Forums: Discussions for entrepreneurs and small business.

I received a report from a SEO professional who says googlebot is having a problem with our Content Management Software. 

I would agree that for the amount of content we have and the amount of traffic we receive we are not SEO.

I was wondering if anyone could give me some more details as to the problem with our CMS.  I am more then happy to pay a SEO professional to fix the site, it just the company I spoke with said they were going to get us to rank number one on google by adding content.  (I held in my laughter when I was on the phone with him)  Our website is www.usspin.com.

Thanks.

-------------------------

Erik
www.usspin.com
www.unitedbusinessalliance.com

Two things I see from looking at the site for a total of two minutes:

• You have over 22,000 pages indexed in Google, but how long does it take me to get to the dreaded "we have omitted some entries" message - 44 results.  With 22,000 pages plus, you shouldn`t be hitting that mark that quickly.  Looks like primary reason is...
• Lack of distinct title tags.  Within the 44 results you have a total of 3 distinct titles, and one of those is a db error message.  Ouch.  Looks like you also have some duplicate content issues.

I wouldn`t go with any SEO firm that ever said anything about guaranteeing a number one ranking in Google, but you might want to talk to some reputable providers, or at the very least talk with whoever installed/configured/manages your CMS and see what capabilities it has in generating distinct titles for those pages - and that would just be a first step of many.

FYI, your signature has two links to the same location (those duplicate content issues really can be a pain!)


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chuck fuller

Thanks Chuck,

This lack of distinct title tags sound about what the report said.  However, can you example exactly what the difference is.  I believe that is my personal problem is I do not understand the terms when it come to website lingo.  If you start talking about "saly" or IRR I`m gold but distinct title tags I draw a blank.

Every one of our articles has a title, so why is that not "distinct".

Thanks you very much for your previous posting.

-------------------------

Erik
www.usspin.com
www.unitedbusinessalliance.com

Each page has a title, but the same title is carried over to every page.  Surely the same sentence doesn`t describe the tens of thousands of pages on your site.

Go to google, and enter this as a search:  site:usspin.com

Look at your first page of results - you`ll see 2 identical titles (your homepage and what looks like a blog page), that db error page with a distinct title, and then all of the rest of the results come up on google with the same title.

That`s because google is reaching out and looking at those pages, and when it adds them to its index it looks at the code and pulls out the text that`s entered in the <title></title> tag on that page.

If you want to see what`s entered there on your website, go to any page on your site, and use your menu`s browser to select View > Source or View > Page Source (depending on which browser you`re using).  That will bring up the code behind your site - I did so for your homepage, and if you look past the javascript you have a the beginning you should be able to see that <title> tag. Not surprisingly, google sees that as your choice for the most appropriate summary of your page, and enters that in its index as the title of your page.

So when you have an immense number of pages with identical titles, google eventually decides that while it will quickly run a scan of your site, it`s not going to spend much processing time distinguishing between the pages - after all, they all have the same title, so chances are the content is quite similar.

The only problem is that`s not the case with your site, so you`re leaving a huge opportunity on the table by not clearly defining what each page is about within that title tag.  SEO practitioners distinguish between onsite and offsite factors in your ranking within search engines, and when it comes to onsite factors, having a different title tag for each page that contains useful and highly trafficked keywords/phrases is the starting point.


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chuck fuller

Chuck,

I see what you are saying.  Thanks for the great note.  I reviewed the source code and as I am sure you saw it give the <title> several times.  I am coming to copy the code below and then ask a question.

<title>Super Powerful Networking, SPiN, Mastermind Business Networking</title>
        <script type="text/javascript">
        <!--
            _editor_url = "http://www.usspin.com/mambots/editors/htmlarea3_xtd/";
                        _editor_lang = "en";
        //-->
        </script>
        <script type="text/javascript" src= "http://www.usspin.com/mambots/editors/htmlarea3_xtd/htmlare a_xtd.js"></script>
        <script type="text/javascript" src= "http://www.usspin.com/mambots/editors/htmlarea3_xtd/dialog. js"></script>
        <script type="text/javascript" src= "http://www.usspin.com/mambots/editors/htmlarea3_xtd/lang/en .js"></script>

        <style type="text/css">@import  url(http://www.usspin.com/mambots/editors/htmlarea3_xtd/html area.css)</style>
        <script type="text/javascript">
        <!--
            // load the plugin files
                        var editor = null;
        //-->
        </script>
        <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=iso-8859-1" />
<meta name="resource-type" content="document">
<meta name="Generator" content="usspinco Tag Generator">
<meta name="revisit-after" content="1">
<meta name="classification" content="Business Networking and Marketing">
<title>Super Powerful Networking, SPiN, Mastermind Business Networking - How to Create and Run a MasterMind Group</title>
<meta name="title" content="How to Create and Run a MasterMind Group" />
<meta name="author" content="Erik Davenny" />
<meta name="description" content="Business Networking, SPiN, Super Powerful Networking is a business and professional mastermind business networking organization; members have an opportunity to share ideas, resources and introductions" />

<meta name="keywords" content="Business Network, Super Powerful Business Networking , network, networking, business networking, social capital, social networking, marketing, business mastermind, mastermind, masterminding, mastermind groups, super powerful networking, spin, profit, business growth, better business, business partners, mastermind organizations, professional networking, buzz marketing, Business Networking, Mastermind, Mastermind Groups, small business, success," />
<meta name="Generator" content="Mambo - Copyright 2000 - 2005 Miro International Pty Ltd.  All rights reserved." />
<meta name="robots" content="index, follow" />

As you see
<base href="http://www.usspin.com/" />


As you can see from the bold section.  I believe that google is picking up the first title (which I believe the mambo CMS is generating).  What I want it to pick up is the third bold section and only that section.  However I can not just start deleting this code.  So... What should I do?



-------------------------

Erik
www.usspin.com
www.unitedbusinessalliance.com

Sadly, when I clicked the link I got:

DB function failed with error number 1226
User `usspinco_mambo` has exceeded the `max_questions` resource (current value: 50000) SQL=SELECT session_id FROM mos_session WHERE session_id=MD5(`4bec8c216a695deaf1e1309803b98f89`)
SQL =

SELECT session_id FROM mos_session WHERE session_id=MD5
(`4bec8c216a695deaf1e1309803b98f89`)

Wish I could help, but I`d want to see the site
first, to see what it`s about.