Hoping to pick the brains of some old pros!

lankeeyankee:

lankeeyankee

http://sa***tore.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=5&products_id=4

native zen cart 1.3.9h

sitemap xml

no google analytics or webmaster tools

date added Jan 5 at 1:50pm Eastern Time US

age of site, can't remember but it's always been a test site without real products.

Any SEO tools? CEON, Simple SEO, other?

Thanks
Rod

SPH:

This ticks me off. I risked a main production site - prommart.com - with that cr ap product and text. If you weren't going to risk a real site, you should have so advised.

I feel free to pull prommart

Shop.vcsweb.com IS a 'real' site. True, it doesn't carry as many products as it used to in the past, but it is very much a core part of our business, and frankly, I'd be screwed if it were ever blacklisted/penalised or otherwise lost its current good SE rankings.

If I thought there was even the remotest possibility of anything detrimental happening as a result of these tests I would have set up a throwaway site for the purpose, and not risk the 5yo established store, and I would never, ever contemplate asking others to join this experiment if I thought it would harm their stores either. I've chosen to be offended that you would even suggest this was a possibility.

Furthermore, not only has this 'new invention' (aka cr ap product) NOT caused any threat whatsoever to the participating stores, but the exact opposite is happening, even as we speak..... This product, along with its 'gibberish' description has caused Google to create more links to your store(s) than you had when you started the tests... This is always good It will increase the store rankings by virtue of the additional links alone.

You have no valid reason to be ticked off.

Cheers
Rod

RodG:

Any SEO tools? CEON, Simple SEO, other?

Thanks
Rod

Neither have any SEO rewriting, they are both native zen cart URLs.

lankeeyankee:

A way around this whole fear is to simply use this as the description:

This is a nice Wurldbitzer Debibulator.

Or something along that line.

This is also removing one of the few things that we have the control over to help keep a level playing field.
Not only that, it is the second most important factor in regards to the rankings (beaten only by the links).

If we remove this important control factor any subsequent rankings will be severely biased by the new content, and we'll not be able to come to any conclusions in regards to the SEO efforts under test.

I'm starting to regret my decision to use random text, it obviously has too many needlessly running scared (which has me convinced that those with this opinion really don't know as much about SE's as they claim).

The offer for any one of you to create your own 'meaningful' description (that we would all use) was made available, even though I clearly stated that if I were to do it it would be 'randomized text'. No one took up the offer. No one said 'don't use that gibbereish because it will cause problems'.

WE ARE ALL IN THE SAME BOAT.

Even if one of you DID write a proper description (which we'd still all need to use for control purposes), the same site(s) would STILL get the 'omitted from search results' issue, as well as any other issue that is being attributed to 'gibberish' or duplicate content.

I really can't see why this has somehow become a major issue. :(

Cheers
Rod

RodG:

I'm starting to regret my decision to use random text, it obviously has too many needlessly running scared (which has me convinced that those with this opinion really don't know as much about SE's as they claim).

I don't know very much about how SEs work. But after researching I get mixed results and since this is 100% of my income and I have employees that depend on us providing them with a paycheck among many other obligations I have chosen to be safe since I am extremely risk-adverse when it comes to our site. Paranoid almost.

Maybe this could just be another aspect of factors to consider, the differences in description. Or, if there is a consensus to change it to non-gibberish then all could change it to the same thing.

I am probably wrong, but since I couldn't find a clear answer and since I am not knowledgeable enough to make a reasonable informed decision and since I don't know any of you and therefore have to take all statements with a healthy dose of salt (no offense intended), I have decided to play it safe. If it's determined that this will be detrimental to this test I will remove the products.

lankeeyankee:

I have done some searching re. the gibberish and get a mixed bag of opinions. My POV is to not take risks so I changed it to the simple one line I put in the above post since I am about to launch this site for realz.:smile: And I don't want to be penalized before I even get it rolling.

This site will NOT be form a part of the tabled results. There is no way that we can make a valid comparison, you have changed the second most important factor involved in the google rankings, and any results will be significantly biased by this fact alone.

FWIW, although it can no longer be considered a part of the testing, it is my opinion that your new product description is actually going to produce lower rankings than the sites using the 'gibberish'.

Why? The 'gibberish' has the words or phrase "Wurldbitzer Debibulator" embedded in it three times (as I recall), this will make this content more relevant to a search query than your new entry with the phrase only appearing once.

