SEO FAQs
Search engine optimisation is a topic that has a whole pile of rubbish being written every single day. Search for virtually any question relating to SEO and you are pretty much guaranteed to find contradictory information, and there are a couple of big reasons for this:
- Outdated information – the major search engines are always updating their algorithms and methods. An article written in 2003 relating to meta keywords will have very little accuracy to todays search engines, and is therefore now incorrect. When it was written, it was factual and accurate, but that does not mean that it still applies today.
- Misguided information – sometimes people write articles based on information they themselves have read. If their only source is outdated, then what they write today will be incorrect. If you are taught the wrong facts, you will repeat them believing them to be true. The fact that you believe them to be true does not mean that they are.
- Misleading information – some less scrupulous SEO consultants deliberately put misleading information onto the web in order to either mystify the subject or to ensure that their clients can’t do their own SEO
The Flosee approach is very different. Our job is to be bang up to date with the latest amendments to algorithms, and to keep our clients fully apprised of what needs to be done to acheive high rankings. Our transparent SEO ethos means that we will always do our very best to make sure you know as much as possible about the search engines and how to best use them for your business.
Our SEO FAQs
So, without further ado, here are some of the most frequently asked questions relating to search engine optimisation (SEO FAQs):
- What is SEO (Search Engine Optimisation)?
- Why does my business need SEO?
- Why doesn’t my Web site rank very well in the search engines?
- How does the Search Engine find websites?
- How long does it take for SEO results to kick in?
- What is my site ranking dependent on?
- Why might I need to have extra elements added to my website?
- If these elements are so important, why didn’t they get added when my site was originally designed?
- Does every page of my website really need to be optimised?
- Isn’t This Something We Can Do Ourselves?
- Can you guarantee a number #1 position in the search engines?
- It’s been several months and my website finally shows up in Google but it’s ranked in the hundreds. Why is that?
- My website did not get accepted last time I submitted to the search engines… why?
- Why Should I Choose Flosee for my SEO?
- How Do Flosee Choose the Best Keywords?
- Will You Need to Access Our Web Server?
- Do You Have to Make Changes to Our Site?
- I found other services that do what you do much more cheaply: how do I choose?
- What should I look for when choosing a SEO consultant?
- What’s the right time for me to start a search engine marketing campaign and how long will it last?
- How often will I receive search engine ranking reports
- How often do you resubmit my site to search engines?
- How will I know if my business increases as a result of top rankings?
- What is a Search Engine?
- What is a Directory?
- What are Spiders, Crawlers and Robots?
- What’s the difference between Search Engine Optimisation and Pay-Per-Click methods?
- Will using dynamic pages harm my rankings?
- Do filenames and directory structure matter?
- What is a “reciprocal link”?
- What are “inbound links” and how important are they?
- How can I find how many inbound links I have?
- What is link popularity?
- How do you increase my site’s link popularity?
- What is “PageRank (PR)”?
- Is it OK to use Flash?
- How does Flosee keep up with what search engines are looking for?
- What is cloaking? Does Flosee use this technique?
- How can I contact you?
SEO FAQs Answers:
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What is SEO (Search Engine Optimisation)?
SEO is an abbreviation for Search Engine Optimisation – the method by which a website is promoted to the search engines and the website itself is made more readable and easier to access by search engine robots. SEO is an ongoing process and constantly evolves as the search engines refine their techniques of finding, reading and ranking websites and web pages.
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Why does my business need SEO?
The only area of the British economy which showed significant growth in 2010 was online commerce. Whether you sell online or whether your website is an online profile for your business, this statistic proves that more and more of your customers are turning to the internet to find YOUR products and services. Added to this, recent research conducted by two leading Britsh Universities have shown that customers are more than ELEVEN times more likely to buy from businesses after finding sites through a search query online than all of the other traditional advertising methods combined (including trade shows, newspaper and magazine advertising, direct mail, radio, and even television).
This is largely because of the fact that when you advertise using other methods, by and large you are trying to create a need for your product when consumers aren’t necessarily looking for it. When a customer finds your website through a search engine they are indicating that they are ready to buy and actively seeking a place to spend their money.
Most customers only click websites from the first two pages in the search results, so attaining those high rankings in the search engines will make an enormous difference in the amount of visitor traffic your site receives, and therefore to the amount of business it generates.
