may seem well researched, even though it is not. Eg.

if you make a list of “101 Ways to xx” people will give you a few ideas and feedback, but will anyone ever make “383 Ways to xx”?

Quote / related content
Quote investigations, stimulate further reading, and link to related content from your sources. It makes your story well researched and associates your work with other well-known names or brands in your field. You can also consider to quote a couple of persons from who you want to receive links.

Decoration of linkbait
Make use of good design for your linkbait and / or use photographs of relevant sites as Istockphoto.

Use good titles
According to SEOBook good linkbait always starts with a good title! What works well is to express an opinion, so be partisan. Show opinions as facts. Linkbait is about emotional reactions, as expressed in comments and quotes. Be precise with your titles. For example do not use completed numbers but use exact numbers. Write your titles with the intention to distribute them widely. Put the focus on writing something that provokes emotional reactions and put the focus less on the keyword-targeted (SEO) writing.

Given the fact that social media sites do have a voting mechanism that does not require people to read the article, the title is enormously more important than the actual content of your linkbait.

See for example 10 title formulas Copy Blogger:

• Who would also <fill in>?
• The secret of <fill in>?
• This method helps <fill in> in <fill in>.
• Less well-known ways to <fill in>.
• Save you once and for all from <problem>
• Here is a quick way to <solution problem>
• Now you can <something wishful> <good condition>.
• <Do something> as <first class example>.
• Make a <or> Create a <fill in> where you can be proud of.
• What everyone should know about <fill in>

Be biased / partisan
You may want to display your idea polarized, so it attracts and / or divests a special group. If other people are arguing about what your intention is, you’ll get good quality links.

Make people talk
It is good to write in a way that the reader likes to pass it true, like newspaper stoke up discussions.

Choose smart topics or think out of the box
Choosing the right subject that many people are interested in just works better. Try to relate news from outside your niche to your site, in a creative way. If your niche is saturated, try a subject from a different niche.

Valuation of your content
On the web your content will be valued in the following ways:

• It is attention worthy, based on a general topic and credibility and authority related
• People want to subscribe, it is worth to re-visit or to add a feed.
• It is advisable, thru a link, instant message or email.

History
Look in your existing statistics, what has worked out and what not. Use Yahoo! Site Explorer to see how many backlinks your individual pages have.

Syndicate
Write articles of good quality at other sites. This is good for credibility, link popularity and it generates traffic.

3.2 Release

Make it simple to pass your page / content thru

For example use plug-ins for Digg, REDITS, eKudos, NuJij.nl etc.
Put the content code on your site, so that another can display the content on his / her site (such as YouTube or like in cartoons or quizzes)

Release timing

Think about the best time and location of the launch. For example, if friends and acquaintances are present. It is also good to ensure that you come online at the beginning of a day at sites such as Digg. Many people are surfing through this site and it is handy if you top.

Make yourself known
A few short tips as a summary of the mentioned words above

• Create accounts on social media sites / social news sites
• Digg your own post
• Send emails to relevant blogs
• Let a friend or yourself post your best ideas on the sites with the most authority and relevant social news
• Please note that your story has a good title and that it is easy to vote on
• Please note that your story will be spread at an appropriate time

If you won’t do it quickly after you’ve put it on your site, it’s likely that someone else will spread it under a dumb title or stupid content

Beg by friends / acquaintances
Let your friends and acquaintances help you by email and instant messaging, but do not post the direct URL of a voting location in your instant messenger (referrer is recognized and potentially seen as spam). Also make use of network features that sites like del.icio.us and ekudos offer.

Be careful here: do not compel your friends to vote, but let them decide.

Ask for feedback
Ask for feedback from people who may be interested in your idea and are willing to improve or to help you with marketen.

Pitching
Build up a good relationship with the market, before you put your linkbait on the market Make sure you know relevant bloggers and media sources who may be interested in your linkbait, so you will be quickly followed with the linkbait you launched.

Launching a new site
If you want to launch a new site, you could do linkbait in this way:

• Ask for favours from people you’ve helped in the past
• Unite community ideas with your idea
• Spread your ideas, for example, if you’ve formed a new partnership, you will have a threefold advantage:

1. Interview partners through a different channel
2. Announce the launch
3. Add the linkbait to the site at a later date

Take in mind that the Web is selfish
People find themselves important. Many bloggers search several times a day for links to their blog on Technorati or Google Blog Search. Making an appeal to certain people, caught in humour, is a simple way to collect links. Digg has often stories about Digg or Digg users. People believe (and spread) stories that reinforce their worldview earlier.

