Rank better on Yahoo with dynamic URL rewriting

Search Engine Journal - Big news from the Yahoo Site Explorer team as they have announced a new dynamic URL rewriting service for sites which use multiple variables in their URL strings which may damage their ranking potential within Yahoo Search, even if the site is full of good relevant content and has lots of natural incoming links.

Site owners can now alert Yahoo about the dynamic parameters used within their URL strings. Yahoo Search can then ignore the variables and automatically rewrite the URL to make it more search friendly.

How does this help site owners? Yahoo says the rewriting of dynamic URLs effects everything from the crawling of a site to the distribution of link juice:

* A more efficient crawl of your site, with fewer duplicate URLs being crawled.
* Better and deeper site coverage, as we’ll be able to use our crawler capacity to find and index more new content on your site.
* More unique content discovered, as we’ll handle more dynamic parameters in your URLs (if you remove the content-neutral dynamic parameters).
* Fewer chances of crawler traps.
* Cleaner and easier-to-read URLs displayed in the search results.
* Better aggregation of link juice to your sites, which can help your pages rank better.

More on Dynamic URL Rewriting via the Yahoo Search Blog.

cannibalistic URLs

Search Engine Journal - When you build a web site, you create paths to certain pages. Most web developers will put those pages in specific folders like: www.example.com/press-releases/ or www.example.com/store/ to give the site a logical structure. Unfortunately, depending on a slew of technical stuff like servers, file extensions, redirects and internal site links, that pretty path can end up looking like a number of unique paths to both users and search engines even though they’re really the same:

www.example.com/press-releases/
example.com/press-releases/

www.example.com/press-releases/default.aspx
example.com/press-releases/default.aspx
www.example.com/press-releases/?id=1
example.com/press-releases/?id=1

Why is this a problem?

Isn’t this just ugly code to some standards-compliant web freaks?

It’s a problem because when a link goes to that page (either from your site or another site) and it uses different paths (through a mistake or technical error), that path is seen by the search engines as unique pages. And when Google determines page rank from links to your page, if they find multiple pages, you could be splitting your best possible ranking.

Let’s use Play-Doh to demonstrate the principle.

If you have three page paths:

example.com/default.aspx
example.com/default.aspx?id=1
WWW.Example.com/Default.aspx

The first one might have just one or two links to it and a PR of 1. The second might have a few more links and a PR of 2. And let’s pretend the third has even more links with a PR of 3.

Unfortunately, page rank isn’t simple arithmetic, but for the sake of this discussion, if you could make all of those links go to the “same” page, you would be channeling greater link equity to one central location. This could potentially result in a PR of a big, beautiful 6, which should mean increased rankings.

How do you find out if you’re cannibalizing your page rank

First things first… open your website in a browser and type in the domain as www.example.com. Then type in example.com without the “www.” If the domains stay the same when you type either one, you need to designate one version over the other. For detailed instructions on how to do this, read Chris Hooley’s article, Canonicalize with .htacces. Your goal is to make one version redirect to the other.

Now that, that biggie is out of the way, you need to choose how you want your pages to look. I recommend removing extensions entirely if you are using folders (e.g. www.example.com/example/ versus www.example.com/example/index.htm). This is for a maintenance reason, but I am also partial to keeping pages in the root directory as much as possible, which means you have to show an extension like www.example.com/example.htm.

Whatever you choose to do, make sure you stay consistent in how you code your internal links. What I mean is that if you create a path on your site to www.example.com/example/, do not make the page www.example/example in another area of your site. This is one of the few times in life when it’s okay to play favorites!

You should also control the amount of variables appended to your path. Often, for tracking or programming reasons, variables are appended to URLs that can make your paths appear different. Try to limit them and again, be consistent.

To test for variables and path mistakes, create a Google Webmaster Central account and navigate to Webmaster Tools. Then go to the Links tab (after you have verified the site) and scroll through both the internal and external links. You should be able to easily eye serious issues. I also like to use Xenu Link Sleuth, which detects broken links, but also displays a list of paths on your site.

