Some SEO 2016 questions
-
Hello MOZ Community,
I have some questions where the following is still working for seo in 2016:
- Is an exact keyword in the domain still a good start?
- If a domain contains the most important keyword does one still need subfolders with that keyword in the url?
- Do you need multiple subpages so the main url becomes stronger?
- Is linkbuilding still the number one factor?
Thank you for your thoughts!
-
Thank you.
These are some good answers for me.
I will focus on brand building and kickass content!
-
All of these questions will draw different opinions from different people.
Sometimes contrary opinion is most valuable.
Is an exact keyword in the domain still a good start?
If you mean... EgolsWidgets.com... then, widgets in your domain name isn't worth much. But if you have a site about brass widgets with BrassWidgets.com as the domain... then the domain will be slightly helpful. Exact match is what you need. Partial match is worth little to nothing.
If a domain contains the most important keyword does one still need subfolders with that keyword in the url?
If this is worth anything at all, it is not worth much. If I own BrassWidgets.com, I am not going to have a folder named /brass-widgets/
Do you need multiple subpages so the main url becomes stronger?
Huh? If you want a good website you will probably need a lot of subpages. That is called "content".
Is linkbuilding still the number one factor?
No. KICKASS content is the number one factor. "Content" isn't worth much at all unless it is KICKASS. If you make a website with crappy content then who is going to link to it, who is going to read it, who is going to do anything with it.
If you don't have kickass content then you will be forced to pay a linkbuilder and he will have to perform some type of sin to get people to links to your crappy website.
-
Thank you for responding.
I was trying to get some "almost" exact keyword matches combined with lots of weak backlinks to rank for some affiliate marketing sites, but it does nothing.
And your answers clearly show why.
Thanks again.
-
Thank you for responding and your helpfull answers.
It really seems that shortcuts are not helping and brand building is the way to go.
-
Hi mhenze,
Will answer to the best of my ability:
- Exact match still a good start?
It depends on what the brand of the website/business you're working on is. This one was answered well in Q&A in December of 2015 with the following:
"If your "brand" is going to be "Region Family Holidays" then an EMD is fine. Just make sure you're branded that way, and try to cultivate a variety of natural backlinks. If your brand is "Acme Travel UK" and the site is regionfamilyholidays.co.uk then you'll be fighting a losing battle."
Here's the link: https://mza.bundledseo.com/community/q/exact-match-domain-should-i-use-one
Long story short, the value of EMD's lessens as your brand diverges from the keywords you're targeting. If you are branding based on keywords you're targeting, then you're still in good shape.
-
Kind of related to the first question - it depends on what your brand is. I would stay away from the EMD/keywords discussion and just focus on producing solid content targeting keywords. It's the safest way to go and it gets results in my experience. It's a small piece of the pie compared to your link profile and properly optimized content/site structure.
-
I'm not entirely sure what you're asking here. Subpages don't really add strength to the main URL (in fact, it works in reverse). Subpages are great for ranking additional keywords or if you have multiple products or services that are not related to one another and you want to keep your services separated for SEO purposes. Your main URL will be strong if you can generate sufficient links and provide excellent resources to your visitors.
-
According to Moz's 2015 Search Engine Ranking Factors Survey, links are still the #1 factor when it comes to rankings.
Link is here: https://mza.bundledseo.com/search-ranking-factors
Granted this survey was based on 2015 factors and your question revolves around 2016, but the factors have not changed significantly in this time and it is doubtful there will be anything game-changing in 2016 (at least not for a few months).
This doesn't mean links are the be-all and end-all of rankings, but many very smart people seem to think they are still a big factor. Make sure you are following best practices, make sure your link profile is natural and whatever you do, don't spam or buy links for your sites and you should do just fine.
-
Greetings. I'll start this one off!
First and foremost, I have to point you to the 2015 Ranking Factors. They haven't change that much and it is really the best reference out there for all of these questions.