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Why doesn’t my Web site rank very
well in the search engines?Attaining high rankings in the search engines is a complex process and the rules for determining positions within the search engines are always changing.
The most common reasons for poor performance are:
- Poorly constructed or lack of title tags, meta descriptions and meta keywords.
- Incorrect keyword density – having the same keyword too many times can be as damaging as not having it appear enough in your website content
- Heading Tags not being used or being misused
- Poor alt tag optimisation on your images
- Relevant content – poor or irrelevant content on your website
- Insufficient content – the search engines need something to get their teeth into!
- Insufficient pages – if your site is too small, you limit the possibilities for broad keyword rankings.
- Not enough inbound links – consider link building.
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How do the Search Engines find websites?
There are two ways a search engine can add a website to its database. The first and most direct method is to accept search engine submissions. Most search engines have a “submit your URL” section inviting submissions from Internet users, but it is very important to submit your information accurately and as a part of your overall SEO strategy.
The other method of finding new websites is using the search spiders or robots, which will index every single link they encounter on sites that are already known. Each of these links is then reported back to the search engine and added to the queue of pages to send the spider back to in the future.
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How long does it take for SEO results to kick in?
Depending on exactly when you start the SEO in comparison to where the search engines are in their own updating schedule, your Search engine optimisation work can take effect in the search results in as little as a few days up to a few months.
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What is my site ranking dependent on?
If you think of your overall SEO as a snowball being pushed uphill, the larger the snowball is to begin with, the more snow will stick to it as it rolls. In addition, the following factors all have a big influence:
- The specific keyword phrases (search terms) that have been targeted.
- The overall competitiveness of your industry – how many players are there.
- Whether you are targeting a regional, national, or international market.
- How well ranking is monitored and the site tweaked over time for SEO improvement.
- The progress of your inbound linking campaign.
- Number of competitor sites achieving new ranking themselves.
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Why might I need to have extra elements added to my website?
Search engines spiders periodically crawl your website. As the spider is a computer program, it is designed to look for and rank very specific items on each page it probes. If those elements are present, the spider computes a higher ranking than it would if those elements were not present.Our onsite SEO review will analyse your website and show us what elements and content we may need to add in order to give you the best chance of success. We will naturally consult with you regarding these amendments to make sure you are happy with the changes we propose.
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If these elements are so important, why didn’t they get added when my site was originally designed?
Most website designers haven’t learned the importance of SEO Design. In almost every case we’ve encountered, the site designer is a highly skilled and creative person whose job is to put your ideas on the web. More often than not, the designers have not received any training in search engine optimisation and don’t think about it while pursuing a cool looking design.
Search engines are also constantly changing their ranking criteria. They do this to prevent gross manipulation of their search tools. Often, website designers are not fully up to date with changes to search engines.
We are happy to work with designers at the beginning of the web design process, or we can make every effort to maintain the desired elements of an existing site while converting and introducing new elements to make the site search engine friendly.
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Does every page of my website really need to be optimised?
In a word – yes. Every page of a website can be a potential entry point or ‘landing page’ for visitors. You can’t predict which page or pages will be ranked the best for specific keywords. As such, each page must be individually optimised for optimal ranking. Collectively, all pages of your website reinforce the common “theme” of the site, which also can help boost ranking. Don’t assume that your home page is the only important page on your site.
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Isn’t This Something We Can Do Ourselves?
Large amounts of time, attention and expertise are needed to achieve the desired results in such a constantly changing niche industry. The expense of adding personnel and necessary resources alone would quickly outweigh the cost of hiring our company, which is why outsourcing SEO is by far the most popular method. We have already established strong, ongoing relationships with all the top search engines, and have experienced professionals who are constantly researching the changes and trends in this dynamic field.
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Can you guarantee a number #1 position in the search engines?
Nobody can guarantee a number #1 position or specific ranking for your site for a given keyword phrase in the organic search engine results. There are simply too many factors beyond anyone’s control – the search engines changing their ranking algorithms, efforts made by competitors, and new sites being added to the Web.
Obtaining a specific ranking is similar to managing a portfolio. Your financial advisor will do their best to monitor the stock market and other indicators and to make sure your portfolio is managed to the best of their abilities. However, your advisor cannot guarantee that your portfolio will be at a specific value or even that the amount will be up at all by a given date. Please see our article on guaranteed SEO to see why we dont offer this service.
