Once a month Contributing Authors Sharon and Roy Montero answer a Search Engine Optimization question submitted by one of our newsletter subscribers. This month's column answers the question,

How Do I Acquire High Rankings For My Replicated Website?

May 2004

Question:

I have a replicated Website, however I have access to the meta-tags, title, description and keywords.

How can I get higher rankings on the search engines? I have tried search engine optimization companies who take the money but don't produce the results, or get me high rankings for keywords few people search under.

Elizabeth Martin
http://PureCare.MyArbonne.com/

Answer:

Hi Elizabeth,

You raise an issue that is quite disturbing to us. The issue that a so-called search engine optimization company would take you on as a client and then not produce the results you asked for, is unacceptable.

Just a word of caution to you, Elizabeth, and others who are looking for an SEO (search engine optimization) company. It is wise to learn at least the basic principles of SEO before you go in search of a company to do the work for you. This way you will know what is possible and what is not possible. You will also know when they are going to use techniques that either won't work or that are against the search engine's guidelines. Ask your prospective SEO all the right questions BEFORE you sign on the dotted line or you may be sorry. This is ESSENTIAL for you to know before you hire any SEO firm.

As far as your replicated Website is concerned, we will inform you that in order to compete in the organic (free) listings, you will need to register your OWN domain name. FORGET about replicated Websites because they are not what the search engines want in their databases, as you will see from the Google guidelines listed below:

In your case, when you visit this page ...

http://PureCare.MyArbonne.com/

.... Arbonne will redirect you to another page, this one ...

http://www.purecare.myarbonne.com/arbonne/purecare.nsf

The method they use to redirect your page is not search engine compliant. In fact, Google refers to this technique as a "sneaky redirect" and it is therefore a violation.

A sneaky redirect is any method used to redirect page-A to page-B whereby the contents of page-A is indexed rather than the contents of page-B.

Therefore, the acceptable method for redirecting a page is with a permanent redirect (using a "301" code in HTTP headers).

In addition, the redirected page is a frameset page and while it uses the NOFRAMES element to write content that will be indexed, the ranking consideration is not worth as much as the content would be if it were outside of the NOFRAMES element. Then to make matters even worse, the content within the NOFRAMES element is duplicate content (it's the EXACT same content as the framed page), which is also a violation and not search engine compliant.

We would strongly advise you to host with another company so that you can design your page(s) anyway that YOU want to and more important, need to, in order to obtain high rankings. Some hosts are have quite reasonable fees that include HOSTING and DOMAIN REGISTRATION whereby you can then come up with your own domain name.

We know of a service that starts as low as $25.00 a year that includes domain registration and Web hosting.

Another reason to acquire your own domain name is so that once you have built up some Web pages and rank well in the search engines and have many links leading to these pages that you will be able to sell the site if you ever need to or want to. You won't be able to sell a replicated Website since you don't own it.

Now, in order to acquire high rankings on the search engines, once you have your own domain and have spent a good amount of time doing your in-depth keyword research, simply design your Web page for just one primary keyword phrase and place this phrase in all the right places.

Next, make sure that your navigation menu links to around a dozen or so of your most important pages. Include a site map page(s) that is linked to from each of your pages. Design and create lots of pages for your new domain, because the 3 pages that you get with your replicated Website is not going to help you acquire high rankings as much as a large Website will. Then keep your content current and frequently update your homepage and other important pages.

Then of course, just acquire lots of backward links to your most important pages, those that you want high rankings for.

If you study the top ranked pages for the most competitive terms you notice that they all have a few things in common.

1. Lots of backward links from both hubs and authorities sites within their own neighborhood.
2. Lots of intra-domain pages that are rich with unique content with an average of around 600 or so words.
3. A proper and well defined link architecture.
4. Current and frequently updated content.
5. If you decide to continue with your replicated Website then realize that you'll do so at your own risk.

Just an FYI ... We see that your current ranking on Google for your primary keyword phrase (natural skincare) is #31 http://www.google.com/search?q=natural+skincare&start=30  and that the term is searched for 53 times per day Web-wide.

For your information, the term ...

natural skin care

.... Is currently searched for 242 times per day Web-wide.

Lastly we'd like to address the concerns that we have with Arbonne's services page ...

http://www.myarbonne.com/services.htm

.... As their claims here are misleading, so we'll point them out and set the record straight.

They say ...