SEO FAQs

Table of Contents

1. How long does it take to rank in Google?
2. Domain Best Practices
   1. How to Choose a Domain Name
   2. Subdomain vs. Subdirectory?
   3. Should my client change their domain name?
   4. Moving Domains
   5. Redirecting / migrating multiple live sites under a single, pre-existing domain
   6. Sending a site live on a secondary domain to “test out” a FareHarbor site
   7. Multiple Domains
3. Duplicate Content
4. Title Tags, H1s, & Meta Descriptions
5. How does the SEO Team make sure that a clients rankings, organic traffic, and revenue does not drop when they switch to a new site?

How long does it take to rank in Google’s Index

See this article for more information.

Takeaways: The average top 10 ranking page is 2+ years old, and only 5.7% of all newly published pages will get to Google Top 10 within a year.

Domain Best Practices

How to Choose a Domain Name

This article has some good information, as well as the points below.

1. Make it location specific

• Having the location of your business in the domain name can help with SEO
• Although exact match domains are valued less than they used to be, it is still helpful for users to be able to see the location of your business
• It may give you a boost in the keywords that you rank for as well

2. Make it brandable

• Brandable, meaning that when you hear or see the domain name, it sounds like a brand. Which means that hyphens and numbers are a real problem because they don’t sound like a brand. They sound generic, or strange.
• For example, if we wanted to create a pasta website that has pasta recipes and sells some pasta related e-commerce products on it,
  • Pasta-shop.com would be hard to brand, say, or remember.
  • PastaAficionado.com sounds brandable, is unique, but quite challenging to say.
  • PastaLabs.com would be amazing because it has a scientific connotation to it, is very brandable, unique, memorable, and stands out.

3. Make it pronounceable

• A cognitive bias that human beings have where we remember (and have more positive associations with) things that we can easily say and think about. That includes pronounceability in our own minds.This is going to vary on the language and region that you’re targeting.If you can’t easily say the name, you’re going to lose processing fluency, memorability, and the benefits of brandability that you’ve created.

4. Make it short

• Length matters because of the processing fluency that we talk about above.
• The fewer characters a domain name has, the easier it is to type, say, share, and the less it gets shortened on social media sharing platforms and search results.

5. Bias towards .com

• I know, why are we still talking about .com? The internet’s been around 20-plus years. Why does .com matter so much when there are so many TLD extension options? The answer is, .com is the most recognized and most accessible TLD.
• Cognitive fluency dictates that we should go with something easy, that people have an association with, and .com is still the primary TLD. If you want to build up a very brandable domain that can do well, you want a .com. Probably, eventually, if you are very successful, you’re going to have to try and go capture it anyway, and so I would bias you to get it if you can.
• If it’s unavailable, my suggestion would be to go with the .net, .co, or a known ccTLD. Those are your best bets. A known ccTLD might be something like .ca in Canada or .it in Italy.

6. Make it intuitive

• A good domain name gives people a strong idea of what a website will be about. Being able to look at a domain name and say, “Oh, they probably do this. This is probably what that company is up to” is a big win.
• PastaPerfected.com, for example, is pretty obvious, intuitively about pasta, and anyone could figure that out.

7. Use broad keywords

• Keywords in a domain name can help with the cognitive fluency biases, but also from an SEO perspective. Google has been biasing away from these exact match and partial match domains, but the anchor text you get from people linking to your domain can help.
• If you can get a keyword mention in your domain name that helps make it obvious what you’re website is about, go for it. But if you’re trying to secure a keyword rich or a keyword targeted domain, I would stay away from those in 2017. They don’t carry the weight that they used to and have negative associations (with users and search engines) that you should avoid.
• For example, I would not purchase a domain name like; RecipesForPasta.com or BuyPastaOnline.com. I would instead, go for something very broad like Gusto.com.
• Think about Amazon.com or Google.com, which clearly has no association with what it is. These are very well-branded but don’t have keyword richness to them.
• It’s more of a creative association, just like “gusto” means “taste” in Italian. So I might be tempted to go in that direction instead.

8. It’s okay to append or modify it

• If your domain name is not available, it’s okay to go out and add a suffix or a prefix. It is okay to use an alternate TLD extension, like we talked about previously, and it’s okay to be a little bit creative with your online brand.
• For example, let’s say my brand name is Pastaterra. Maybe I’ve already got a shop somewhere maybe in the Seattle area and I have been selling pasta at my shop and now I’m going online with it. Well, it is okay for me to do something like ThePastaterra.com, or PastaterraShop.com, or even Pastaterra.net.

Subdomain vs. Subdirectory?

