Sharing advice from our site clinic

Webmaster Level: All

Members of the Google Search Quality Team have participated in site clinic panels on a number of occasions. We receive a lot of positive feedback from these events and we've been thinking of ways to expand our efforts to reach even more webmasters. We decided to organize a small, free of charge pilot site clinic at Google in Dublin, and opened the invitation to webmasters from the neighborhood. The response we received was overwhelming and exceeded our expectations.

Meet the Googlers who hosted the site clinic: Anu Ilomäki, Alfredo Pulvirenti, Adel Saoud, Fili Wiese, Kaspar Szymanski and Uli Lutz.

It was fantastic to see the large turnout and we would like to share the slides presented as well as the takeaways.

These are some questions we came across, along with the advice shared:

1. I have 3 blogs with the same content, is that a problem?
   
   If the content is identical, it's likely only one of the blogs will rank for it. Also, with this scattered of an effortwith this scattered of an effort chances are your incoming links will be distributed across the different blogs, instead of pointing to one source. Therefore you're running the risk of both users and search engines not knowing which of your blogs is the definitive source. You can mitigate that by redirecting to the preferred version or using the cross domain canonical to point to one source.


2. Should I believe SEO agencies that promise to make my site rank first in Google in a few months and with a precise number of links?
   
   No one can make that promise; therefore the short answer is no, you should not. However, we have some great tips on how to find a trustworthy SEO in our Help Center.


3. There are keywords that are relevant for my website, but they're inappropriate to be shown in the content e.g. because they could be misunderstood, slang or offensive. How can I show the relevance to Google?
   
   Depending on the topic of your site and expectations of the target group, you might consider actually using these keywords in a positive way, e.g. explaining their meaning and showing your users you're an authority on the subject. However if the words are plain abusive and completely inappropriate for your website, it's rather questionable whether the traffic resulting from these search queries is interesting for your website anyway.


4. Would you advise to use the rewrite URL function?
   
   Some users may like seeing descriptive URLs in the search results. However, it's quite hard to correctly create and maintain rewrites that change dynamic URLs to static-looking URLs. That's why, generally speaking, we don't recommend rewriting them. If you still want to give it a try, please be sure to remove unnecessary parameters while maintaining a dynamic-looking URL and have a close look at our blog post on this topic. And if you don't, keep in mind that we might still make your URLs look readable in our search results no matter how weird they actually are.


5. If I used the geo-targeting tool for Ireland, is Northern Ireland included?
   
   Google Webmaster Tools geo-targeting works on a country basis, which means that Northern Ireland would not be targeted if the setting was Republic of Ireland. One possible solution is to create a separate site or part of a website for Northern Ireland and to geo-target this site to the United Kingdom in Webmaster Tools.


6. Is there any preference between TLDs like .com and .info in ranking?
   
   No, there is none. Our focus is on the content of the site.


7. I have a website on a dot SO (.so) domain name with content meant for the Republic of Ireland. Will this hurt my rankings in the Irish search results?
   
   .so is the Internet country code top-level domain for Somalia. This is one factor we look into not pointing to the desired destination. But we do look at a larger number of factors when ranking your website. The extension of the domain name is just one of these. Your website can still rank in the Irish search results if you have topic-specific content. However, keep in mind that it may take our algorithms a little bit longer to fully understand where to best serve your website in our search results.

We would like to thank all participants for their time and effort. It was a pleasure to help you and we hope that it was beneficial for you, too. For any remaining questions, please don't hesitate to join the community on our GWHF.



Dj Matioka

Webinar: Implementing the +1 Button

Webmaster Level: All

A few weeks ago, we launched the +1 button for your site, allowing visitors to recommend your content on Google search directly from your site. As people see recommendations from their friends and contacts beneath your search results, you could see more, better qualified traffic from Google.

But how do you make sure this experience is user friendly? Where should you position the +1 button? How do you make sure the correct URL is getting +1’d?

On Tuesday, June 21 at 3pm ET, please join Timothy Jordan, Google Developer Advocate, to learn about how to best implement the +1 button on your site. He’ll be talking through the technical implementation details as well as best practices to ensure the button has maximum impact. During the webinar, we’ll review the topics below:

• Getting started
• Best practices
• Advanced options
• Measurement
• And, we’ll save time for Q&A

If you would like to attend, please register here. To download the code for your site, visit our +1 button tool on Google Webmaster Central.


