Why my site isn't #3 on Google

[bethabernathy]

Hi - I have no idea why my client site's isn't beating their competitor on Google with "ski lake tahoe"? We pulled out the java script, added the metatags, adjusted the content, etc. The site has 422 back links that Google is noting. My site lists #6 on Google. The site that lists #4 with the same search is just a doorway page to some lodging. The site that lists #3 has 137 back links and does not contain the search term in the title or description. Any ideas??? Thanks, Beth :)

[bethabernathy]

Well I think I figured it out. The top 5 websites that list out with the search "ski lake tahoe" all have the word "ski" contained in the url:

http://www.google.com/search?sourceid=navclient&ie=UTF-8&q=ski+lake+tahoe

If I am correct, then that means having the search term in the url weighs more heavily than the back links? Maybe just in this case??? :)

[seomike]

Haven't looked but how are your semantics? do you use the term ski, skiing and different variations of the term like skiing in lake tahoe, lake tahoe skiing etc.

[bethabernathy]

The words are all over the page. Much more than the competition.

#1 & 2 site is 1 big image - but the url is:
skilaketahoe.com

#3 site has the word ski in it 2x and tahoe in it 2x - the url is:
skialpine.com

#4 site is a doorway page - the url is:
highsierra.com/ltahoeac/skiguide.htm

#5 site has the word lake in it 1x - the url is:
skiheavenly.com

my site is#6 - has the words all throughout and in the metatags and has more back links than each of the above sites. The url is:
squaw.com

No "ski" in the url. What do you think? -Beth


-Beth

[Jill Whalen]

Google doesn't use Meta tags, so you can rule that one out...

[bethabernathy]

Google uses the Title tag, right? It is not using the back links in this case as my site has more than the top 5 sites. -Beth

[siteseo]

Jill, I beg to differ. One of my websites has a common misspelling of shotguns ONLY in the meta keywords tag of the index page, and I am 6th in Google for that misspelling. The misspelling is nowhere else on my site, nor is it in any links pointing to my site. Imagine my surprise when I began receiving traffic from Google for that misspelling!

[sebastian]

i have been following this thread a bit, and am quite surprised that everyone is attributing one or two factors as "thee" issue.

i don't think it would matter if the domain was "skiingislame.com" as long as the content, document structure, inbound link weights etc... were all in order and stronger than the other competitors...

...but then again maybe not. that's the thing with seo - you never know for sure what the exact criteria is, and especially with regards to exact placement on a keyword or phrase. how can you possibly expect to hit a rank dead-on?

then you have the whole server issue as results can vary by the google server being queried.

the research and investigation is interesting and thorough, but i truly think that aiming for one specific rank is futile ...and even if you do hit that exact rank, it probably wasn't because of "what you think you did" and furthermore, probably won't be at the same rank next week.

[bethabernathy]

Google is spidering this site every 48 hours. I watch the results daily as we make changes to improve the ranking for the selected terms. We picked the terms from an aggressive adword campaign run by the client.

Next we make a page where the url contains the terms with a direct link from the home page, same meta and good content. We will see then. The new page won't have much PR to start, but I bet the page kicks in pretty quick. I have done this before and it works beautifully. -Beth :)

[sebastian]

...and a good strategy it seems to be. kudos to you and your methodologies. they appear well thought-out...

i was simply stating that with so much criteria involved in obtaining good rankings, it's a bit futile to target exact and specific rank numbers.

simple, but valid point.

[Jill Whalen]

Beth, yes, Google reads Title tags. They are not a Meta tag, however.

And siteseo, could you please message me with the URL of this page that shows up in Google for a word only in the Meta tag? I would be very surprised if there wasn't another reason for it.

I'd really like to check it out.

Thanks!

[AussieWebmaster]

Apart from the title tag and url (considerable impact factors) the density of words on the page are stacked to Ski Lake Tahoe (it is in the footer - copyright info and address)... but the links are heavily anchored to the search term... so that is number one...

[Dave Hawley]

Google doesn't use Meta tags, so you can rule that one out... I would no be so sure about that. Nobody here knows for a fact that Google does not use Meta Tags. One can probably safely say not a lot of weight is given, but nobody should assume Google "doesn't use Meta tags".

It's more of a case of, it's been said so many times that "Google doesn't use Meta tags" that it's now become common belief. In other words, say something loud enough and often enough and many will believe it to be fact.

[bobmutch]

Beth: Clearly one of you problems is you are only #7 for allinanchor (http://www.google.com/search?sourceid=navclient&ie=UTF-8&q=allinanchor%3Aski+lake+tahoe). You need more links with "ski lake tahoe" in the anchor tag.