Favor subfolders/subdirectories(domain.com/a/) over subdomains (blog.domain.com)

• Search engines keep different metrics for domains than they do for subdomains, so even though Google itself has stated that — from a ranking perspective — content in subdomains and subdirectories is treated roughly equally, it’s still recommended that webmasters place link-worthy content like blogs in subfolders rather than subdomains (i.e. www.example.com/blog/ rather than blog.example.com). In tests, however, it is often found that subdomains are essentially a seperate site.
• The notable exceptions to this are language-specific websites. (i.e., en.example.com for the English version of the website).
• More info here, here, and here.

Should my client change their domain name?

• Use Moz’s Link Explorer to check the domain authority on ALL pages that have traffic (homepage, activity pages, blogs, etc). If domain authority is less than 10, it might not hurt SEO rankings to change to a new domain if the old domain is redirected the new domain at a page level, especially if the new domain is more descriptive of the overall business or includes location keywords. Make sure that the old site is redirected to the new site. If they have a domain authority greater than 10, it will take them more time to build authority on a new domain and rank on Google than it will for them to build upon the SEO framework they already have.

  • Ex. Good change: Toursbybobby.com to funseattletours.com
  • Ex. Bad change: Toursbybobby.com to bobbysfuntours.com

• If they have two domains, and the second domain has more domain authority and traffic, change the domain to the one with higher traffic and set up redirects from the old site.

Moving Domains

If a client wants to move a domain, you should try and persuade them not to by all means. Switching domains will NOT be better for SEO, it will be worse. If they switch domains, they will have to wait months to build up domain authority to rank on Google. See How long does it take to rank in Google?

If a client absolutely must transfer a domain, these steps must be followed:

1. Pre-launch audit

• Auditing a new site before it launches may sound like an obvious thing to do but you’d be surprised how often this task gets rushed or ignored. Auditing everything you can pre-launch, including website copy, meta content, canonical tags, internal links, menus, mobile usability, meta robots attributes, structured data & markup code, images, page load speeds, and so on, will save a lot of work at the other end, plus minimize any short-term SEO volatility.

2. Redirect mapping

• A lack of proper redirect mapping is where most migrations come unstuck, for example; redirecting all pages to a single page, using the wrong type of redirects (e.g. 302s instead of 301s), or worst of all, neglecting redirects entirely
• During the redirect mapping process, it is equally important to consider any legacy redirects that are in place. Ideally, you’ll want to update any old redirects to point directly to the new site pages (A -> C), rather than having unnecessary redirect chains across the site (A -> B -> C). Not only do redirect chains increase page load speeds, but they also reduce the value of any external links pointing to the original pages.
• Finally, for big projects, you’re probably going to have to prioritize – while in an ideal world every page would be redirected to its most relevant equivalent, realistically that process can take days or even weeks to initiate. Priority pages are pages that drive traffic, have external links, maintain good SERP visibility and so on.

3. Updating all internal links

• While redirects will help ensure users aren’t presented with 404 pages as they navigate around the new site, updating internal links at the source is a much cleaner, more SEO-friendly solution. It also ensures users end up in the right place, as opposed to being redirected to a generic top-level page or homepage. This takes longer to implement in the short-term but will be worth it later down the line

4. Google Analytics & Search Console

• From the moment you launch your new website you’re going to want to start collecting data so it’s important to make sure everything is set up correctly regarding Google Analytics. Aside from ensuring all new pages have the right tracking code on them (don’t take this for granted), you’ll also want to update any Goals and Events to reflect the new URLs.
• Similarly, you should set up a new Google Search Console account and use it to monitor performance, tell Google about the change of address using the Change of Address tool, and submit and test new sitemaps (on that note, create new sitemaps!) It’s also worth noting that as soon as the new Search Console account starts collecting data, the old account will stop. If you wish to hang on to the previous 16 months worth of data, now’s the time to hit the export button.

5. Post-launch audit

• Following a migration it’s critical to audit the website to ensure everything is working as it should be, not least redirects. If there’s a big spike in 404 errors, for example, it might be that not all of the redirects were implemented properly. Drops in traffic, major fluctuations in keyword visibility, and an increase in Error reports in Google Search Console can also be indications that something hasn’t gone to plan.

More about site migrations

Read more here and here.

Redirecting / migrating multiple live sites under a single, pre-existing domain

Pros

1. Technical Migration and Site Integrity – We will do all the legwork to ensure a smooth migration, maintaining site appearance and function. Having our team handle redirects, sitemap updates, and link integrity will help prevent any technical issues

2. Customized Menus for Each Business – Individual businesses can retain their own distinct menu sections within the new website, allowing for personalized navigation that suits their unique needs while remaining part of a unified site

3. SEO Strength and Future Growth – A single domain offers stronger SEO potential compared to maintaining multiple sites in the long-term. This consolidated approach sets the foundation for future growth, enhancing visibility and scalability

4. Building Brand Recognition – A singular domain helps create a unified, stronger brand presence. Great for expansion opportunities

5. Improved Domain Authority – Redirecting multiple websites to a single domain consolidates all the backlinks and authority, which can lead to stronger overall domain authority and potentially higher search engine rankings in the long term

6. Simplified Website Management – With one domain, you streamline website management, including technical SEO, content updates, which simplifies maintenance

7. Enhanced User Experience – Users can access all the content from one domain, which reduces confusion and enhances brand consistency. This can lead to longer site visits, lower bounce rates, and improved engagement

8. Avoiding Keyword Cannibalization – Merging will help each location compete less with one another for the same keywords, improving their ability to rank higher.

