WebProNews

MSN Loses (Badly) In 301 Indexing Race

Moving a website can be intimidating, especially if it's a bigger site. There will almost certainly be a loss of traffic, and much of that is due to the time it takes the search engines to recognize the new site. There are ways to dull the pain, but don't count on Microsoft for it. 

SMX: Experts Discuss Duplicate Content

The second session from the Search Marketing Expo in Seattle was focused on the issue of duplicate content.

AOL Needs To Shine Its Shoes

This article will be part tutorial, part sweating the small stuff. The tutorial is much, much shorter and more basic than the rest, so we'll get to it first. AOL needs to hear it.

Fixing Duplicate Content Issues

Not all webmasters are aware that search engines view each URL as a different page, even it has the same content or is different from the other URL by ending with a slash or if it preceeded by a www or not. To serve only one version of the page to get the deserved traffic, you’ll need to remember a couple of things about fixing URL issues.

Topix Worries About Domain Change

After paying $1 million to purchase the rights to the Topix.com domain, Topix.net CEO Rich Skrenta now has to deal with a couple of daily realities in the search world: changing domains could cause a dropoff in search engine-driven traffic, and Google isn't exactly Nordstrom or L.L. Bean when it comes to customer service.

Domain Names & Defensible Traffic

Andy Hagans recently posted about his linkbait marathon strategy to rank his sites at the top of the search results. Brian Provost posted about his love for domaining. Domain names may play a big roll not only in anchor text, but also in overall domain credibility, linkability, and defensibility.

301 Redirects Resolve in 2 Weeks in Google

A thread over in the Google Webmaster Groups talks about the Google Sandbox, and about 301 redirects. In this thread, Adam Lasnik jumps in and sets some expectations on the handling of 301 redirects, and also does some myth breaking. Here is what Adam has to say:

301 Redirects Pass Google PageRank In 2 Weeks

Search Engine Roundtable reports that 301 Redirects Pass Google PageRank & Signals in a "Couple Weeks". SEOs and Webmasters have always queried about the time taken for a site to pass along a PageRank value from one URL to another via a 301 redirect.

PubCon: The Duplicate Content Zone

A PubCon session entered a place beyond indexing and search traffic: The Duplicate Content Zone, where websites sometimes go and are never seen again. WebProNews tagged along as the session hosts played the Rod Serling role for the audience.

How to *Properly* Create a 301 Redirect in .htaccess

Last weekend, when I moved my blog to this new domain, after moving the files from their old location at http://www.infohatter.com/blog/ to their present location, I needed to set up a redirect to ensure that traffic following links pointing to the old location would still end up at the right posts.