This is something even feznizzle realized when we first discussed this test.... It appears to have been forgotten. :(

Cheers
Rod

Agreed, I don't know why I forgot to check the amount of times it appeared in the description. I guess it was because I was multitasking as usual and forgot to think about that. I will add the equal amount of keywords, even if this isn't part of the rest of the test I would like to see how it does.

lankeeyankee:

Why not simply change the description so the penalty risk is avoided? I reckon it will take at least a week or maybe two before any kind of definitive ranking can be established. Although, I am still of the opinion that this whole thing will be of limited value since there are a wide variety of uneven variables that can come into play. I think niccol's point of A/B on two subdomains, both identical in every way apart from one having native and one having rewritten links is the best way to eliminate as many variables as possible.

We don't have the luxury of setting up ideal test scenarios.

We DID have a chance of setting up test scenario's with controls over the most critical factors.. Factors that would outweigh most other issues that are hotly debated. Seems like its all gone to the dogs now though. All controls have been tossed aside. Test sites have been pulled before anything other than 'how long does it take to get into Google' has been established.

This was probably the only chance the SEO addon supporters had any chance of actually** proving** it is beneficial, and its just been tossed aside because of unfounded fears..... Very, Very disappointing.

There really is only one conclusion that I can come to now... The SEO 'bad ##########' rely on nothing more than myth, hearsay and anecdotal reports to forward their claims. They have no understanding in regards to how a SE crawls sites (let alone how they rank and index them). They are so unsure of how a SE will behave when they come across a set of 0's and 1's that are indistinguishable from any other set of 0's and 1's that they are in no position to advise their clients as to what is good or bad....

Meanwhile, there is one person here me, that is confident enough with what he knows, that he is quite happy to add the same 'cr ap product' with the same 'gibberish' to his live (and only) store, with No SEO addons, and initial tests prove there is nothing to be gained by using the SEO addons in regards to initial indexing (time based rankings may prove different, but the SEO 'bad ##########' aren't willing to allow this to be proven. How convenient.

On this basis, there is only one thing to conclude... Zenners, you should avoid these tools like the plaque. They have no proven value whatsoever, and if you don't use them, you, like me, can be confident that you can add any product to your store, whether it be an exact duplicate of another site/page, or whether it be nothing but 'gibberish', with full confidence that there will be no detrimental effect to your site.

Cheers
Rod

lankeeyankee:

Neither have any SEO rewriting, they are both native zen cart URLs.

Thanks. I'll be going over the data table with the updates sometime tomorrow... At the moment I don't really have any idea who's left in the game and who isn't.

Cheers
Rod

RodG:

You have no valid reason to be ticked off.

Cheers
Rod

RodG, I apologize if I offended.

As for customer content/marketing, frankly they seem to go solely by the photos so I'd LOVE IT if we could just generate spun gibberish for GOOGLE! :smile:

Re-entering main site prommart.com usinging Lankeeyankee's description.

Time: just a minute or two before this post (perhaps date of zc post is best time standard?)

http://www.prommart.com/wurldbitzer-debibulator-p-2211.html

My second entry fashion-mart.biz is still in the game, along with first entry promdressesforless.us

This is the updated description with 3 mentions of the keywords:

This is a nice Wurldbitzer Debibulator. The Wurldbitzer Debibulator became the top selling unit in the world due to it's high quality and unmatched features. The debibulator by Wurldbitzer comes in one size and fits everyone.

RodG:

This was probably the only chance the SEO addon supporters had any chance of actually** proving** it is beneficial, and its just been tossed aside because of unfounded fears..... Very, Very disappointing.

There really is only one conclusion that I can come to now... The SEO 'bad ##########' rely on nothing more than myth, hearsay and anecdotal reports to forward their claims. They have no understanding in regards to how a SE crawls sites (let alone how they rank and index them). They are so unsure of how a SE will behave when they come across a set of 0's and 1's that are indistinguishable from any other set of 0's and 1's that they are in no position to advise their clients as to what is good or bad....

Meanwhile, there is one person here me, that is confident enough with what he knows, that he is quite happy to add the same 'cr ap product' with the same 'gibberish' to his live (and only) store, with No SEO addons, and initial tests prove there is nothing to be gained by using the SEO addons in regards to initial indexing (time based rankings may prove different, but the SEO 'bad ##########' aren't willing to allow this to be proven. How convenient.

