Let The Search Guru show you how to use the canonical element to fix duplicate content and search engine index issues.

Here at The Search Guru blog we’ve posted previous entries discussing canonical issues and how they can cause duplicate content in the search engine index. To refresh your memory, canonicalization is the process of the search engines having to choose the best URL to index when there are several choices. To a search engine, http://www.mysite.com and http://mysite.com look like two different sites that have exactly the same content, which can trigger the Google duplicate content filter.

One way to address this is by implementing a 301 redirect from the non-preferred to the preferred version of a URL. We show you how to do this on a Unix/Apache server and a Windows server.

Use the canonical element as well to fix Google duplicate content.

The canonical element was introduced by Google about a year ago, but you may not yet realize its power. The canonical element (also referred to as the canonical tag, although it is technically not a tag) shows Google which version of a URL to include in the search engine index.

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Spring is coming – so it’s time to freshen up your website by once again choosing keywords for your site and updating your web page content.

When was the last time that you conducted keyword research on your site? If the answer is a year – or more – then it’s definitely time to repeat the process. First, rerun all the keyphrases that you’ve been using. (The Search Guru provides links to terrific free keyword research tool options.)

What changes do you notice in your keyword research results? Why do you think those changes are occurring? What do they mean to your business?

For example, perhaps you’ve been featuring the luxury version of your product, because keyword research had previously indicated that there was significant interest in that product line. Perhaps, in today’s more uncertain economy, fewer people are searching for the luxury version of your product – but there is much stronger search traffic now on another product line of yours. How will this change your business – and search – strategies?

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Here’s The Search Guru ebook review of The Web Content Recipe Book: 21 irresistible content ideas to wow visitors and boost your search engine optimization.

This ebook is written by multiple authors associated with Wordtracker, the professional keyword research tool; a copy of this ebook was given to us for review purposes.

The sub-title of the ebook does a great job of sharing both its scope and purpose, which is to present readers with numerous ways of writing web page content to help your company:

• engage customers
• increase online traffic
• build your business

That’s pretty straightforward – and useful stuff for anyone engaged in e-commerce today.

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Curious to know which sites are linking to your competitors or which are the most important link directories? The Search Guru has answers.

Follow these link building strategies to get some link love to your site!

Valentine’s Day is an annual reminder that we all need love. Our websites need love, too – link love, that is. But what link building techniques should you use to get that love?

First and foremost, for an effective link building campaign your site should contain fresh and interesting content, otherwise known as “link bait.” If you offer something worth linking to, then other sites will naturally link to your site. Be sure to include your target keyphrases in your content, too.

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Make sure the search spiders will crawl all the pages on your site by following these search engine optimization strategy tips!

This is the last post in our multi-part series on how search engines work; read the basics of how search engines work and the importance of visibility to the search spiders.

Search engine optimization strategy #1: Add a robots.txt to your site.

A robots.txt is a file that tells search spiders where they are and are not allowed to go on a site. Having a robots.txt, even a basic one, is considered to be a “sign of quality.” It shows that you acknowledge that search engines are allowed on your site and that they may have free access to it. Learn how to add a robots.txt file to your site.

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