In this last year I worked with a client to put up a website for him for La Quinta, California. As usual I added a sitemap( BTW this site makes quick and easy xml sitemap files) and verified the site with Google’s webmaster tools (Which just underwent an awesome Google facelift and gives more data and feed back than ever).
Pay attention to the bones of your Site: File Names
Well, I just went back and checked in to my Google webmaster tools account and discovered something very strange for this real estate and local centric website for La Quinta, CA…
I was totally confused why this site had so many different terms that it ranked for for “Skeleton”… Well I did some digging and realized that when I built the site, I had added the background image with the file name “images/skeleton.gif”. The rest of the site has NOTHING to do with skeletons but here Google is giving rankings for a wide mix of terms related to the main content of the page, as well as for terms related to skeletons! For example Google webmaster tools showed me ranking 48 for [Jack Skeleton] from Nightmare Before Christmas, as well as [skeleton in desert] which seemed to have used the geographic context along with the filename. The lesson here for your site is that filen ames are one of the many factors in how Google understands your website, so do everything you can to name them appropriately!
7 responses so far ↓
Diety // May 20, 2009 at 11:43 am |
Oh my gosh, that sure explains a lot! When I started with thinking about positioning my website I was really confused about the traffic I got. Now I’m sure it was a “joke” made by the bastard that created my site – i had people asking about fried food all the time. On a website about diets!
This was over a year ago and I changed the site completely till then, but now at least I know why …
jeremypenguin // May 20, 2009 at 2:13 pm |
Hey Diety,
Oh geez, I’m glad to hear that you at least got it corrected and glad to provide a possible explanation
Pozycjonowanie // June 25, 2009 at 9:13 am |
Woah I had no idea that something as simple could bring results like that. I always give my files weird and funny names to make building the site a bit more interesting. I guess it’s time to stop doing that.
Arif Gangji // July 10, 2009 at 6:29 pm |
Totally…and we found that you can essentially “hide” what we call “dumb” images by naming them something like 1.gif or 2.gif
Google won’t give those much weight so you don’t have to worry about your graphical bullets or icons being indexed in images or causing problems.
You can obviously name them something that does help you in your quest but we found it’s best to just keep the proper alt attributes for the main graphics and photos.
jeremypenguin // July 10, 2009 at 6:41 pm |
That’s brilliant Arif, actually taking advantage of adjusting the file name!
Obozy Studenckie // July 15, 2009 at 8:58 am |
Is google indexing small images actualy a problem? I mean it’s a bit more publicity for your site (maybe someone will click on a small pic) and there shouldn’t be anything harmful in it, should it?
jeremypenguin // July 15, 2009 at 4:43 pm |
@obozy
I don’t think it’s a bad thing in and of itself, but if Google is picking up enough value from 1 filename to give a site rankings in several minor searches, it would make sense for you to be sure that the filename aligns with your message, site content, keywords and goal of the site.