1. I say yes with a giant BUT...you have balance branding with that nifty keyword domain name. My personal experience is not all is lost on keywords in the domain as some will tell you, but I'd only do it IF there is no significant loss to your brand.
2. Keep the URL as short as possible.
3. Not sure what you mean here. A well structured website with quality content will give you the best results, so I'm leaning towards yes on this one.
4. Short answer is Yes. That and great content. See the 2015 Ranking Factors.
Good luck.
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
-
SEO Elements for Canonicalized URLs?
I am helping a client with SEO for their ecommerce store. They have around 65 products, but close to 500 URLs all for those same products. Basically they have a bit of an index bloat problem but long story short restructuring was too much of a lift for them, so I got them set up with a canonical URL strategy to ensure all duplicate pages point to one "main" product page. Getting to the point: They also need an on-page overhaul. I've created keyword optimized titles, metas, H1s, etc. for each product. Do these elements need to be added to every single one of the 450+ product pages OR do I only need to add them to the 65 "main" product pages that everything else is pointing to, since that will ultimately be the page that gets crawled?
Technical SEO | | AJTSEO0 -
Question Regarding Website Architecture
Hello All, Our website currently has a general solutions subdirectory, which then links to each specific solution, following the path /solutions/ => /solutions/solution1/. As our solutions can be quite complex, we are adding another subdirectory to target individuals by profession. I would like to link from our profession pages to the varying solutions that help. As both subdirectories will be top level pages in the main menu, would linking from our professions to **solutions **be poor architecture? In this case the path would look like: /professions/ => /professions/profession1/ => /solutions/solution1/. Thanks!
Technical SEO | | Tom3_150 -
Optimized filename management for SEO
Hi, I'm currently undertaking a project to manage better my images and to rank for image searches. My site uses mod_pagespeed to optimises images, therefore image urls are changed to a pretty seo unfriendly url or even sometimes inlined within my page. On top of that I generally resize all my images by passing the desired file dimension within the image url in order to optimise the loading time of my site. Is there a way to provide a hint to google that I have a much better quality image with higher dimensions and better name? Can i specify within my image sitemap an image that actually does have different dimensions and a different within the page it serves? Are there better tricks to achieve that? Thanks in advance
Technical SEO | | mattam0 -
Controlling PageRank Flow Question
One of my competitors rose above me drastically, above everyone actually. His website has a sidebar on the homepage, but when you click a post it leads to a full width page of his content - with no sidebar at all. The only button on page is HOME. My site has the sidebar on all pages, meaning juice is flowing around in all directions. Would it be smarter for me to remove my sidebar as well? In theory, this would create a boost in rankings correct?
Technical SEO | | PrivatePartners0 -
Seo on a dk site
hi my client has asked if we can seo their dk site , my question is does all link building and article submission have to be in danish
Technical SEO | | Westernoriental0 -
Domain Crawl Question
We have our domain hosted by two providers - web.com for the root and godaddy for the subdomain. Why SEOMOZ is not picking up the total pages of the entire domain?
Technical SEO | | AppleCapitalGroup0 -
Does HTTPS Only make a impact on SEO?
Hi. I run a site that's SSL only. (Using a 301 redirect to redirect traffic from http:// to https://). This might be a stupid question but i can't seem to find any conclusive answers to the question by searching. Does this negatively affect the search engine ranking of the site? Regards,
Technical SEO | | Host1
Eivind1 -
WordPress Question: Canonical field in Category Section of Yoast SEO Plug In
I've added the Yoast SEO Plug In for my word press blog. When I add a new category, there is a listing called "Edit Category". On this page there is a listing "Yoast WordPress SEO Settings." In this section, there are two fields in which I need guidance on what is supposed to be included. One: There is a field called "Canonical". What info is supposed to be entered in this field and how does it need to be formatted? Is it a URL. If so, what URL is supposed to go there? Two: Breadcrumbs title. What is the purpose of this field? (Isn't it OK to just use the category name as the breadcrumb title?)
Technical SEO | | EricVallee340