On this basis, there is only one thing to conclude... Zenners, you should avoid these tools like the plaque. They have no proven value whatsoever, and if you don't use them, you, like me, can be confident that you can add any product to your store, whether it be an exact duplicate of another site/page, or whether it be nothing but 'gibberish', with full confidence that there will be no detrimental effect to your site.

Cheers
Rod

RodG, while I apologized above and truly do respect you, you make it difficult. While we've referred to this as a "religious" debate, I've spent years on real religion debate forums and have come across a lot of types. I recognize you (type).

Have you considered that, in my case, I may just like looking at my human readable url more?

What we've proved is that with indexing, CEON and Ultimate SEO worked. And the actual test product was indexed at least as fast as the Native entries thus far. Let's overlook that no Native test product is actually yet indexed. So no zencart user should fear either rewriter, until RodG proves something else.

Now, assuming that all test products will eventually be indexed, shall we then go by who has the most ancillary ("garbage") links? That that will declare the winner?

Regarding the gibberish text description: all zencart users can note that the rewritten sites are also working, duplicate content/pages and all.

So RodG hasn't yet proven anything remotely supporting that these rewrite mods should be avoided like the plague.

That, now, is RodG's burden.

lankeeyankee:

This is the updated description with 3 mentions of the keywords:

This is a nice Wurldbitzer Debibulator. The Wurldbitzer Debibulator became the top selling unit in the world due to it's high quality and unmatched features. The debibulator by Wurldbitzer comes in one size and fits everyone.

Thanks, just added to prommart time of this posting:

http://www.prommart.com/wurldbitzer-debibulator-p-2211.html

lankeeyankee:

I don't know very much about how SEs work. But after researching I get mixed results

One of the problems with 'research' (especially with the topics at hand) is that you'll get a LOT of opinions but very little in the way of provable facts.

This thread and the tests are designed and have evolved to produce facts, or at least data/evidence that can be seen and/or verified.

What have we seen so far? Firstly that Google can quickly identify duplicate content (even 'gibberish'). The 'penalty' for this duplicate content is that some of the duplicate results are omitted from the initial search results. They can be retrieved at any time by repeating the search with the omissions included. This proves

1. only the duplicate pages are 'penalised'. NOT the entire site, not even any other pages on the same site. The duplicate test products do no harm. (omitted pages are not desirable of course, but even a single word or two change will rectify this situation. This makes the use of duplicate content a valid control factor that we shouldn't mess with... all it will do is make subsequent observation less conclusive).

2). Google isn't 'penalising' the 'gibberish' in any way shape or form, It is showing up in the search results just like any other page.

So, if you still think the test product, complete with gibberish poses any risk whatsover, you are either ignoring the things that these tests have already shown us, or there is some other 'risk' that has yet to be discussed or mentioned. I would assume that this other 'risk' was something you found in your research. If so, I think you should inform us what it is, because if there is any truth to it at all, I will also be taking the product out of our store. Otherwise it is going to stay.. for ever... Its very existence has already increased our site rankings..

lankeeyankee:

and since this is 100% of my income and I have employees that depend on us providing them with a paycheck among many other obligations I have chosen to be safe since I am extremely risk-adverse when it comes to our site. Paranoid almost.

Definitely paranoid. Simply no other reason for this irrational fear. :)

FWIW, among my many qualifications, I've also done diploma level courses in risk management. You'll probably need to take me at my word that I did a risk assessment shortly before proposing the tests. I deemed it safe.
I've also done a risk assessment regarding the use of SEO tools with ZenCart. This was deemed unsafe. (and will remain so, until proven that it has the potential to provide some kind of benefit).

lankeeyankee:

Maybe this could just be another aspect of factors to consider, the differences in description. Or, if there is a consensus to change it to non-gibberish then all could change it to the same thing.

This means starting the entire experiment again (for no valid reason, the test product will still have some pages being omitted from initial search results, and the 'real description' will have as much 'meaning' to Google as the random text. IOW, no meaning at all... just a long string of 0's and 1's.)

Then, assuming we DID start it again, it'll only be a matter of time before someone decides the results aren't going the way they would like, so another change will be proposed, and we'll be right back here again..

We set our controls. We should stand by them.

Cheers
Rod

SPH:

RodG, I apologize if I offended.