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It’s been several months and my website finally shows up in Google but it’s ranked in the hundreds. Why is that?
It’s not always easy to get better search engine rankings. In fact, search engine optimisation is part science and part art. Search engines continually change their algorithms and tweak their rules for ranking. It is possible that Google does not fully read your page due to structural issues, your website (or at least individual web pages) could be lacking in meaningful content, no significant websites link to you, your website is too small to be of any value to people searching for your topic, or any other range of problems.
Search engines may be flooded with websites on a given topic, making it more difficult to achieve higher rankings. As such, a good search engine optimiser will look for a niche to exploit. For example, consider whether your website has greater appeal to a local, national, or international region.
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My website did not get accepted last time I submitted to the search engines… why?
Search Engine listings are not guaranteed to everyone who posts a website to the Internet. Search engines are for-profit businesses and have the right to refuse to list any site for virtually any reason. Flosee specialise in getting sites listed on Search Engines. We ensure all bases are covered and all necessary elements are present before submitting the finalised site to the search engines or directories.
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Why Should I Use Flosee For My SEO?
To achieve a high ranking web site, you have to know exactly what is the most effective META tag design formula, best web copywriting techniques, keep track of current search engine ranking algorithms, know what format to submit the site in to every engine and how often to resubmit the site. You also need to know whether your site is technically compatible with search engine robots, what types of pages the engines will accept and which will be barriers to ranking, plus what sort of overall “relevancy score” your site will receive from each engine you submit to.
Not only that, but once you’re ranking highly, you have to monitor your progress and adjust your tags every now and then to ensure you stay up above your competitors on all engines for your major search phrases. These are all crucial steps to a high ranking, but very time consuming and not your core business! That is why we conduct SEO competitor analysis to make sure your site stays above the competition.
Flosee Ltd are specialists in the area of search engine marketing, whose full-time role is to place our clients high in the search engines and keep them there. Our consultants have developed and streamlined a unique and ethical search optimisation formula that has resulted in very impressive rankings for our clients on international and regional search engines.
Other SEO companies may simply use software programs to do the work for them, with little understanding or concern for the work itself. We believe that personal knowledge and experience are far more important. Software applications are a good tool, but they are just one ingredient to a much larger recipe. Additionally, Flosee will provide an unparalleled degree of personalised service. Your representative will speak directly to, and work closely with, our SEO specialists assigned to your site. Our professionals take a lot of pride in the work that they do, and we take the time to understand your business, your competition, and your buyer’s searching habits.
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How Do Flosee Choose the Best Keywords?
The first step in our SEO campaign is to develop your Keyword Profile. Based on your initial input, we will use a combination of experience, the search engines themselves, your competitors and software programs to generate a list of the most effective and well-searched keywords in your industry. this is known as keyword discovery. We then work together to refine this list and compile the list of keywords and phrases that will be most beneficial to your product or services. You know your business and we know ours. We know how important it is to work together to generate the most effective Keyword Profile possible.
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Will You Need to Access Our Web Server?
Yes, we will need access to your web server in order to upload and periodically update pages. We will ALWAYS consult with you prior to making a change. It is vital that anyone else who may be making changes to your site stays current with the optimised pages we provide.
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Do You Have to Make Changes to Our Site?
While many of the changes made to your site are done behind the scenes in the source code, it may be necessary to make certain minor changes to your site’s copy or layout. In most cases, these changes are minimal. We will always speak to you about the changes that are required and do whatever we can to ensure that it does not interfere with your design or your customers.
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I found other services that do what you do much more cheaply: how do I choose?
Some companies take advantage of the uninitiated website owner promising top rankings for low fees. Beware of such promises – if it sounds too good to be true, it usually is. That “low fee” will typically buy an automated submission to 10,000 “engines” that nobody ever visits or possibly even result in a domain ban for over submitting. Once the campaign is finished, so is your domain. There is no such thing as guaranteed #1 rankings in all search engines or “it only takes 2 weeks and £9.95″. Because the search engines are always changing their algorithms, your competitors are doing their own SEO and many many other factors, the search results have many elements that are outside of your control. With so many factors uncontrollable, you cannot possibly offer any kind of guarantee. Please see our guaranteed SEO page for a fuller explanation. Simple rule, if the price looks crazy, then either its a typo or the service being offered is sub standard.