Involvement in a community is important to identify others with your linkbait
published his’ Search Engine Ranking Factors’, he collected feedback from dozens of prominent members of the SEO world. Many of them are active community members which have helped disseminate the article.

Asking for feedback can provide that others get involved and make it their own. And it is a good way to try out your own ideas.

Keep your linkbait manageable
Launch your story on an important channel in a way that your message or your offer can change, depending on the feedback you get. If you do not have a large channel to your launch your idea, try to give a popular channel as Tech Crunch’s exclusive rights to your story.

Try to get a lot of confidence and attention of the market before you launch your message.

Think in advance about reflection: Do you want to make your message easily wrong interpretable (as much buzz) or make it clear, depending on the importance of your message and brand strategy.

Make general landing pages. Don’t throw away links where you have the right to on having them. For example, authors who don’t have official pages of their book on their site, receive less links and give them away to top online booksellers.

Don’t compete with yourself
Be careful with the naming of your linkbait ideas. SEObook.com has a tool called “SEO for Firefox.”. The page where this tool is located almost outranks the homepage for the term “SEO”.

Roadmap for high competition in a blog post

Create a new and fresh point of view, ask your self:

• Is there a way to turn the story?
• In what other way can the story be told?
• What impact has this story on my niche?

Be quick
Bloggers in Australia have an advantage of the time difference with Europe / America. Just try to respond as quickly as possible. This applies especially to the news hook of course.

Be controversial or funny
Whether it’s funny or controversial, both can ensure that your story is booming.

Use striking images
Do not use the standard images which are usually used by the subject, but create a new, more targeted picture  which is specified to the case.

Promote your post / content and send your link to other ‘key’ bloggers,
Hold on to the following:

• Look after themselves whether they have already written on the subject in the past.
• Do not be offended if you do not get a response
• Be sure your link is relevant and useful, be selective
• Send a personal message
• Maybe you’re not the only one who sends tip
• Introduce yourself
• Keep it short and informative
• Give something away, such as the use of an image
• Original content is the best

Monetizing: how you earn money with link building
Put no ads until you have some authority, in an entirely new site, Too many ads quickly loaded means no authority and no authority means no income.

If links are profitable, link for conversions from your content
If you’re planning to sell ads directly, it may make sense to place a couple fake ads in the sponsored section. If a company has repurchased, more will follow because they see that their competitors also do it.

Put AdSense as the standard method if you do not want to deal with ad sales. Mix the ad colours with those of your own content and place ads in your content area, so they seem to form part of your content. Think about everything what may effect your click trough rate. View the ads after you’ve written a page. Make sure that your page is about the topics that the ads refer to or make more target pages that better reflect that kind of ads

Analyze the ad click trough rate per page and see what keywords deliver the ad clicks. Turn on channels to test different formats / sections of your site on income. Let your site grow to where the most income comes from. The deeper you dive into a topic, the more specified traffic you will get, but don’t forget to build your site authority if you make a big site.

4 Examples

Below are some examples, categorized to “hook”:

Research and Statistics hook

• For how many of the global warming are you responsible? Make for example a calculator, or let visitors compare with an average in their own city or country. Make sure that this tool is easily and quickly to fill in and that the numbers are clearly interpretable.
• What’s in a McDonalds French Fry that you do not find in a real potato?
• How well are those recommended shares in the spam mails doing? Can you really get to earn that much?

Humour hook

• Bush gives an argument about global warming is good for seals, polar bears fall through the thin ice. You can make a great cartoon of it. For example, especially if you pull on, for example Blog Action Day, this can be fun linkbait.
• You can also send through a hoax to do linkbait. An example is http://www.stillfree.com/. In the video vandals are spraying graffiti on Air Force One.

Tool hook

• How many pesticides have you eaten today? Here is a calculator again which is used to be filled in so that a summary can be made in addition to the potential effects there are.

News hook

• Some time ago, the search engine Sekko was established. Sekko became fairly large attention, because they were very ambitious about the fact that they wanted to compete the search engine Google away.
• After a few days was announced that Sekko only was a copy of Google in a new jacket.