[ppg]

> I would be very surprised if there wasn't another reason for it.
That could well be, but if its a really, really low competion phrase with next to no results then I think its possible that a page could show up with only the phrase in the meta keywords.


> nobody should assume
Actually thats a bloody good point.
I got caught out myself recently accepting received wisdom that google doesn't even read the meta keywords tag. Have since had it proved to me that its not the case.

1 out of 10, must try harder....

[dannysullivan]

Last time I looked, Google was not reading the meta keywords tag. However, I haven't checked for some time. It wouldn't surprise me if they were reading it in some occasions, such as with text light pages.

Siteseo -- is that misspelling also in your meta description tag? Or want to point to the page and search query? I think we'd all like to take a look at this in action.

Google does read the meta description tag. If I recall correctly, it will both index the text in the tag as part of the page and will also return some or all of the description as a page's description, if it determines that makes sense. Usually this is because the description is among the first text on the page containing the search term.

[Dave Hawley]

On the point of Meta tags, why on earth wouldn't anyone not make use of them? Whether Google does/doesn't (I doubt anyone could say for a fact) use them today, there is always tomorrow. Besides, there are other SE, although they do very little for many.

[sebastian]

On the point of Meta tags, why on earth wouldn't anyone not make use of them?

>> very good point. in the amount of time it takes to argue about the validity of their use, you can create a pretty keyword rich set o' metas.

i have a misspelling example:

there is an arena in atlanta called, "philips arena", but according to keyword research, there are more people hunting for "phillips arena". i made a page that only mentions "phillips arena" once in the copy as a "common mispelling" and then i tossed it in the title for quality indexing (as i believe more than anything TITLE, along with at least one mention in copy, is the key.)

i have the #1 position (at least 9:46 a.m. EST) for "phillips arena tickets" and the #3 position for simply, "phillips arena (both are the misspellings) ...and interestingly enough, i also have the #1 position for the correct spelling, "philips arena tickets".

while this does not illustrate the "one word in meta" concept, it shows great power in the idea of researching misspellings and finding out that most people are pretty bad spellers and you can dominate your competition by thinking in that direction.

i have more examples i can share as well.

[siteseo]

Jill, you're right! I accidently misspelled the word on my site (it's still in development) and that's where G picked it up from. For the past few weeks I've been thinking the only place the misspelling appeared was in the keywords tag, because I would never intentionally put a misspelling in the visible copy. My bad.

I wasn't saying that the keywords tag is important - I side with those that believe the title tag and description tag, on-page copy and inbound text links (and other things) determine your relevance and ranking. I only use the kw tag for common misspellings.

To the lady who started this thread, I once spent several weeks trying to figure out why one of my sites didn't rank ahead of so-and-so. I finally figured out that the ONLY difference between my site and all the sites that were ahead of me was one thing, and one thing only - they all had it, and I didn't. What was it? A listing in a prominent, expensive Directory. Now my site (not the one referred to above for the misspelling) is in that Directory as well, and I'm slowly starting to pass my competitors on the inside lane, because my site is genuinely optimized better than my competitors.

[Jill Whalen]

I would no be so sure about that. Nobody here knows for a fact that Google does not use Meta Tags. One can probably safely say not a lot of weight is given, but nobody should assume Google "doesn't use Meta tags".

I don't "assume" anything.

Google does not use/read/index the Meta keyword tag. PERIOD!

I don't make statements like that unless I have tested it and know for certain. There's enough misinformation out there already and I would never add to that.

The original poster who said his Meta keyword tag was being read was mistaken. He just pm'd me and realized that he mistakenly also had the misspelling on his page, not just in the Meta keyword tag. Mystery solved. [oops, I see he posted before me!]

Every time someone has thought that Google has indexed something in their Meta keyword tag, there has always been another reason for it, with the word in question appearing somewhere else.

This is not to say that Google couldn't start indexing this tag at any time, but the facts up to this point is that they are not and have not been using it. (I don't recall if they ever did, but if they did it was a looooong time ago.)

Jill

[chrisharris]

Google does not use/read/index the Meta keyword tag.

Probably google does not use the meta keywords tag, But they read and index it, if something is showing up in google cache it simply means it is indexed,

And keywords tag is in google' html cache so they read and index them, I agree they dont use them but please dont make blunt notions that they never index them,

[Jill Whalen]

And keywords tag is in google' html cache so they read and index them, I agree they dont use them but please dont make blunt notions that they never index them,

No, they don't index them.

Do a search for any word in your Meta keyword tag that isn't elsewhere on the page or in a link pointing to the page and you will never, ever, ever find that page showing up in Google.

If they indexed that info, you would find it.