 Dj Matioka

Recognizing Top Contributors in Google's Help Forums

The communities around Google products and services have been growing tremendously over the last couple of years. It is inspiring and motivating for us to see how many users like you contribute to Google Forums. For some time, we´ve been thinking of ways to thank our Top Contributors -- our most the passionate, helpful, friendly, and active users. These TCs have demonstrated incredible commitment to our communities and continue to share their profound knowledge by answering user questions within the forums.

TCs from all over the world will attend our first global summit in California.

We decided to give the online world a break for a moment and meet in real life to celebrate our past success and work on future endeavours. Google Forum Guides, Googlers that participate in the forums, and Top Contributors will convene for the first global Top Contributor Summit on September 13th and 14th in Santa Clara and Mountain View, California. During the Google-organized two-day event, Top Contributors will meet guides, engineers and product managers in order to get to know each other, provide feedback and share new ideas. We’ll be sharing some of the insights and takeaways after the event too, so stay tuned. And if you would like to follow the events online, look out for the #TCsummit tag on Twitter and our updates on Google+.

 Dj Matioka

Webmaster forums' Top Contributors rock

Webmaster level: All
The TC Summit was a blast! As we wrote in our announcement post, we recently invited more than 250 Top Contributors from all over the world to California to thank them for being so awesome and to give them the opportunity to meet some of our forum guides, engineers and product managers in person.
Our colleagues Adrianne and Brenna already published a recap post on the Official Google Blog. As for us, the search folks at Google, there's not much left to say except that we enjoyed the event and meeting Top Contributors in real life, many of them for the first time. We got the feeling you guys had a great time, too. Let’s quote a few of the folks who make a huge difference on a daily basis:
Sasch Mayer on Google+ (Webmaster TC in English):

"For a number of reasons this event does hold a special place for me, and always will. It's not because I was one of comparatively few people to be invited for a Jolly at the ‘Plex, but because this trip offered the world's TCs a unique opportunity to finally meet each other in person."

Herbert Sulzer, a.k.a. Luzie on Google+ (Webmaster TC in English, German and Spanish):

“Hehehe! Fun, fun fun, this was all fun :D Huhhh”

Aygul Zagidullina on Google+ (Web Search TC in English):

“It was a truly fantastic, amazing, and unforgettable experience meeting so many other TCs across product forums and having the chance to talk to and hear from so many Googlers across so many products!”

Of course we did receive lots of constructive feedback, too. Transparency and communication were on top of the list, and we're looking into increasing our outreach efforts via Webmaster Tools, so stay tuned! By the way, if you haven’t done so yet, please remember to use the forwarding option in the Webmaster Tools Message Center to get the messages straight to your email inbox. In the meantime please keep an eye on our Webmaster Central Blog, and of course keep on contributing to discussions in the Google Webmaster Forum.
On behalf of all Google guides who participated in the 2011 Summit we want to thank you. You guys rock! :)

That’s right, TCs & Google Guides came from all over the world to convene in California.

TCs & Google Guides from Webmaster Central and Search forums after one of the sessions.

After a day packed with presentations and breakout sessions...

...we did what we actually came for...

...enjoyed a party, celebrated and had a great time together.
 Dj Matioka

Answering the top questions from government webmasters

Webmaster level: Beginner - Intermediate

Government sites, from city to state to federal agencies, are extremely important to Google Search. For one thing, governments have a lot of content — and government websites are often the canonical source of information that’s important to citizens. Around 20 percent of Google searches are for local information, and local governments are experts in their communities.

That’s why I’ve spoken at the National Association of Government Webmasters (NAGW) national conference for the past few years. It’s always interesting speaking to webmasters about search, but the people running government websites have particular concerns and questions. Since some questions come up frequently I thought I’d share this FAQ for government websites.

Question 1: How do I fix an incorrect phone number or address in search results or Google Maps?

Although managing their agency’s site is plenty of work, government webmasters are often called upon to fix problems found elsewhere on the web too. By far the most common question I’ve taken is about fixing addresses and phone numbers in search results. In this case, government site owners really can do it themselves, by claiming their Google+ Local listing. Incorrect or missing phone numbers, addresses, and other information can be fixed by claiming the listing.