List hook

• Now Rita Verdonk is a big topic, you can make a nice list with all typical and characteristic rulings of Rita Verdonk, such as “I’m not left, I’m not right – I’m straightforward.”

What do you do if there appears a ‘404 Not Found’ error message on a website? Do you close the window? Are you going to search for the right page? Do you contact the webmaster? Most people do leave the page. Their first visit to the website was also their last.
In this article I will explain you as a webmaster or marketeer how you could prevent these messages based on a simple road map. I will also give some tips on how to turn a disadvantage in to an advantage: a 404-page can be successfully deployed in the sales of your website!

The full overview in 7 steps:

1. Optimize the existing error pages
2. Improve internal links
3. Improve external links
4. NEVER remove pages from your site, but archive them
5. Redirect some common misspellings
6. Monitor error pages
7. Monitor search queries

Plus two bonus tips:

1. commercialization of the 404-page
2. keep your content up-to-date

The road map, Part 1: optimize existing error pages

Step 1: optimize existing error pages
On the web many articles can be found which explain how an error page can be made as user friendly as possible to decrease the percentage of visitors who leave your site without viewing more pages. The general view is that a 404-page must be user-friendly and that you should help visitors as good as possible by finding what they sought for. Place a few popular links or a search field on the error page. The other recommendations have already been extensively discussed at various sites, so I give merely a few links:

Additional information:

• General information can be found on Wikipedia and Evolt.org. More technical information can be found on the web designers magazine A List Apart.

Step 2: improve internal links
Prevention is better than cure. Try to avoid visitors to stream at the 404-page as much as possible, how good this page may be. A comprehensive scan shows if all links within your site (both internal and ‘outgoing’ links) are still functioning properly. The free program Xenu Link Sleuth is an excellent tool, but there are obviously more tools that do the same. The inventory of your internal links can be done automatically, but the corrections are mostly done by hand.

Additional information:

• The tool Xenu Link Sleuth. A simple Google query provides enough other tools;

Step 2.1: adding favicon.ico
This part actually belongs in step 2, but I thought it was important enough to mention it separately. Internet Explorer asks for the so-called ‘favicon.ico’ file at each Web page with a browser view. This is the small icon on the left side of the address bar of a Web browser, you must have seen it sometimes. If there is no file called ‘favicon.ico’ in the root of your website (http://www.yourwebsite.com/favicon.ico) it won’t be found and Internet Explorer generates an error message. You can easily prevented this common error by placing a favicon on your site.

Additional information:

• Technical and substantive “how-to” for dealing with favicons: http://www.trilithium.com/johan/2005/02/no-favicon/

Step 3: improving external / incoming links
Once if the internal link structure is okay, the next step is to improve the links from other sites to your site. These are the so-called inbound links or links. The inventory could also be automated, for example, with the free program back link analyzer, with the Yahoo Site Explorer and Google Webmaster Tools. The correction of incoming links is possibly more labor intensive, because you are relying on third parties. However it is worthwhile to take action on this part.
Tip: If you’re improving your external links, make sure the incoming links contain decent descriptive texts with keywords (for example: “web design and seo weblog” instead of “weblog” as link text) .

Additional information:

1. An excellent tool unfortunately with limited export opportunities is Back link analyzer;
2. Yahoo! Site Explorer: gives accurate information about incoming links;
3. Google Webmaster Tools gives an overview of all incoming links for a website. These data are not available for third parties, so you should set the webmaster tools environment with a Google account (is a winner anyway).

Step 4: NEVER remove pages, but archive them
On the news section of your site is an article from 2006. When it was placed, there was pretty much coverage by the media and the article was linked by several blogs that discussed the content in detail. But anno 2008 the news is not relevant anymore. Whatever you do, do not delete the article! The article is a while on your site already, it is included in the index of Google and Yahoo and has perhaps built up some pagerank/relevance/history. It would be an eternal shame to throw that away. So, keep it! Put it in an archive; if necessary, put an additional comment on this article that the news might be outdated and comes from the archive. This also prevents errors when people have followed the old link.