[chrisharris]

Hello Jill,

I think we are now confused what is indexing and what is using, I agree 100% google is not using it, But they index and show it in their cache, So do we call that caching, may be i am confused with caching and indexing,

Hope someone clears that to me,

[sem4u]

I would like to see an example of this Chris. I don't see how meta keywords would show in the cached version.

[chrisharris]

Please check the cache of your site in google, see the source code you will see the meta keywords tag, So what doest that mean indexing or caching,

[Jill Whalen]

I guess you would just call that "caching."

I think of indexing as the stuff they actually put into their database. It seems that just because they can show you the entire page in their cache, it doesn't mean that they actually place all the information from that page into their database to use for anything.

I've never really thought about the distinction before though!

[chrisharris]

Thanks for clarifying Jill,

[bethabernathy]

siteseo - If you are talking about the Open Directory project and / or the Yahoo directory, the site has a listing in both. Is this what you are talking about?

My site has the terms in 3 links at the bottom of the page. I don't see the terms "ski lake tahoe" in links in any of the 5 pages above mine.

Related to the meta description tag, if you do the search for ski lake tahoe (http://www.google.com/search?sourceid=navclient&ie=UTF-8&q=ski+lake+tahoe) and look at the description underneath my site's title:

squaw.com

"...Save up to $20 a day on lift tix. Ski Lake Tahoe at Squaw Valley..." that is directly pulled from the meta description. I wrote it that way, as that was what the adwords campaign was using as the description. So whether or not Google counts it in factoring rank, it is using it.

[Jill Whalen]

Beth, you may be interested in my Meta Description Tag (http://www.highrankings.com/metadescription.htm) article that tries to make sense of when the various engines display your Meta description tag as opposed to a "snippet."

Generally, if the exact phrase searched upon is in your Meta D tag (in the exact order of words) they'll show that tag instead of just snippet from the page. Interestingly enough, I believe I discovered when I last checked that Google will only do this IF the phrase is also somewhere else on the page.

[bethabernathy]

O.K. Thanks Jill. :)

[siteseo]

Beth, I was talking about Yahoo Directory.

Have you checked other variables, such as:
* do the sites that rank higher have more pages indexed by Google?
* do they have more backlinks from more relevant sites?

How long have you been in DMOZ compared to your competitors? The "magic" of DMOZ is that after 6-12 months, all the little directories out there that use DMOZ data to fill out their own database go in and pick up a fresh copy of the DMOZ dbase, and get indexed by G with your new link. Now, instead of having one lousy link from DMOZ, you have dozens from sites that use DMOZ data.

Here's a tip: check Google's and Yahoo's backlinks to your competitors, and request links from all of them. This may compensate for any shortcomings you might have in your on-site SEO. As I like to say, "backlinks cover a multitude of sins."

[bethabernathy]

I checked out each site and ran a little analysis using Optilink and an Access database.

Good links = Not on the same class c ip; have a page rank of 1 or better; related to the sites topic

Rank on Google:

#'s 1 & 2 = skilaketahoe.com: Yahoo reports 256 back links. Out of those links there are 14 good links; site registered on 4/22/97; 99 pages listed on Google.

#3 = squaw.com (my site from my location): Yahoo reports 3400 back links. Out of those links there are 291 good links; site registered on 3-22-96; 8320 pages listed on Google.

#4 = skialpine.com: Yahoo reports 1830 links. Out of those links there are 313 good links; site registered on 1-31-96; 129 pages listed on Google.

Maybe I am counting links incorrectly. I have been working real hard on it. But my site is #3 at the moment. Thank God!! -Beth :)

[AussieWebmaster]

Beth: Clearly one of you problems is you are only #7 for allinanchor (http://www.google.com/search?sourceid=navclient&ie=UTF-8&q=allinanchor%3Aski+lake+tahoe). You need more links with "ski lake tahoe" in the anchor tag.
Beth this is the post to look at the closest... you need to convert your inbound links into anchor text for Ski Lake Tahoe right now the people above you have more of them and in some cases are placed higher from repetition in the title and use of Domain names and urls.

You could claim a jump if you tried this.

[Dave Hawley]

Jill, sorry but you are assuming. You have assumed that by searching for a term/word only in the Meta tags and Google not showing the page that Google does not use Meta tags in its ranking method. That is far from proof that Google does not use Meta tags I'm afraid.

As I have said, nobody should assume anything about how/what Google uses to determine and page position in their SERP's.

Meta tags (used or not) are your friend and you are your own enemy if you do not use them.

[AussieWebmaster]

Let's keep this to the point

[bethabernathy]

So, since the last Google update my site is now #3. Shows that it takes a while to propogate across the data centers to get into the SERPS. :)

[Dave Hawley]

But aren't Meta Tags part of the point? The OP has raised the issue a few times.