And, that’s about it, though there’s probably a lot I did not cover either from my own misunderstanding or tiredness. Either way, I got to play with Play-Doh and talk about page rank. It doesn’t get much better than that!

Online ads taking over

The Internet Outsider demonstrates how the web is causing a shift in advertising dollars, according to the Web Strategist.

“US advertising revenue at 4 big online media companies–Google (GOOG), Yahoo (YHOO), AOL (TWX), and MSN (MSFT)–grew by $1.3 billion in Q2, or 42%.

US advertising revenue at 15 big television, newspaper, magazine, radio, and outdoor companies (Time Warner, Viacom, CBS, etc.) shrank by $280 million in Q2, or 3%.”

42% online vs -3% traditional

Read the bottom line on this spreadsheet analysis. Google is growing hand over fist at 96% while NYT has a decrease by 6%.

Online video will dominate: forecast

eMarketer - Television networks, film studios, independent content owners, Web portals, social media sites, technology providers, online stores, brand marketers and consumers are all joining the Internet video revolution. They are changing the way digital content is created, distributed, consumed and monetized.

The Online Video report analyzes and compares the online video delivery channels that are creating both uncertainty and a sense of opportunity among media professionals.

Some players are fearful that the widespread availability of video content on the Internet will threaten the TV and film industries. Others see the potential to increase revenues through a variety of business models, including ad-supported streaming, pay-to-own downloads, subscription services and online rentals as a boon.

eMarketer projects that by 2011, 86.6% of the US Internet population will consume online video, up from 62.8% in 2006.

In raw numbers, that means the number of viewers will rise from 114 million in 2006 to 183 million in 2011.

US Online Video Viewers As a Percent of Internet Users, 2006-2011

Key questions the "Online Video" report answers:

  • What is the size and projected growth of the online video audience?
  • What are the leading types of online video content?
  • Which business models will prevail for video on the Internet?
  • How will the widespread availability of video on the Web affect TV viewing?
  • What are the top video content Internet sites?
  • Which devices do consumers prefer for viewing video online?
  • And many others...

eMarketer Reports—On-Target and Up-to-Date

The Online Video report aggregates the latest data from marketing and communications researchers with eMarketer numbers, projections and analysis to provide the information you need to make the right business decisions—right now.

Online Advertising to Surpass Newspaper Advertising by 2011

Forecast: Internet Expected To Exceed All Other Ad Media By 2011

Private equity and investment firm Veronis Suhler Stevenson (VSS) put out a new ad spending forecast, covered in MediaPost and the Financial Times. Driven by audience migration, the US Internet is anticipated to capture $61.98 billion and become the top ad medium in 2011. Traditional media will show slow, low single-digit growth while alternative media will grow at a compound annual rate of 17.4 percent during the forecast period.

According to the MediaPost write-up of the VSS findings, consumers are spending less time with media overall and less time with "push" vs. "pull" media in particular:

At the same time, the consumer migration to digital media--which require less time investment than traditional media counterparts (think 3-minute YouTube clips versus 30-minute TV shows)--has spawned a year-over-year decline in the amount of time consumers spent with media, VSS researchers say. The tally came in at 3,530 hours in 2006, a per-capita decrease of 0.5%. It's the first time since 1997, researchers say, that such a behavior has occurred.

Consumers are also migrating away from ad-supported media and spending more time with media they support, according to the VSS Forecast. Consumers spent an average of 1,631 hours in 2006 with consumer-supported media, such as the Internet and video games--a gain of 19.8% compared to 2001. Time spent with ad-supported media, such as broadcast television and newspapers, has fallen 6.3% since 2001 to 1,899 hours per person.
While forecasts are often inflated and make assumptions that don't come to pass as quickly as expected, VSS claims its forecasts are historically very accurate:
The VSS Forecast also features the industry’s most accurate spending forecasts, producing a margin of error of +/- 2% for 9 of the last 10 years. The margin of error for the 2006 forecasts was + 0.4%.
VSS projects paid search will reach roughly $8.7 billion by year end and $16.7 billion in 2011. The report also projects roughly $6 billion in local search and online yellow pages spending by 2011. All locally targeted online ad spending is expected to reach just over $19 billion by 2011.