Additional information:

• Cool URIs don’t change: http://www.w3.org/Provider/Style/URI

Part 2: installation of extra usability

Step 5: redirect some common misspellings
Are certain misspellings often made on your website? Is the word ‘contat’ tapped in by many visitors when the search for your ‘contact’ page? This is a random example, but you know what I mention. If this occurs frequently, you can redirect visitors automatically (with a so-called ‘301 redirect ‘) to the proper ‘contact’ page. You can find a clear overview of the different 301-techniques on the Onetomarket site.
Please note: build in an additional warning for those who have landed on the page by using a ‘misspelling’. Show a message like: ‘We have automatically redirected you to this page, while you searched for the page ‘mispelings.html’. Make sure if you want to bookmark or link this page, that you use the correct address. Or something similar to this effect.

Part 3. Aftercare: monitoring

Step 6: Monitor error pages

To have access to the amount of visitors which comes into contact with error messages on your site, you must use your statistics package.
With the free Google Analytics package, you must set a little by your self. For example, are certain misspellings made (see step 5) and which websites provide false links that causes’ bounces’. This information could also be provided through Google webmaster tools, which shows so called “crawl errors’. Wordpress users can use log-404. This Wordpress plugin logs error messages and makes a network overview of the last 100.

Additional information:

• Tracking 404 pages in Google Analytics;
• Debug using Google Webmaster Tools;
• And a Wordpress plugin that effectively logs error pages.

Step 7: Monitor search queries
Another aspect that can be monitored, concerns the so-called referrers. Most statistical packages would not only provide information about which site provides you visitors, but also, as they came through Google, which keywords they had used in Google when they found your site. Google Analytics works in this context with ‘keyword considerations (‘All reports > ‘Marketing Optimization’> ‘Keyword considerations ‘).
These ‘considerations’ are nothing more than suggestions for keywords that you could use in your site. People were looking for these and thought that they would find them on your site. Why not give them what they want? At least, as long as it’s relevant.
We are not very satisfied with the operation of this feature of Analytics, but because anyone can use Analytics for free, we mentioned it here. Other, but from better quality and also more specialised are the following tools: HitTail, 103Bees and the Search Meter Wordpress plugin.

Additional information:

• Wikipedia on referers;
• Search Meter Wordpress Plugin. Keyword suggestions from the Wordpress interface;
• HitTail: http://www.hittail.com/
• 103Bees: http://www.103bees.com/

Part 4. Bonus tip: 404-pages as part of the sales process

1: commercialization of the 404-page
In some cases, an error page can be used to encourage the sales on the site rather than merely provide navigation to continue to search the site.

A good example is the 404-page of Apple. At first glance, there is a ‘normal’ 404-page, there is a slightly accusing text which says that I as a visitor might have typed in something wrong (there is some improvement needed) and there are links that leads a visitor deeper in to the site.

The most striking part of that page is a trio of images of approximately 175 by 150 pixels with information about certain offers, promotions or new products. So called banners, and they rotate. For example press several times on F5 (Ctrl-R for Safari) and you will see that each time a different banner will be shown on the page. That is a very clever action from Apple. On the 404-page are teasers that are popular. Apple makes a virtue of necessity and this principle can be applied to all kinds of sites!

Additional information:

• Apple error page: http://www.apple.com/error.html

Tip 2: keep the content up-to-date
Suppose your company site is growing and there will be new jobs at your site. For some functions you are looking for new people continuously, while others already have been filled in. It is also possible that certain functions are fulfilled now, but they will be brought back on the site in the future.
In all cases, you are better off not to remove the vacancy pages, even though the functions are already fulfilled.
In the first place the pages build up a history in search engines, in links from job sites, perhaps even on the personal weblog of someone who has responded.
Secondly, it is a cold trick to add an additional piece of text on the vacancy page in question: “at this moment this vacancy is fulfilled, but there is always place for enthusiastic, talented hard workers” or something similar. That is a lot better than ‘404 Not found’….

This article is based on the excellent overview of Steven Hargrove.

Each website is – to a greater or lesser extent – updated, changed and there are even entire pages or domains removed.
Now that your website has been renovated completely. The file names are changed (for example index.html to index.php), etc.
Of course this is fantastic: a Web site must be improved continuously! But what if you want to get rid of the old pages without being concerned about people who stream old links to the old pages and then land on a ‘404 not found ‘error? That’s not all, search engines like Google and Yahoo and MSN may have the old urls in their index and send visitors to the now deleted pages …

The 301 redirect

The best way to redirect those pages is to redirect with the so-called ‘301 ‘. What does this 301 redirect do, The redirect automatically forwards to a new page when it is called. This makes the 301 redirect the best, not only because it automatically forwards (which the ‘302 redirect also does), but it also does it safely, without that you have to fear for penalties from the search engines.
Specifically spoken the 301 redirect tells the browser or search engine that the page is moved and sends the client (browser or search engine) automatically to the new address. It tells them, in spoken word: ‘Hey, this page was moved here and this is the new address! “.
For you as the reader, the technique will be far more important, so we go further with the technique now.

