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  Daily Search Forum Recap: November 4, 2010

  Posted: November 4th, 2010, 10:00pm CET by rustybrick

  Tags:  Search Forum Recap  

  Here is a recap of what happened in the search forums today, through the eyes of the Search Engine Roundtable and other search forums on the web.

  
  

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  Will You Use Google's mod_pagespeed?

  Posted: November 4th, 2010, 2:40pm CET by rustybrick

  Tags:  Google Optimization  

  A couple days ago, Google announced on several blogs that they released a new module for the Apache HTTP Server called mod_pagespeed.

  It should do what the name says, speed up your pages. Google said:

  We're starting with more than 15 on-the-fly optimizations that address various aspects of web performance, including optimizing caching, minimizing client-server round trips and minimizing payload size. We've seen mod_pagespeed reduce page load times by up to 50% (an average across a rough sample of sites we tried) -- in other words, essentially speeding up websites by about 2x, and sometimes even faster.

  My team tested it but we have not yet activated it or made a decision if we will.

  We all know how obsessed Google is with speed and how it may play a small part in the Google ranking algorithm. But at the same time, there are some concerns.

  A WebmasterWorldthread has some of those concerns:

  Great stuff provided it does what it promises, my only concern is about installing any thing coming from big bro on my servers. We'd better check sources before installing.

  Also, the mod does a fair amount of page code 'rewriting', something once considered absolutely not okay when browser-based because of the high likelihood it messed up your original code -- alignments changed, ditto font and image sizes, etc.

  On the flip side:

  I see no reason that this would send anything back to Google. Google have never lied about what Chrome does - and you can turn it off.

  So, will you use it? Take my poll:

  Will You Use Google's mod_pagespeed?Market Research

  Forum discussion at WebmasterWorld.

  
  

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  November 2010 Google Webmaster Report

  Posted: November 4th, 2010, 2:21pm CET by rustybrick

  Tags:  Google PageRankSERP Updates  

  As we do every month, we summarize an ongoing WebmasterWorld thread specifically designed to track Google changes. We also provide links to the most interesting Google SEO related topics we covered in the past month. You can find last month's report over here.

  Here are some of the points from the WebmasterWorld thread:

  • Significant ranking changes
  • Google's holiday shopping algorithm
  • Ranking changes from day to day

  Tedster mentioned the "holiday shopping" algorithm, implying Google knows people are now in buy mode for the holiday season and maybe Google's algorithm is a bit more product/shopping sensitive these days?

  Anyway, here is a break down of the topics we covered in the past month.

  Google Algo/Ranking Related:

  • Google Update or Bug: More Complaints Over Google's Search Results
  • Google Ranking Update or May Day Impacting More Sites?
  • Google PageRank Updating This Morning? October 2010
  • Google Fixes Blogspot Indexing Issue: New Content Being Indexed
  • More Google May Day Theories, Five Months Later
  • Google: Different Algorithms Can Apply To Different Sites At Different Times

  Google User Interface Related:

  • Google Pleases Local Optimizers & Upsets AdWords Optimizers With Place Search
  • Google Showing Related Brands, Stores & Types In Results
  • Google's Realtime Counter & Shared By In Web Search Results
  • Google Magnifying Glass Page Previews, A Real Google Test

  Google Webmaster Tools Related:

  • Google Improves Parameter Handling For Faceted Navigation Control
  • Google Adds Rich Snippets Support For E-Commerce Sites
  • Google Webmaster Tools Says "You Have More Sites" To Add
  • Google Updates Link Reports Before Bing
  • Google Webmaster Tools Adds Change Percentages To Query Report

  Forum discussion at WebmasterWorld.

  
  

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  Link Building Tip: Discover Broken Links & Request Those Links

  Posted: November 4th, 2010, 2:07pm CET by rustybrick

  Tags:  Link Building  

  A WebmasterWorld thread has a short discussion around a basic but solid link building tip. Basically the strategy is to find third-party web sites that link out to sites, but those links are simply linking to pages that no longer exist. Then politely email the site owner informing them of the broken link and suggest that you know of a resource that can replace the broken link.

  The tip here is credited to Martinibuster, posted by wheel. I should note, Martinibuster has given this tip for almost as long as I have known him. But let me quote Wheel's interpretation of it:

  Here's what I'm doing over the next month.

  1) I'm going looking in the really old 2000 era directories specific to my niche.
  2) I'm going to run Xenu link sleuth on the directories to find broken links (again, these will be links to sites in my niche). i.e. I'll build a list of defunct sites in my niche.
  3) I'm going to find sites that link TOO those defunct sites, i.e. busted links on other sites.
  4) I'm going link begging. Basically saying "hey, you got a busted link. And while you're fixing your web page, howzabout hookin' me up?'.

  Worth a shot and you are doing the web a favor. :)

  Forum discussion at WebmasterWorld.

  
  

• 

  Why Google Maps Transit Routes May Not Be Correct

  Posted: November 4th, 2010, 2:00pm CET by rustybrick

  Tags:  Other Google Topics  

  A Google Maps Help has one Seattle mass transit commuter asking why the transit directions are not a 100% correct. In short, the routes Google plots for some transit directions do not follow the actual routes used by that transit agency. Instead, Google will plot a straight line, and not go along the streets.

  You can see an example of this by clicking here - notice the route is basically a straight line across the map. Of course, this may change if you read this article months later, but for now, this is how it works.

  Google's Dave explained why this may happen. Dave said:

  Currently, we rely on the transit agency to provide us with information on the route. Although transit agencies can provide us with the exact shape of their routes, not all agencies do so. So we interpolate between stops, which we think is better than showing nothing.

  That makes sense but obviously it might not be too clear to those using the transit directions. So Dave added, "I'll look into whether we can do something to provide a better experience on our end."

  Forum discussion at Google Maps Help.