Any good SEO will tell you that if you cloak content on a page, Google will not only “slap” you, but furthermore, your site is in jeopardy of not fully recovering all of its rankings even after you fix the cloaking issue.

It appears, however, that not only will Wikipedia not be penalized, but Google feels the same way Wikipedia does — and even supports Wikipedia’s cause (because it will have a direct negative impact on Google’s own business as well).

The bottom line: this Wikipedia situation is yet another example of Google playing favorites and accommodating certain websites (aka its “white-list”). I challenge people to do a test the same exact way as Wikipedia did for 24 hours and see what happens to their rankings and traffic. We all know what will happen to us, and we all know it won’t happen to Wikipedia.

Update: Google is accommodating Wikipedia to help support their cause…doesn’t that mean that they are manually favoring websites?

The internet has become an invaluable tool in promoting both large and small businesses.  In an effort to improve visibility and spread knowledge about their products retailers are utilizing SEO strategies to strengthen their online presence. Consumers are becoming savvier and looking for companies they can trust, and ranking highly in search results on reputable search engines such as Google helps to set a wary customer’s mind at ease. By optimizing their websites businesses are able to reassure existing customers and recruit new ones at the same time. By investing in SEO retailers can greatly improve their company visibility and revenue for just a small cost.

Retailers can also improve their online visibility and increase their customer base by using business video production firms for online marketing. Video marketing gives businesses a platform to reach new customers and educate them on the services and products they offer. Business video production allows customers to learn about the products and services a company offers in a way that they can’t in written form. By marketing their products in video form, retailers lend visual support to their claims and are able to better showcase the goods and services they offer. By utilizing websites such as YouTube, businesses can further improve their visibility and customer base by targeting new audiences free of charge.

Corporate video production is also an effective way to cut costs in employee trainings without sacrificing the quality of employee performance. In a buyers market the effectiveness of a sales associate’s pitch and the extent of their product knowledge has a huge effect on sales numbers. Yet training employees is both time-consuming and pricey. Corporate training videos allow companies to train their employees in a faster and more efficient manner. Videos are much cheaper than individual training, and make it easier for a large company to offer consistent service throughout multiple establishments. For large retailers with many stores in different locations corporate video trainings can improve employee product knowledge and consistent service for a fraction of the price and time needed for individual training. By utilizing SEO strategies and business video production retailers can greatly increase their revenue at a small cost, while streamlining their business and maintaining consistent products.

In order to get them back to shredding at maximum potential, they should consider making some of these changes. Then they’ll be record label certified instead of your neighborhood garage band.

Problem 1: Images above text on product pages.

How to fix Problem 1: Text links should appear above the images because Google only counts the first link that it sees, and the text links pass more strength and relevance than pictures.  Therefore, the text links on the product pages should be moved above the images.

Problem 2: Sitemap only shows zipped versions.

How to fix Problem 2: Currently, there is no XML sitemap on SamAsh.com; only the zipped versions appear.  SamAsh.com’s webmaster should create both XML and zipped versions of the sitemap (as well as submit them both to the search engines).

Problem 3. Lackluster 404 page.

How to fix Problem 3: The 404 page is a dead end.  A good 404 page should provide a search functionality and useful links to encourage customers to return to the store.

Problem 4: Dynamic URLs in subcategory pages.

How to fix Problem 4: These pages should have static, keyword-rich URLs and content on the page.  Including these keyword-rich URLs and content on the subcategory pages will help SamAsh.com rank for additional keywords.

Problem 5: Canonical issues.

How to fix Problem 5: There are two versions of the home page.  The non-www version should be redirected to the www version because this is the stronger of the two versions.

We’re not trying to sweat you, Under Armour, but we too are all about performance. Take a peek at some ideas we had for them to take their SEO game to the next level.

Problem 1: JavaScript Dropdown Menus.

How to fix Problem 1: UnderArmor.com’s dropdown menus are created with Javascript. While search engines can crawl Javascript, it is unknown how much link juice is passed through the links.  Therefore, it is not recommended that sites use it for their global navigation.  We strongly recommend HTML and CSS navigation.

Problem 2: Lack of keyword-rich content.

How to fix Problem 2: The home page and all major category pages should have keyword-rich content that is accessible to the search engines and helpful to customers.

Problem 3: Cannot locate the sitemap.

How to fix Problem 3: The page http://www.underarmour.com/sitemap.xml exists, however, no sitemap loads when you go that URL.  We recommend implementing a sitemap that will actually load.

Problem 4: No Custom 404 Page.

How to fix Problem 4: All 404 errors return customers to the home page. A custom 404 page should be created with a search feature and useful links to encourage customers to continue shopping.

Problem 5: Product Pages are not indexed.

How to fix Problem 5: Poor internal linking structure is causing the product pages to not to be indexed.  Proper site architecture should be created making sure that all pages that should be indexed are accessible to search engines through links.

Bonus Problem: Slow Load time

The site loads in over 16 seconds.  Google penalizes sites that load in anything over 4 seconds.

Here are five SEO problems that DicksSportingGoods.com is currently facing, and our recommended solutions.

Problem 1: The site has multiple home page URLs.

