Tag Archives: breadcrumbs

Increase Traffic & Sales by Using Sitemaps, Breadcrumbs and Keyword Clouds



BWMagic’s Internet Marketing News


Increase Traffic & Sales by Using Sitemaps, Breadcrumbs and Keyword Clouds


This week I thought I would give you some basic site design tips
which will make your site more visible to your visitors and the
search engines. Over the years, using these design features have
produced more traffic and sales for me. These may also prove useful
to your site or sites.





Google Sitemaps





Some years back, there was a lot of fuss made about placing a Google Sitemaps
on your site. Such a sitemap would let the search engines quickly find your
content and index it. It was also a way for you as a webmaster to let the
search engines know which content you wanted to be featured most from your site.
This was an XML file which updated automatically on your server as you
added new content.

If you want to know more about Google Sitemaps – try this article I wrote
which also have links to some good sitemaps generators.


http://www.bizwaremagic.com/Google_Sitemaps_Explained.htm




General HTML Sitemap




You don’t hear as much about sitemaps these days but just common sense
says you should have a sitemap – listing all your web pages and major
content – featured on all the pages of your site.

This will make navigation of your site much easier for your site’s
visitors. Personally I can’t count the number of times I have used a sitemap
to find what I am looking for on a site. Next to an onsite search box,
a sitemap is a very important element of good site design.

Most of my sites are very simple HTML sites with very simple and easy site
navigation. I try to place a link back to my homepage on every page on my site,
never leave your visitors stranded. Another practice that I have always done,
is to place a sitemap link on every page.

For SEO reasons most experts suggest you keep all links on your site no more than
three clicks away from your homepage. I usually design my index page with my main
keywords listed and then break these keywords up into sub-topics.

Usually, this follows a simple pattern – these keywords are usually made up of one
or two words, then the sub-topics are usually longer three or four keyword phrases.

For example, you could have a site or domain entitled “CheapVacationsDeals” and
on your index (main homepage) you could have links entitled “honeymoon vacations”
“disney vacations”… then these would have further sub-topics or links going
to “niagara falls honeymoon vacations”, “orlando disney vacations” and so on.

If you’re running an affiliate site it is extremely important to create
content/web pages based upon the keyword phrases surfers are using in the
search engines to find what they’re looking for on the web. Obviously this
will increase your traffic and sales.




Breadcrumbs





On this subject there is another related topic which should be discussed
and that is the use of breadcrumbs in your site design. This is a simple
way of letting your visitors know what topics and sub-topics they’re
using on your site and how they can get back to the home page.

For like in the Hansel and Gretel story, using breadcrumbs is one method
to find your way home. Here it’s using a linking structure on your site
to help your visitors find what they’re looking for.

Searching different levels of any site can be confusing for your visitors
so providing some direction can be helpful.

home > computers > laptops > gaming laptops

If you want to know more about breadcrumbs and how to use them, here are
a couple of good links:

/www.devlounge.net/code/css-breadcrumbs-in-5-minutes




Keyword Cloud





And if you’re running a blog related to your site, a common practice is to include
a “keyword cloud” which tells your visitors which keywords are most prominent on
your blog. This is a visual presentation of the keywords on your site and is also
know as a “tag cloud”.

Here’s a nice page which will show you how to use/put a “keyword cloud” on
your WordPress Blog.

www.staygolinks.com/easy-wordpress-tag-cloud-page.htm

Hope this email has you thinking about sitemaps, breadcrumbs and
keyword clouds… all ways to make your site more useful and easier
to use. It will also help those all-important search engines to
find and index your content faster.




Helping You Succeed Online Since 2002!

Kind Regards,
Titus

http://www.bizwaremagic.com

Did you find the above information helpful? If so, why not
help spread the word – recommend this content by using
the social bookmark sites below. The SEO Gods will Thank You!

Spiders, Breadcrumbs & Google – Why All Three Are Important To Your Site

BWMagic’s Internet Marketing News

Spiders, Breadcrumbs & Google – Why All Three Are Important To Your Site’s Success

Spider

Do you see what I see!

It could just be me, but one of the least talked about aspects of Internet
marketing has to do with the pesky little spider. Actually these are the
countless spiders/robots that spider the web continuously and report back
all content and links to the search engines.

It is surprising that this lowly spider is not better known or understood
by webmasters since they play a major role in the success of your website
– at least where the search engines are concerned. How these spiders see
your site and what they report back is crucial to getting your pages and
content listed in the search engines.