There are several ways to use a 301 redirect: PHP, ASP, ASP.NET, JSP (JAVA), IIS, ColdFusion, CGI/PERL and finally with Htaccess. The most powerful technique is to use the so-called Apache mod_rewrite module in httpd.conf or .htaccess.

Redirect with HTML or Javascript

You want to know how you can use HTML or Javascript to redirect?! Very simple: Don’t!
In the past, the so-called “meta-tag refresh redirection method is often abused with the aim to spamming. The result is that the use of it is penalized by the search engines. So don’t use it.

301 redirect with .htaccess

The big advantage of using .htaccess is the fact that redirects can be regulated on a meta-level. Unlike with the mentioned programming languages .htaccess can redirect an entire directory.
It works as follows:
1. Create a file named “.htaccess” (note the dot in the beginning!) and place it in the root of the website;
2. Open the .htaccess file in a code-editor and add the following lines to the .htaccess file:
Redirect 301 /old/old.html http://www.yoursite.com/new.html
Please note: the first part of the statement concerns the path of the old files FROM the top level of the site (So without the ‘http://www’). Also note that there is a space between these elements:
redirect 301 (The instruction that the page has been moved permanently)
/old/old.html (The old relative path en name)
http://www.you.com/new.html (new complete path and name)
Also notice that it is not required for pages to redirect to a new domain name. This can be done within a domain too!

301 redirect with Mod_Rewrite

There is much more possible within the world of redirecting with mod_rewrite, a module of the Apache Web server.
This is an incredibly powerful module where regular expressions are used, for example, to flare dynamically redirects. I show an useful example below.
When someone links to your site, they don’t always exactly use the way you prefer.
If someone links to http://www.yoursite.com and someone else links to http://yoursite.com, then Google will use a separate page rank for each url.

Yes, that’s clumsy, but it’s a fact. You can customize it with the code below.
Incidentally, those who use sitemaps in Google webmaster central, can indicate under the “preferred domain” submenu, whether they prefer Google to index the www-variant or the www-free version of their Web site.
RewriteEngine On
rewritecond %{http_host} ^yoursite.com
rewriteRule ^(.*) http://www.yoursite.com/$1 [R=301,L]

301 redirect with IIS

1. Use the right mouse button in the Internet Services Manager to choose which folder should be redirected;
2. select the radio button that says “a redirection to a URL ‘;
3. fill in the page where to will be directed;
4. Check “The exact URL entered above” and “A permanent redirection for this resource”;
5. Click on ‘Apply’.

301 redirect with Cold Fusion

For most server-side scripting and programming languages is the use of 301-redirect quite simple.

In Cold Fusion it works as follows:

301 redirect with PHP

Use the following code:
<?php
header( "Status: 301 Moved Permanently" );
header( "Location: http://www.yoursite.com/" );
exit(0); // this is optional, but is recommended. This will help prevent unnecessary output?>
ps: The Microsoft IIS server crashes if you use the following (more common) used line:
header( "HTTP/1.1 301 Moved Permanently" ); ?>


301 redirect with ASP

Use the following code:
< %@ Language=VBScript %>
< %
Response.Status="301 Moved Permanently"
Response.AddHeader "Location", "http://www.yoursite.com /"
%>


301 redirect with ASP.NET

Use the following code:
>

301 redirect with JSP / JAVA

Use the following code:
< %
response.setStatus(301);
response.setHeader( "Location", "http://www.yoursite.com /" );
response.setHeader( "Connection", "close" );
%>
301 redirect with CGI / PERL
Use the following code:
$q = new CGI;
print $q->redirect(" http://www.yoursite.com / ");
301 redirect with Ruby / Ruby on Rails
Use the following code:
def old_action
headers["Status"] = "301 Moved Permanently"
redirect_to "http://www.yoursite.com/"
end

Disclaimer: we have used these techniques in practice and found out that the operation is quit satisfying. But there are 567897653 ways in which it can go wrong. Therefore the use of these techniques is at your own risk!