How to fix Problem 1: Redirect all of the duplicate homepage URLs to the root URL:
http://www.dickssportinggoods.com/

Problem 2: Many of the URLs are dynamic and are amongst the most non-SEO friendly URLs that we’ve ever seen. Here is an example:
http://www.dickssportinggoods.com/category/index.jsp;jsessionid=QhfGTyGB0qZ5t4v8FWl7d7jHGVkJg5LySYTlbjjp2xcXv2RQn04C!1820288686?
ab=TopNav_Footwear&categoryId=4413987

(Imagine having to read that URL to someone.)

How to fix Problem 2: Update the URLs accordingly. Here is an example of what the above URL could look like: http://www.dickssportinggoods.com/category/footware

Problem 3: The category pages have no content on them, which is holding them back from an SEO perspective.

How to fix Problem 3: Add unique, relevant content to the category pages and add internal links to the most important sub-categories or products.

Problem 4: Not using H1 tags.

How to fix Problem 4: Adding H1 tags to the home page, internal category pages, and product pages is an SEO must-have.

Problem 5: There currently is no alt text on the logo and no title on the logo url

How to fix Problem 5: Add alt text to logo like this:
alt=”Dick’s Sporting Goods”

Every Thursday, we’ll publish a post about a specific, high-profile website and identify five opportunities where that particular website can improve its SEO. (If you
have any websites that you’d like for us to assess, please e-mail us at info@highlyrelevant.com.)

Not only will we point out five specific challenges that the website is having from an SEO perspective, but we’ll also make recommendations on how these issues can be corrected. We’re solutions-oriented at Highly Relevant

Being big football fans, and since we’re right in the middle of football season, the first website that we’ll be “tackling” is NFL.com.

Here are five SEO problems that NFL.com currently faces along with recommended solutions:

Penalty 1:
Many of the URLs are dynamic or contain non-SEO-friendly characters (e.g. question marks and equal signs). Here is an example: http://www.nfl.com/teams/pittsburghsteelers/profile?team=PIT

How to fix Problem 1: Re-write the URLs and ensure that all of the URLs have SEO-friendly characters.  This is what the above URL should look like: http://www.nfl.com/teams/pittsburghsteelers/PIT.

Notice that this new URL doesn’t have any non SEO-friendly characters in it.

Penalty 2: Many of the home page links to inner pages have unnecessary characters (for click-tracking purposes). Here is an example: http://www.nfl.com/goto?id=09000d5d8237f2f9&module=HP11_cp

How to fix Problem 2: Link to the base URLs to pass link juice and page strength to the correct URL.  This is what the above URL should look like: http://www.nfl.com/news/story/09000d5d8237f2f9/article/cowher-to-dolphins-both-parties-should-tread-carefully

Penalty 3:
NFL.com has multiple H1 tags.

How to fix Problem 3: Only have one H1 tag on a given page; change the other H1 tags to H2 tags.

Penalty 4: Not using rel=”canonical” tags.

How to fix Problem 4: Certain pages are tagged for clicks, and they should have the rel=”canonical” tag to the correct URL. The URL should look like this: http://www.nfl.com/players/search?category=team&filter=0610&playerType=current&clickid=topnav

Penalty 5: There is no alt text on the logo and no title on the logo URL.

How to fix Problem 5: Add alt text to logo. Here is what it should look like:
alt=”National Football League”
title=”NFL”

That concludes the first installment of our SEO audit series.  Feel free to comment with any questions that you may have about these particular problems of general SEO issues. We’ll see you next week when we take a look at DicksSportingGoods.com!

Fill out the form on this page – https://services.google.com/fb/forms/realtimeanalytics/

Features of the new service include:

• Monitoring visits to a site minute-by-minute
• The number of people on your site at that moment
• Monitoring traffic sources in real-time (referral, Organic or Paid Search, direct, ect.)
• Geo Location of your current visitors
• Keywords that brought the visitors

We’ve decided that we don’t want to hoard all of this good SEO information to ourselves, so we’ve published the Highly Relevant SEO Process for you to see.

The process is laid out in a step-by-step format, and it takes into consideration many SEO best practices (such as keyword research, on-page optimization, and linkbuilding), but we’ve also sprinkled in some other strategies that enhance our SEO efforts.

You can access our SEO process here or just click on the screenshot below.

Please let us know if you have any questions or comments about the SEO process. Enjoy!

If you would like a coupon, please contact us and we will send you the code right away.

Please note: There are only 9 coupons left (including the one in the image ABOVE) so better get a move on!

Update (6-24-11): We are OUT of Adwords Coupons. We have contacted Google for more and will update this as we hear from them.

74% of people searching for local business information use search engines to find it first. This is significantly higher than the old days when people used the yellow pages first. Think of SEO as the new, de facto investment you need to make as you would your de facto investment in the yellow pages. You now have to make that de facto investment. It has not become more clouded though and not as easy as taking an ad out in the yellow pages.

That’s because there are so many so-called “experts” out there and very few authorities. This course is the authority on search engine optimization.

Another statistic is that for every $1 spent online, it drives $6 offline. If you are actively looking for an agency, consider Highly Relevant’s ethical search engine optimization services.

Note: All statistics taken from “The Art of SEO.”