Most locations in Google Maps have a Google+ Local listing — businesses, offices, parks, landmarks, etc. I like to use the San Francisco Main Library as an example: it has contact info, detailed information like the hours they’re open, user reviews and fun extras like photos. When we think users are searching for libraries in San Francisco, we may display a map and a listing so they can find the library as quickly as possible.

If you work for a government agency and want to claim a listing, we recommend using a shared Google Account with an email address at your .gov domain if possible. Usually, ownership of the page is confirmed via a phone call or post card.

Question 2: I’ve claimed the listing for our office, but I have 43 different city parks to claim in Google Maps, and none of them have phones or mailboxes. How do I claim them?

Use the bulk uploader! If you have 10 or more listings / addresses to claim at the same time, you can upload a specially-formatted spreadsheet. Go to www.google.com/places/, click the "Get started now" button, and then look for the "bulk upload" link.

If you run into any issues, use the Verification Troubleshooter.

Question 3: We're moving from a .gov domain to a new .com domain. How should we move the site?

We have a Help Center article with more details, but the basic process involves the following steps:

• Make sure you have both the old and new domain verified in the same Webmaster Tools account.
• Use a 301 redirect on all pages to tell search engines your site has moved permanently.
• Don't do a single redirect from all pages to your new home page — this gives a bad user experience.
• If there's no 1:1 match between pages on your old site and your new site (recommended), try to redirect to a new page with similar content.
• If you can't do redirects, consider cross-domain canonical links.
• Make sure to check if the new location is crawlable by Googlebot using the Fetch as Google feature in Webmaster Tools.
• Use the Change of Address tool in Webmaster Tools to notify Google of your site's move.
• Have a look at the Links to Your Site in Webmaster Tools and inform the important sites that link to your content about your new location.
• We recommend not implementing other major changes at the same time, like large-scale content, URL structure, or navigational updates.
• To help Google pick up new URLs faster, use the Fetch as Google tool to ask Google to crawl your new site, and submit a Sitemap listing the URLs on your new site.
• To prevent confusion, it's best to retain control of your old site’s domain and keep redirects in place for as long as possible — at least 180 days.

What if you’re moving just part of the site? This question came up too — for example, a city might move its "Tourism and Visitor Info" section to its own domain.

In that case, many of the same steps apply: verify both sites in Webmaster Tools, use 301 redirects, clean up old links, etc. In this case you don't need to use the Change of Address form in Webmaster Tools since only part of your site is moving. If for some reason you’ll have some of the same content on both sites, you may want to include a cross-domain canonical link pointing to the preferred domain.

Question 4: We've done a ton of work to create unique titles and descriptions for pages. How do we get Google to pick them up?

First off, that's great! Better titles and descriptions help users decide to click through to get the information they need on your page. The government webmasters I’ve spoken with care a lot about the content and organization of their sites, and work hard to provide informative text for users.

Google's generation of page titles and descriptions (or "snippets") is completely automated and takes into account both the content of a page as well as references to it that appear on the web. Changes are picked up as we recrawl your site. But you can do two things to let us know about URLs that have changed:

• Submit an updated XML Sitemap so we know about all of the pages on your site.
• In Webmaster Tools, use the Fetch as Google feature on a URL you’ve updated. Then you can choose to submit it to the index.
• You can choose to submit all of the linked pages as well — if you’ve updated an entire section of your site, you might want to submit the main page or an index page for that section to let us know about a broad collection of URLs.

Question 5: How do I get into the YouTube government partner program?

For this question, I have bad news, good news, and then even better news. On the one hand, the government partner program has been discontinued. But don’t worry, because most of the features of the program are now available to your regular YouTube account. For example, you can now upload videos longer than 10 minutes.

Did I say I had even better news? YouTube has added a lot of functionality useful for governments in the past year:

• You can now broadcast live streaming video to YouTube via Hangouts On Air (requires a Google+ account).
• You can link your YouTube account with your Webmaster Tools account, making it the "official channel" for your site.
• Automatic captions continue to get better and better, supporting more languages.

I hope this FAQ has been helpful, but I’m sure I haven’t covered everything government webmasters want to know. I highly recommend our Webmaster Academy, where you can learn all about making your site search-engine friendly. If you have a specific question, please feel free to add a question in the comments or visit our really helpful Webmaster Central Forum.

Posted by Jason Morrison, Search Quality Team