What tips do people have for implementing SEO strategies for large websites?
-
Hi,
I would like some tips on how to manage SEO on Large sites with limited. For example, I have a client with a large Ecommerce store that wants to rank high for every product and every category.
Obviosly every page has to be keyword optimised, but what is the best strategy for acquiring links and should we target all deep pages or just the home page and category pages, then use good internal linking to pass the link juice around?
All advice welcome!
thanks
-
I wholeheartedly agree. Any efforts made to personalize the pages, engage visitors and not appear like a generic page of a large e-commerce site is a step in the right direction.
-
Although the ideal path is to make each product page remarkable and worthy of generating links, itdepends on how much resources are available. I like the example of Woot who creates really humorous and entertaining product descriptions. You can also create original content like videos and photos instead of just using the boring manufacturer's descriptions and photos. I like how ThinkGeek encourages customers to post their own photos of them using their remarkable products. Creative ideas like that can make you stand out from the crowd and make your pages worthy of generating links.
-
If you have the budget and time then divide and conquer. Attack a set of pages that are high value loe effort. Use the 80 / 20 rule. The advice below is good. If you post the area of your site then specific advice can be given
-
What tips do people have for implementing SEO strategies for large websites?
The problem with large sites is scalability. I am not talking about the hardware or software, but instead the human factor.
Pick an item for sale, let's go with wall clocks. If you have a small site which sells 50 wall clocks then each and every clock would probably have it's own page. Sure you can have category pages but there would probably be some level of intimacy offered. The site might have began with selling a single clock, then expanded with another clock every couple weeks over a period of two years.
Each clock page could tell a story. The page could talk about who designed the clock, the manufacturer, people who have bought the clock, rooms where the clock would look best in, some details about the clock's history, how the clock is the same or similar to the one from a movie scene, etc. Detailed images might be offered from various angles. There is a level of detail and personalization offered when a human being is involved with creating a web page and sharing a high quality experience. These pages offer a lot of value to visitors and therefore search engines.
On the other extreme, there are websites which carry tens of thousands of products. The site owner has never seen nor heard of the item being sold. The product is listed based on a feed, the page URL is clock12z43, the description feels more like reading the Supplement Facts label from a vitamin bottle, etc.
When the owner of the latter style of website asks "why doesn't my product page rank higher" I ask them in return how many hours are they willing to spend on the page building it with quality information to help it rank higher. The response is often none, and there is your roadblock. The explanation is the owner doesn't have the time or ability to spend an hour per page with 10k+ products. Often the e-commerce solution does not have the flexibility to accommodate reasonable changes either. The site is restricted by the gridlock of attempting to allow one person to manage 10k products which simply is not reasonable.
If I could offer one tip for managing a large site it would be treat each and every page as if it belonged to a small site. Each and every page should have a human review it, and it should look like a human was involved with it's development.
what is the best strategy for acquiring links
Again, that human interaction does wonders. If you build outstanding pages, allow user generated content and provide social integration, many links will come naturally. Whenever you feel your linking needs a boost, reach out to the community. For the clock example, there are many types of sites ranging from interior design to arts and crafts. Read their forums and become involved in their community. Participate in sincere, helpful discussions which do not necessarily involve your site. When a topic arises where you can smoothly share a link to one of your clocks, do so in a high quality (i.e. non-spammy) manner. This method is one of many techniques to build links.
should we target all deep pages or just the home page and category pages
A balance works best. All pages would benefit from links.
-
Yes target the homepage and category pages, good internal linking with proper anchor texts. Look into the rel prev and rel next tags instead of canonical as a way of dealing with duplicate content. Make sure all title tags and meta tags are unique. Add enough unique identifiers to ensure uniqueness.
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Magento 1.9 SEO. I have product pages with identical On Page SEO score in the 90's. Some pull up Google page 1 some won't pull up at all. I am searching for the exact title on that page.
I have a website built on Magento 1.9. There are approximately 290,000 part numbers on the site. I am sampling Google SERP results. About 20% of the keywords show up on page 1 position 5 thru 10. 80% don't show up at all. When I do a MOZ page score I get high 80's to 90's. A page score of 89 on one part # may show up on page one, An identical page score on a different part # can't be found on Google. I am searching for the exact part # in the page title. Any thoughts on what may be going on? This seems to me like a Magento SEO issue.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | CTOPDS0 -
Can I define that one area of my website is a regualr news (no subscription) and the other part of the website is news that only subscribers can read?