More importantly, most of these services only include submission, not optimisation, as a part of their deal. Submitting an un-optimised site to the engines simply will not improve your rankings. If you don’t plan on optimising your site before submission then you shouldn’t bother submitting it at all.
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What should I look for when choosing an SEO consultant?
The ideal Search Engine Optimisation Consultant is one that understands the dynamics of marketing, business, and technology – and employs the highest levels of integrity in their work. There are a number of unethical practices or shortcuts that can be used in search engine optimisation, but the search engines are wise to them and if you’re caught you will be penalised or even removed from the search results entirely.
You should choose a company that doesn’t promote these practices to achieve short-term results for its clients. You should also expect to benefit from the research expertise, customised approached, management expertise, and on-going consultative process from an SEO firm.
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What’s the right time for me to start a search engine optimisation campaign and how long will it last?
You can start your SEO campaign whenever you like, with results normally taking an upward turn within a 2 month window. We usually establish 6 month campaigns initially, then move to a rolling contract on a month by month basis. 6 months gives us enough time to prove our worth to your business, and demonstrate a solid return on investment to you. There is an enormous amount of education, research, analysis, technical programming, and testing performed in the first 3 months in particular.
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How often will I receive search engine ranking reports?
We send out detailed search engine ranking reports monthly to our clients, but we also have comprehensive keyword ranking reports generated every single day and available to view at any time you like, and are happy to discuss your keywords rankings at any time of the month on the phone.
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How often do you resubmit my site to search engines?
If your site is search engine compatible and optimised correctly, regular resubmission to engines is generally unnecessary although we find that monthly submissions to some search engines assists in maintaining rankings. Our ranking reports have daily updates on individual keyword performance and our monthly reports will reveal whether further submissions are required. If your site is already ranking highly, there is no need to resubmit it. However if any engines have lowered or dropped your site altogether (as can happen from time to time), it will be resubmitted to those engines.
If an engine has dropped your rankings considerably since last report, it is time to tweak your META tags or check the optimised pages for any problems. This is included as part of your SEO contract. Search engines will generally pick up the changes during their next edit and re-rank the site accordingly. Resubmission is usually only necessary if your site has undergone major content changes.
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How will I know if my business increases as a result of top rankings?
There are numerous Web Analytics tools available in the market that can help you to track the effectiveness of your campaign. By the end of the first six months, you will get an analysis of your activity at the end of the campaign as compared to the baseline established at the beginning of the campaign. If you dont already have an analytics system in place, we will establish your website with Google Analytics on your behalf and send all access details to you. If you do already have an analytics programme, we will need access to this in order to maximise the benefits we can bring to your business.
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All this is very confusing and I still have some questions about your services.
You are invited to contact us with your concerns before, during and after your SEO campaign. Clients always get priority handling: we are here to help you get better rankings and understand what we do.
Why not check out our case studies to see the different clients we have worked with and then contact us to see if we can help your site achieve high rankings.
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What is a Search Engine?
A search engine is an online database of websites that allows internet users to search by “Keywords” for information contained on websites that are contained in the database.
Keywords are words that Internet searches are likely to use when looking for information on a specific topic. For example, the words “universities” would likely be used when looking for information on continuing post-secondary education. Each search engine has slightly different behaviours and characteristics and so will show different results for the same search.
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What is a Directory?
A directory is a search tool much like a search engine but with a few major differences. Directories tend to employ human editors to review and rank websites submitted to their database. Yahoo! is the most well known example of a directory. Most directories catalogue websites based on a variety of topic categories such as Business and Economics, or Arts and Culture. Many directories demand payment before assigning a website review to one of their editors; others are free.
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What are Spiders, Crawlers and Robots?
Search engines work by sending out what are called spiders, crawlers, or robots. Whatever the name used they are essentially just computer programs that follow web links looking for pages to index. When they get to a page, they take a sort of picture of the page, indexing the information on it, and integrating it into their giant database of millions of websites.
When you type a keyword into the search engines looking for websites with content on that topic, in a split second they go through billions of web pages that the spiders and robots have visited. Web pages are typically revisited every few weeks by these programs.
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What’s the difference between Search Engine Optimisation and Pay-Per-Click methods?
Search Engine Optimisation is a long, carefully planned and executed method for generating more visits to a website. It involves maximising your website’s structure, content, code, and links. When done properly, various pages within a website bubble up to the top of the search engine results pages (frequently called “SERPs”). Ideally a top 10 placement will be achieved.