Cons

1. Temporary Ranking Drops – As with any domain migration, there’s the potential for temporary ranking drops, even with proper redirects and a domain change submitted to Google. Authority could take 3-6 months to rebuild, so timing the migration away from peak season is crucial. If the individual websites rank well for specific keywords, redirecting them could result in temporary ranking drops

2. Loss of Individualized Site Features – Site-wide design settings, such as the menu bar, can’t be fully individualized for each business, meaning there will be limitations in custom design for different sections of the site

3. Local SEO – Potential loss of first page SEO rankings since it will be a broader focus on their business. We would need to ensure that the 2nd pages (Location/Category Pages) target Keywords & City audience as to not lose relevance.

4. Brand Identity Challenges – If each website had its own strong brand identity, merging them could confuse users. Would need to carefully plan how to maintain brand equity within the new structure.

5. DNS Management for Emails – If they want to keep using individual domain emails – client will need to manage their own DNS

6. Lengthy Redesign Process – The process of consolidating multiple websites into a single domain is time-intensive, and the larger and more complex the site, the longer the redesign and migration process will take

7. Loss of Historical Google Analytics Data – Migrating to a single domain means losing historical Google Analytics data for the individual sites

Sending a site live on a secondary domain to “test out” a FareHarbor site

• We have sent clients site’s live on secondary sites but it is highly recommended to persuade the client not to. Basically we start from a domain that has a domain authority of nothing so it actually ranking would take several years. It’s basically an exact duplicate of their other site and its extreme duplicate content which Google will penalize. It’ll never prove to them that their main site will do well because a secondary domain will never rank or drive traffic.

Multiple Domains

Do not use more than one domain for a website. Using more than one domain for the same site or company confuses search engines and essentially spreads out your domain authority – an important ranking factor that communicates important information to Google about who you are, what you do, and how authoritative you are. The result of using multiple domains is that you will not be as effective on Google, Bing, and other search engines. It can be very confusing for your customers as well. Domain names should be unique, to the point, favoring .com, and not changed or manipulated over time.

Reasons to use multiple domains:

• If the client is offering two different services (cooking classes vs. snorkeling tours).
• If the clients wants a country targeted domain.it email address and a domain.com email address. However, it is better to just pick the primary language that the sites users are coming from, and stick with that top level domain.
  • Example, all users are coming from italy. Use the domain.it domain and nest all other languages in subfolders
    • domain.com/it/en/ for english speakers
    • domain.com/it/es/ for spanish speakers instead of creating domain.es and having to maintain several different websites
• More on international SEO Targeting
• More info
• Sending sites live on new domain names

Duplicate Content

My client from mauertour.de is not sure how to handle their blog because the content is from their main page berlinonbike.de. They don’t have the capacity to write completely separate content and don’t want to hurt the SEO of their main page by posting the same blog posts on their new FHS. I found this article (https://moz.com/learn/seo/duplicate-content) were they mention 301 redirect as an option, but I wonder if this would be bad for the SEO of the new FHS. We also thought about posting the blog posts in German on the main site and in English on the FHS but not sure if that’s beneficial and if one would need a Hreflang tag then. Any advice?

They should use a cross domain canonical to the original website which can be done through the backend of each blog post. Just add the URL to the original post on the new website in the canonical field.

Title Tags, H1s, and Meta Descriptions

For homepage hero units using slider rows, does the h1 on each slider need to be the company name? If only one slider has the company name as the h1, will it affect SEO negatively?

There should only be one H1 on the slider, the rest should be H2.

See the below help pages for information on:

• Title Tags
• Meta Descriptions
• Headings
• Alt Text

How important are we considering H2s now, especially for location keywords?

H2s are the second most important part behind the h1 so unless it’s unnatural put it in the h1 (except homepage should be the name of the company), second best bet is h2

How does the SEO Team make sure that a clients rankings, organic traffic, and revenue does not drop when they switch to a new site?

• We create all the pages that rank and receive traffic from search engines.
• If the URLs change in the process we make sure to set proper redirects.
• We optimize each page for what they are currently ranking for and make suggestions to add more targeted keywords.
• Copy team looks over content for keyword optimization purposes.
• We optimize titles, headings, meta descriptions so they are targeting the correct keywords.
• If they rank really well we can leave all titles, headings, meta descriptions, content pretty much all the same so there will be little to no fluctuations in rankings.