Local Search Booms - Driving Offline Sales

Need Hits - If you thought that local search is not affecting the way consumers shop offline then you would be mistaken! TMP Directional Marketing has released the results of a comScore study, revealing that 61% of local online searchers proceeded to purchase from a local business. Just under half made a phone call or visited the store offline, whilst only 6% made a purchase online!

While 33% of searchers still look to Yellow Pages for the majority of their local information, and 90% believe that print directories are "still a valuable source for shopping information." the majority (over 60%) of consumers use the internet to find local and business information. Half this number utilizes popular search engines like Google and Yahoo!, 17% choose to search Internet Yellow Pages (IYPs) and 13% use local search sites such as Citysearch, InsiderPages or Merchant Circle.

Despite the strong evidence, highlighting the benefits of investing in local search, Stuart McKelvey, CEO, TMP Directional Marketing, said that advertisers have been slow to embrace local search marketing efforts due to the lack of perceived value in driving purchases, and the cost of moving dollars from offline to online local directories. With only 6% of the 61% of local searchers actually purchasing online, and no tracking to link offline purchases to online searches, advertisers just aren't seeing the proven benefits of local search marketing.

"Online local search is a $9 billion market and growing. The consumer is there, and the opportunities for marketers to capture a share of this growth are huge," states McKelvey. Now is the time to invest in clever local search marketing to drive your offline sales!

Start your local search marketing with Local Search Listing. You provide us with your details. We submit your business to 46 major search engines and local directories, and create an optimized local webpage, displaying all your business information! Simple and smart local search marketing!

Toronto Star facing tough road but online taking on important role, CEO says

CP - Despite its successful redesign, Canada's largest daily newspaper continues to face revenue challenges amid ongoing slippage in advertising, while online media has taken on a modest but increasingly important revenue-generating role, the head of Torstar Corp. said Wednesday.

The comments from a concerned Rob Prichard came even as Torstar (TSX:TS.B), owner of the Toronto Star and other media properties, released "solid" second quarter financial results showing overall profits climbing 15 per cent to $30.1 million or 38 cents a share.

"Our growth slowed in the second quarter despite year over year favourable cost comparisons," Prichard said in a conference call with analysts. "The second quarter was tougher than the first."

Three-month revenues rose 1.7 per cent to $397 million, with modest growth seen in newspapers, digital and at the Harlequin book publishing unit.

Prichard stressed the difficulties facing the Star, the country's biggest circulation paper, a trend he predicted would continue. Advertising linage fell 5.6 per cent for the quarter with ad rates barely eking out gains.

The "tough" revenue trends at the paper were offset by the discontinuance of the weekly Scoop, which cost the Star $3.1 million in 2006, and lower pension and newsprint costs, CFO David Holland said.

The redesign of the Toronto Star, which Prichard said has been "greeted with acclaim," will further yield significant savings in the order of $3 million a year because it will be printed on smaller pages.

Overall revenues for Torstar's newspaper and digital division climbed a scant 1.9 per cent to $281 million in the quarter compared with the year-before period.

At the same time, the newspaper's website torontostar.com is enjoying increased traffic and revenues as the company invests heavily in online media.

"Digital revenue for our newspaper and digital segment grew by about 50 per cent year over year, albeit on a modest base," Prichard said.

Although digital revenues accounted for just 4.3 per cent of the total in the quarter, that was still significantly ahead of the 2.8 per cent in 2006.

"This is an important achievement for securing our future," Prichard said.

Besides the Star, Torstar also owns the Hamilton Spectator and other papers in southern Ontario, including the Metroland community newspaper chain around the Toronto area.

The company's Harlequin division, publisher of popular romance novels, continued to perform well, especially in the North American series market.

"For the year as a whole, we expect Harlequin will deliver stable earnings despite the rising strength of the Canadian dollar as business growth offsets the foreign exchange headwinds," Prichard said.

In all, book publishing revenue was $116 million in the second quarter, up $1.4 million, including $900,000 favourable impact of foreign exchange.

On the Toronto Stock Exchange Tuesday, Torstar shares were off 15 cents at $21.85.