jatiN mahindrA doT coM

Only 13% Say Google PageRank is “Very Important”

A week ago, we asked our audience to vote on how important Google PageRank is in the overall SEO picture. After a week of time, I wanted to share the 300 plus responses. What I am happy to say is that only 13% said that Google PageRank is very important. I believe two years ago, 40% would have said it is very important. In fact, 18% said PageRank is not important at all. Let me give you the pull...

Google Webmaster Tools Users Get Spanish Version

A thread at Google Webmaster Help reports a few users complaining that when they go to Google Webmaster Tools it shows them everything in Spanish. The first report came yesterday and it read: Yesterday everything was fine, but today when I go to www.google.com/webmasters everything is in Spanish, since I do not speak or read Spanish this is a problem. I’ve searched but can’t seem to find...

Does the Canonical Tag Work Well on Google?

Google introduced the Canonical tag a while back now. It basically is a 301 redirect, but without redirecting individual users. We know it has yet to be supported on Bing or Yahoo, but Google supports it and they even support cross domain canonical instructions. A WebmasterWorld thread has some SEOs discussing how effective it is. Some say it is really slow but ultimately works, some say it is very...

SEOs Continue To Dissect Eric Enge’s Interview of Google’s Matt Cutts

As most SEOs know, Eric Enge interviewed Matt Cutts, of Google. Eric is probably one of the best technical interviewers I know, so whenever he posts an interview, I try to read them carefully. When he posted an interview of Matt Cutts, I, as well as other SEOs, really read it carefully. The biggest tidbit that came out of the interview was that 301 redirects lose some PageRank when used. We discussed...

More Google Caffeine Speculation : Is It Almost Live?

Let me start off by saying this is speculation, Google has not (I repeat, NOT) confirmed this. A WebmasterWorld thread has renewed reports that Caffeine, Google’s new index, is going live really soon. Since yesterday, dozens of webmasters in the thread have been swearing that they see the new Caffeine results in Google.com. Yes, it is possible that they are hitting the single data center that...

Google Providing SEO Support For Muti-Regional Web Sites

JohnMu from Google posted a blog post named Working with multi-regional websites. The post goes over many of the SEO implications behind making multiple web sites all targeting different regions around the world. John discusses URL structures, hosting, domains, using Webmaster Tools and much more. If you ever had to deal with a multi-regional web site before, this post is something you should read....

301 Redirects Do Not Pass Full PageRank & Link Value

Eric Enge interviewed Matt Cutts of Google and uncovered a few interesting tidbits about Google, but the most significant piece of information was that 301 redirects do not fully pass the PageRank from the redirect. Let me quote you the interview from that piece: Eric Enge: Let’s say you move from one domain to another and you write yourself a nice little statement that basically instructs the search...

Keyword Data in Google Webmaster Tools Goes Blank For Some

Over the weekend there were several reports in the Google Webmaster Help forums that the data in the keywords reports within Google Webmaster Tools was empty. Here are some of those reports: Yesterday and for the last few months the Keywords section in google webmaster tools had keywords listed, now today it says “No Data Available”. The GWT shows no keywords… any idea why? Google...

How Important is Google PageRank in 2010?

Every year or so, the Google PageRank debate lives on. Some people say Google PageRank is the number one important attribute to have a page rank well in Google. Some say PageRank is worthless and should be completely ignored. Others take a middle ground. SEO’s opinion on the topic changes from year to year – even mine. A WebmasterWorld thread has renewed discussion on the topic. So...

Stealing Google Maps & Local Citations

Google Maps has been a extremely important area for SEOs and SEMs to focus on for their clients. Ranking in the Google results that have a maps result is often critical to these businesses and those map results come up more often in the web results at Google on a daily basis. So when you see bugs reported, especially ones that can end up in a competitor claiming your spot, you get worried. A Google...

Google Shuts Down “Site Performance” Tool While Upgrading It

An updated Google Webmaster Help thread has confirmed reports from Google’s “sreeram” that Google is updating the Site Performance reports in Google Webmaster Tools. During this update, Google has temporarily stopped updating the existing reports. The Googler said: We are making some changes to the algorithms and pipeline behind the site performance feature and so had stopped updating...

Have Google Index Your AJAX, Here Is How

In October 2009, Google proposed a way to index AJAX. Back then, all it was, was a proposal, but it was not implemented. However, last week, Vanessa Fox reported that the AJAX feature for Google is now live and well. I am not going to get into the technical details of how it works again. In fact, you can read about that over here and begin implementing it as soon as you like. We currently have...

Google Adds Sidewiki Control to Google Webmaster Tools

If you login to your verified web sites at Google Webmaster Tools and go to the “labs” section, you may notice a new feature to help you control your Sidewiki messages. Here is a picture: The feature basically let’s you control the message you show to users who use that Google Sidewiki within the Google Toolbar. In the past, webmasters had to use the Google Toolbar to add a site...

The Google 7 Day Index Delay?

There is a new Google theory going around, possibly a penalty or possibly a Google bug – no one is sure. There are a couple threads on the topic, one at HighRankings Forums and Google Webmaster Help. In short, webmasters are claiming that they will post content and it would take seven full days for Google to index the content and rank it in the search engine. I can’t seem to replicate...

.TV Domains Can’t Set Crawl Rate in Google Webmaster Tools

A Google Webmaster Help thread reports that there is an issue with some domains setting the crawl rate in Google Webmaster Tools. The report came in from an owner of a .TV domain. The person said: I have registered www.themediagroup.tv and themediagroup.tv with Webmaster tools and I want to change the crawl rate. But I keep getting an error ‘Setting is restricted to root level domains only’. JohnMu...