What you see is not what you get.

One common mistake many webmasters make (especially those just beginning)
is that they take if for granted all the information and content on your site
can be seen by the spiders/search engines. You can have a spectacular looking
site with all the bells and whistles – full of images, java scripts, flash
banners, widgets… a visitor to your site will come away amazed at the content
and information.

But a spider comes along and spiders the same spectacular page and finds
nothing – no content whatsoever – nothing. That spider then reports this
back to the search engine and your page or content is not indexed since
nothing of importance was found.

This can mean disaster, even for the most spectacularly designed pages.
No content, no listing.

Of course, the whole issue or problem is a simple fact that spiders can’t
read images, banners, java scripts, widgets… and so on. What they see
when they visit your webpage MAY be entirely different from what you or
your visitors see. If they can’t see or read your content it doesn’t exist
for the search engines.

For this reason, it is always a good practice to run your pages through
software programs that tell you exactly what the spider sees. Get your
pages read or displayed through the eyes of these spiders.

http://www.seomastering.com/search-engine-spider-imitator.php

Just type in your page URL and you will see what the spider sees. If any
of your main information or keyword phrases are missing – make sure you
place them as “text” on your page, not text in an image or banner.

One common mistake, which I see all the time, a site has it’s main keyword
phrase in the domain name but then creates an eye-catching logo with the
site’s name displaying the keyword phrase – but the spider cannot read this
logo and that much-needed keyword SEO is lost. Especially if this logo is
displayed on every page of your site, which in most cases, it will be.

It is much better to have this domain name/keyword displayed as text on all
your pages. In this manner, the search engines know exactly what your pages
are about; having it read as “site logo” just doesn’t cut it.

However, many webmasters are smart enough to put your keyword phrase in
the “alt” tags connected with this logo or image – which the spider and
the search engines can read. For SEO reason it is good to place your targeted
keyword in the “alt” tag, but like everything, don’t overdo it or you will
be accused of keyword spamming.

Another whole issue is the matter of site/link hierarchy. Explained simply,
your domain index is level one, links flowing off this main homepage are
usually considered level two, links flowing off these level two pages are
considered level 3 and so on… most web experts suggest you keep all your
content within these three levels. Why? Mainly because it is easier for the
spider to index them. If you go down too deep, some spiders may not spider/index
your deeply linked pages.

Another reason, you want your site and pages to be easily accessed by your
visitor. A simple page structure or layout is best suited for this purpose.
Make sure all your content can be easily found, especially by spiders.

So in conclusion, make sure spiders can read all your content, use the link above
and check your pages. If you are unpleasantly surprised or disappointed by
what these spiders are seeing, then simply fix the problem by making your
important content placed in “text” on your pages. Keep feeding those spiders,
and they won’t come back and bite you in the… well, you get the picture.

……………………………………………………………….

Get Your Breadcrumbs in Google for More Links in Results

This is the title of a really good informative piece on Google and Breadcrumbs
in WebProNews by Chris Crum, no pun intended. Basically, breadcrumbs are same
as the linking structure or levels we talked about above – “the hierarchical display
commonly used in site navigation. For example: Home Page>Product Page>Product A Page.”

Google is starting to list these breadcrumbs/links in its results which means
more of your site’s links will be displayed on that first page. Instead of one
link, you can have three or more links on that first page in Google. If you’re
into search engine marketing like I am, you will know this is a major, major deal.
Getting more links in Google for your site simply means more targeted traffic
and more targeted traffic means more sales and opt-ins.





According to Matt Cutts it’s very early days for “Breadcrumbs” but it is
something you should consider when designing your site as Google will probably
be using some form of them in the future.

Click this link if you want to find out more about this topic:
http://www.webpronews.com/topnews/2010/01/20/how-do-you-get-breadcrumbs-in-google-results

………………………………….

The Only 3 Steps You Need To Make Tons Of Sales Online In 2010

This is a free PDF article by Marlon Sanders who is one
of my favorite Internet Marketers. Mainly because he produces
“no non-sense” “point & click” marketing products which
are easy to use and apply. He cuts out all the “bull” and
gives you what you need to market online.

I have always recommended Sanders and his products to
anyone who’s interested in finding out “how” all this
online marketing works. Heck, he was marketing on the web
before there even was a “web” as we know it today.

Helping You Succeed Online Since 2002!
Titus

https://www.bizwaremagic.com