Why are you apologizing? It was my choice to be offended. You didn't really have anything to do with this. I could just as easily chosen to not be offended :)

Lesson: Offence can only be taken, never given. :)

Cheers
Rod

RodG:

2). Google isn't 'penalising' the 'gibberish' in any way shape or form, It is showing up in the search results just like any other page.

What about "content is king" and Panda, etc.? If google doesn't penalize spun garbage then just exactly what does google...or do we...mean by good content? Really, would like to know.

Again, if I can get away with spun gibberish I'd try it for thousands of products. I actually considered that once. Now, with RodG's expertise, maybe can go forward.

Then, assuming we DID start it again, it'll only be a matter of time before someone decides the results aren't going the way they would like, so another change will be proposed, and we'll be right back here again..

Ah, there you go again! My (and possibly Feznizzle's) concern with the gibberish being the same as Lankeeyankee. But not for RodG. Nope. It's because we rewriters don't think things are going like we want.

One thing this thread has established is RodG's politicing.

And news flash: I never for a moment thought that things we going wrong. Well, except for maybe prommart, which I've suspected may be under a google penalty, perhaps this test will show if that's true or not. But that concern DID NOT involve it's Ultimate SEO URL.

Got that, RodG?

RodG:

Why are you apologizing? It was my choice to be offended. You didn't really have anything to do with this. I could just as easily chosen to not be offended :)

Lesson: Offence can only be taken, never given. :)

Cheers
Rod

Okay, thanks. Will dispense with such further pleasantries.

lankeeyankee:

This is the updated description with 3 mentions of the keywords:

This is a nice Wurldbitzer Debibulator. The Wurldbitzer Debibulator became the top selling unit in the world due to it's high quality and unmatched features. The debibulator by Wurldbitzer comes in one size and fits everyone.

Have any of you guys decided who is going to tabulate the results for these new tests?

Unless this is done, you'll have no definitive record of the results and observations, and any findings will remain as nothing more than anecdotal evidence.

I've been doing my utmost to keep this a level playing field, with 'strict' control measures in an effort to document and discuss the results, and hopefully produce a few more definitive facts based on these observations.

I now feel like I'm trying to herd a litter of kittens... everyone going their own ways with their own ideas, and all agreed control measures being tossed aside to make new ones... I'm not sure I really want to be a part of it any longer. I don't actually have anything to prove (and never have done). The onus is, and always has been on the SEO promoters to prove the technology works. If this can't be done IT IS SNAKE OIL.

I'll be happy to sell you guys my 'site performance enhancer'. It will boost the speed at which your site renders a page by as much as 50%. I can't prove it works though, but I can tell you that it won't cause any harm (I know this, because it doesn't really do anything, but you won't know that unless I tell you).
So, how about it, will you buy this product? Will you even risk adding it to your site if I can't prove it works? The sensible answer is no!

So why oh why are you all so quick to add an 'SEO module' to your sites, when they too have no proven benefits, even if you know it isn't harmful either? (like my code, it also does nothing at all). It just isn't a sensible thing to do... but its done nonetherless. It almost leaves me speechless.

Cheers
Rod

My primary goal with prommart is if it gets up there at all. Beyond that, speed would be nice, but have alot of products for google to go through. Don't know the affect, if any, the deleted/readded product may have, with new description. I put the product back in same place (category).

SPH:

What about "content is king" and Panda, etc.? If google doesn't penalize spun garbage then just exactly what does google...or do we...mean by good content? Really, would like to know.

Do I really have to repeat this again? Google doesn't know 'garbage'. Good content is whatever is relevant to the person doing the searching.

The 'gibberish' description of our 'Wurldbitzer Debibulator' has "good content" for someone searching for 'Wurldbitzer Debibulator In raptures" (look at the description). It has "bad content" for someone doing a search for "Wurlitzer debobulator" (remember that product? Ever wonder why I changed it at the last minute?). It also has 'bad content' for someone searching for "Wurldbitzer Debibulator reviews" ("reviews" doesn't appear in the description). However, if one of the store owners adds the word 'reviews' to the description then it good content for the person searching for "Wurldbitzer Debibulator reviews".

Admittedly, this isn't 'obvious' if/when you look at the entire description, if for no other reason that all you will 'see' are a lot of unrelated and even meaningless words... So, how about we simplify...

New description: "This is a nice Wurldbitzer Debibulator".

This is a good one if the search query is "nice Wurldbitzer Debibulator", a bad one if the search is for "nasty Wurldbitzer Debibulator"

How about we amend the description, so it reads "This is a nice Wurldbitzer Debibulator for nasty people"? Is this a good description or a bad one?

