SEO and search engine question

kristenwestlake · 2014-11-09 03:05:45

Hi,

I've been doing a Search engine test to see where my site and blog come up in Search Engines and they simply don't. They used to .. even if it meant taking a sentence from my blog and searching for it, it showed in google. But now, doing this same thing yields nothing. This makes no sense because in searching for something like, "ts not only the animals who are experts when it comes to hiding .. I found that under overcast conditions the colors in the rocks at Devils Lake mimicked the patterns in the fall color on " I should be pretty unique!

Anything that comes up by searching just my name also is very old content and even content that no longer exists.

I don't understand what might be wrong. Blog posts shouldn't be an issue ( I have allow search engines clicked) and you'd think that some of my images would come up in searches or web pages. Any ideas or help in regards to this issue?

Thank you for any help!
Kristen

www.kristenwestlake.net

Last edited by kristenwestlake (2014-11-09 03:10:09)

Matthew · 2014-11-09 11:47:50

I ran one of your galleries through an SEO diagnostics tool.

Your keyword density is low. For an image gallery, I'm not sure how relevant this actually is, but it does raise SEO warnings.

Not all of your images have captions, which are used to populate the alt attribute for images.

Google apparently does not like underscores in URLs; you should use hyphens instead when naming files and folders. Lightroom's file names for virtual copies add _v1 to the end of images and image pages, so those URLs are raising flags. There's nothing we can do about that, except to not use virtual copies. Maybe swap your images around so that the settings for those images published are on the original file, and whatever extra versions you're hanging onto, make those virtual copies ...

The gallery I'm looking at has no description. Putting some content into the block gives you the opportunity to increase your keyword density for the page, and gives Google more content with which to work.

Displaying metadata on the grid will make things look messier, but also gives Google more to work with. That's a tradeoff you will need to weigh for yourself.

You can speed up page load by implementing compression via .htaccess. See the Appendix section of our documentation for examples.

And probably the biggest one:
"Your website doesn't have any social media activity. Search engines are increasingly using social media activity to determine which pages are most relevant for keyword searches. In order to increase your page rank and to increase revenue generated through organic search you are advised to increase your website social media engagement."

If you have not already done so, I would also advise that you setup a Google+ account and establish Authorship for your blog. Or maybe not; I just Googled for instructions on how you can do that, and it looks like they've killed the Authorship program as of August ...

Anyway, your blog is probably the most effective tool you have for SEO ranking. Keep it active, and make it social.

Matthew · 2014-11-09 12:00:43

The other problem worth pointing out, is that Google looks at your page and sees thumbnails. Thumbnails don't really look like content to Google; they look like buttons that link to something else. That something else is image files, so a link to a "page" that has no title, no metadata, etc. that Google typically uses. So this is a case where what's best for design and user experience, is not necessarily good for search engines.

So, what's best for search engines then?

Loading all of your full-size images into a page. Which is why CE4 Gallery also creates single-image HTML pages, and embeds hidden links to those pages in your gallery.

But this is only helpful, not a silver bullet.

We've done everything we can, but Image Gallery vs. SEO is a tricky conflict, and SEO is a constantly moving target.

It also doesn't help that galleries are, by necessity, static HTML pages.

Best thing you can do for your galleries and images is work to improve social media engagement, and tie your galleries into your blog more. Maybe post an article to highlight a gallery or a few related images from a gallery. Put those images into the blog post, link that post back to the gallery a few times, and make sure that blog post shows up on social media.

kristenwestlake · 2014-11-11 04:13:22

thank you Matthew for great information!

I have actually started to implement my galleries (and specific pictures) into my blog more. I need to be more consistent with that so I'm trying to do an every other day blog (at least when I'm not traveling).
From each blog post I'm following it up by facebooking it, Google +ing it, Pintresting it.
I am going to go through all that you wrote more thoroughly and apply your suggestions to my images. Thank you so much!

Kristen

Last edited by kristenwestlake (2014-11-11 04:14:31)

kristenwestlake · 2014-11-11 04:59:23

Matthew,

Is the best CE4 gallery to use the static Html page one?

Matthew · 2014-11-11 10:59:56

For SEO, yes, the HTML presentation is probably the best choice. It's still not a silver bullet, though. Remember that search engine ranking are a competition, and every individual is also competing with the New York Times, Rolling Stone, TripAdvisor, Buzzfeed, The Onion, etc. ... larger, established websites which are heavily trafficked, super active, updated constantly, and which Google weighs more heavily than Average Joe's Personal Webplace.

Most of my photography is travel related. When someone Google's "Cambodia", they're more likely to get matches for TripVisor, Hotels.com or Priceline, than for CampagnaPictures ... that's just life.

A while back, I did a newsletter about page rank. Impossible to say how much has changed since, but it's here:
https://madmimi.com/s/320ec3

kristenwestlake · 2014-11-14 05:04:43

Thank you Matthew

That said about the Html presentation being the best choice for SEO, does that hold true also for mobile devices? I have that set on touch right now but am wondering if its better to put that into the html single page design as well?

Thank you! ..

Matthew · 2014-11-14 12:11:53

The mobile gallery page uses the standard index.php as canonical URL, so shouldn't impact SEO at all. Search engines should only be looking to index.php.

kristenwestlake · 2014-11-14 22:42:31

thank you!

Community @ The Turning Gate

#1 2014-11-09 03:05:45

SEO and search engine question

#2 2014-11-09 11:47:50

Re: SEO and search engine question

#3 2014-11-09 12:00:43

Re: SEO and search engine question

#4 2014-11-11 04:13:22

Re: SEO and search engine question

#5 2014-11-11 04:59:23

Re: SEO and search engine question

#6 2014-11-11 10:59:56

Re: SEO and search engine question

#7 2014-11-14 05:04:43

Re: SEO and search engine question

#8 2014-11-14 12:11:53

Re: SEO and search engine question

#9 2014-11-14 22:42:31

Re: SEO and search engine question

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