Hi I have a client that have a news website, he asked me if he can define one area of his website to be a regular news that google can show on google news search results (no subscription) and the other part of the website is news that only subscribers can read? Thanks Roy
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | kadut1 -
Hreflang implementation issue
We are currently handling search for a global brand www.example.com which has presence in many countries worldwide. To help Google understand that there is an alternate version of the website available in another language, we have used “hreflang” tags. Also, there is a mother website (www.example.com/global) which is given the attribution of “x-default” in the “hreflang” tag. For Malaysia as a geolocation, the mother website is ranking instead of the local website (www.example.com/my) for majority of the products. The code used for “hreflang” tag execution, on a product page, being: These “hreflang” tags are also present in the XML sitemap of the website, mentioning them below: <loc>http://www.example.com/my/product_name</loc> <lastmod>2017-06-20</lastmod> Is this implementation of “hreflang” tags fine? As this implementation is true across all geo-locations, but the mother website is out-ranking me only in the Malaysia market. If the implementation is correct, what could be other reasons for the same ranking issue, as all other SEO elements have been thoroughly verified and they seem fine.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Starcom_Search0 -
Why does some sites rank with no seo
Why is it that some site rank with zero efforts? I have been working on some seo for a while on my main site and i have been getting more info competition analysis with sem and moz. Looking at the states from this website which tends to popup often in the searches on page 1-2 before my site. This site is not keyword optimized, meaning they arent even trying to rank.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | CooperStrzelecki
There is no content, articles etc.,
6 backlinks (nothing powerful just 2 directory links and 2 from developer)
Site really isnt even designed to get traffic as its a trade only ecommerce website
I doubt they are hiding anything as far as backlinks etc. as it will get them too many visitors they dont want
The city i am searching isnt even on the page (it is a city within a city so maybe google still relates it)
PA 24 DA 15 Now my site:
Optimized reasearched keywords
175 backlinks
All my main pages have content with images, alt tags, internal linking
full of content, blogs, videos, products (probably 4000, could a site being too big be an issue?)
Site gets regular updates
I probably have 200 citations
All the social media which gets done often
PA 32 DA 20 They do get a good bit of traffic but that is probably the only thing i would see but it would be direct traffic mostly i believe as it would be people going to order regularly since it is a print reseller. They may have some age on me 15 vs 8 years. Could it be some kind of penalty i am not sure about lingering? According to what i know to check everyything looks ok, no shady links accoding to sem. I am working more and more on all the pages but this competittion site really doesnt have crap going on probably 8 pages and 1 page does all the ordering. What the hell does google want from me exactly!0 -
My website is not indexing
Hello Experts As i search site :http://www.louisvuittonhandbagss.com or just entering http://www.louisvuittonhandbagss.com on Google i am not getting my website . I have done following steps 1. I have submitted sitemaps and indexed all the site maps 2.i have used GWT feature fetch as Google . 3. I have submitted my website to top social book marking websites and to some classified sites also . Pleae
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | aschauhan5210 -
Links from a website or a subdomain, which would generate more benefits in terms of SEO?
I have a customer who just bought a domain (and the full website) of a competitor and decided that they will no longer update the website purchased. The website of my client has a Domain Authority = 50 and DA of the website purchased is 45. Each of them was registered by different companies and are on different servers too.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | marciofelias
The reason for my message is that by being registered by different companies and are in differrent servers I can use the site purchased as a way to make link building to the main website (one way link buiding only from the website purchased to the main website), but I can put the website purchased as a subdomain of the main website and agregate content to the main website.
In your opinion which would generate more benefits in terms of SEO to the main website? Links from the website purchased or put this website as a subdomain to the main website?0 -
How to gain more conversions through my website
Hello, I have a wealth coaching website bobweikel(dot)com Will you look at it and tell me how I can improve traffic and conversions. I want to gain several clients a week just from the web. Possible areas of help: On-site SEO & keywords link building: I don't see how to link build here Content Creation Adwords Thanks!
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | BobGW0 -
Local SEO for franchises
I have a client who franchises an ice cream shop. It started in Utah and there are several stores there. They are ranking well for local searches based in Utah. Now they have opened a store in Federal Way, WA. How can I get the new location to rank for local keywords on the same website?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | fivestarfranchising0