A person searching for "nice Wurldbitzer Debibulator" will find the site among their results, and the person searching for "nasty Wurldbitzer Debibulator" will find the same site in their results.. The second will probably rank lower for the given search query because although all the words are still found, the 'nasty' is out of order... Nonetherless, for both searches, this would be a 'good description'.
We can repeat this process almost indefinably, the longer the description, with the more words likely to be searched for, the 'better' the content becomes.

It really doesn't have anything to do with Google itself. IT doesn't know if "nice Wurldbitzer Debibulator" is better or worse than "nasty Wurldbitzer Debibulator" until someone performs a search. It is only then that 'good' or 'bad' actually have 'meaning'. So, no matter what the description actually is, it is only 'good' or 'bad' in relation to the query that it is given. Does that make sense?

SPH:

Again, if I can get away with spun gibberish I'd try it for thousands of products. I actually considered that once. Now, with RodG's expertise, maybe can go forward.

If the 'gibberish' you spin contains words and/or phrases that a person is likely to use when searching for your product(s) then you'll be on to something. The problem is, the spun words or phrases contain a far greater chance of not having anything even remotely related to the product, as such. it isn't likely to be very productive at all.

SPH:

Ah, there you go again! My (and possibly Feznizzle's) concern with the gibberish being the same as Lankeeyankee. But not for RodG. Nope. It's because we rewriters don't think things are going like we want.

Love the sarcasm. :)

Take another read through this thread... in almost every instance when someone has had an objection or criticism to anything I've proposed I've gone with the suggestions made... even the times when I've disagreed or just not been happy with them. The only thing I have insisted on is that we all use the same product descriptions. I didn't even want to create this... I urged feznizzle to do it instead... In short, I have bent over backwards to cater to the requirements that others felt were needed or essential.
We all agreed by virtue of placing the product and random description in our stores that we were all playing with the same deck of cards. I'm happy with the way things were going with the agreed control measures.

So tell me, why is it that I am the only one willing to continue the test with the agreed control measures when the 'rewriters' are the ones that want to change the rules mid stream? Just because there are three of you all calling some kind of fail play and wanting to change the rule mid game doesn't say a thing about me It says a heck of a lot about you's though.

SPH:

One thing this thread has established is RodG's politicing..

Read the thread again... I've constantly been saying the same things over and over again. My stances and opinions haven't change a bit. I have good reason for
"politicing".

SPH:

And news flash: I never for a moment thought that things we going wrong.

So why do you want to change the agreed controls mid test? This simply doesn't make any sense at all.

SPH:

Well, except for maybe prommart, which I've suspected may be under a google penalty, perhaps this test will show if that's true or not. But that concern DID NOT involve it's Ultimate SEO URL.
Got that, RodG?

I'm not sure what I'm supposed to 'get' other than the fact that some of you have decided that the control measures we put in place to give us a level playing field (to the best of out capability) have been deemed as unsatisfactory and that you want the testing restarted.

OK, have it your way guys........... I know that this is going to be a big mistake on my part (because one of you will simply find something else you don't like if you don't see the results you expect, and we'll be right back at this exact point in about another week or so) but, I've already bent and twisted to give you the best possible chance to prove the benefits of SEO rewrites.. I DON'T WANT YOU TO BLOW IT !

All current tests are to be terminated.

I want one of you to invent another 'new product' and create another description. I can't/wont do this myself for the same reason I didn't do it the first time. I don't anyone accusing me of any kind of foul play. (It is very annoying to find that even random text is somehow supposedly able to affect the outcome though). Totally illogical, but logic seems to be something some of you have a hard time coping with. <sigh>

Please post the details in this forum just as we did before. I suggest we keep the same control measures, and we'll restart the tests completely afresh in a few days time.

I don't expect feznizzle to be joining us with this relaunch of the test though... He is going to excuse himself because he is too busy with other things (he may surprise me though, theres a 1st time for everything). Wouldn't surprise me if other SEO supporters also use this to 'excuse' themselves from the tests. It is what I've learned to expect when the feznizzles of the world find things don't go their way...

I hope that at least a couple of SEO rewrite supporters stay around for the testing though.......

So, how about it? Start the tests again, or admit that SEO benefit cannot be proven. Admit that its simply snake oil.

Cheers
Rod