Pay-Per-Click Advertising (frequently called “PPC”) is a form of marketing that involves paying for each visitor to your site. It typically begins at about 10p per visitor but can go up to several pounds. This gets visitors to a website instantly, not over time as in organic optimisation.
The two most popular PPC methods involve placing ads with Google’s AdWords program and Yahoo! Search marketing. In the long run, when Organic Search Engine Optimisation is done properly it is much cheaper and can be more effective, although these two approaches can be used together as part of a larger marketing campaign.
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Will using dynamic pages harm my rankings?
No. Some of the best performing websites on the planet use dynamic urls – i.e. page.php?id=27&seo=no. However, using htaccess rewrites can amend these unattractive and cumbersome urls to include keywords – this has the double benefit of looking more attractive to humans (remember humans first) as well as putting keywords in to your links right from the point a search engine finds them, which can lead to higher rankings in the long run. Our example url could become your-keywords-here.html and still point to the same content, but now the url is readable and memorable as well as being a more SEO friendly term.
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Do filenames and directory structure matter?
Yes, it does matter. Put your keyword or phrase in your filename, this will give a little push in ranking. The filename should also be no longer then 15-20 characters. If you have vast amounts of data and need to organise it in different directories please add at least one keyword within the name.
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What is a “reciprocal link”?
If your site has a link to another site and that site has a link back to yours, this is called a reciprocal link. In years gone by, this was the simplest and most effective way of getting your website to rank highly within any given industry – simply exchange links like crazy and watch the rankings rise. However, the search engines cottoned on to this and if the search engine detects that a link from your site is reciprocated (ie there is a link back from that site to you) then it is devalued. This doesn’t make it worthless, but it does make it worth less than a none reciprocated link. Some people employ more complex three way linking strategies, but in our experience these are very cumbersome and time consuming to manage for the minimal benefit they can bring to your rankings.
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What are “inbound links” and how important are they?
Inbound links are nothing more than links coming to a given website from an external website. For example, any links on this website to Google.com are considered to be inbound links to Google.
Over the past few years, search engines have placed an increased importance on inbound links. Inbound links are a good way to judge the popularity of a website i.e. the more inbound links a website has, the more important it is considered to be. Many people use words that describe a website in order to link to it, so the words used to the link have become very important. Ideally, all of the inbound links to your website should use your targeted keywords as the link text. Our link building services use many different methods to increase the number of inbound links to your site.
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How can I find how many inbound links I have?
In reality there is no real way to calculate the exact number of inbound links in. The best way to find inbound links to your website is to use either Google or AllTheWeb / FAST. With Google, it is possible to search for inbound links by using the search query “link:www.example.com”, this will search for links to the site www.example.com, however it will not show you ALL the links. If you search instead for “link;www.example.com” this will show you more results, but not all of them will necessarily be to your website and it still will in all probability not be every link. On AllTheWeb, you can check for inbound links to a site by using “link.all:www.example.com”.
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What is link popularity?
Link popularity is a measure of how many other sites contain a hyper link to your site. Some search engines, most notably Google, use link popularity as one of their most important criteria in determining page rank. A further component of link popularity is the quality of sites linking to yours. A link to your site from Yahoo! web site will be regarded as more important than a link from your friend’s Wedding web site that’s hosted on a free server. Relevancy is also a big factor – if you sell tomotoes having a link from a site about high performance cars has very little relevance so will be worth much less than a link from a greenhouse retailer which is very relevant to your subject matter.
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How do you increase my site’s link popularity?
You might think that logic dictates that you can increase link popularity by undertaking an effort to get as many links to your site as possible. Having links to your site from “link farms” or “free-for-alls” can actually be damaging. Search engines, in their constant efforts to produce the most relevant results, are aware of and penalise any such tactics.
There are valid and effective ways of increasing link popularity. The process begins in your own backyard – proper optimisation involves maximisation of the internal linking structure of your site, having keyword-rich link text, and increasing the number of relevant outbound links. From there, Flosee build upon this internal strength to focus our efforts on establishment and cultivation of valuable external linking relationships.
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What is “PageRank (PR)”?
PageRank™ is actually a trademarked term. The trademark belongs to Google Inc. and refers to the “rank” of a website as determined by Google’s ranking system. PageRank is a grade given to a webpage determining its importance in Google’s eyes. If you have a high rank website, you have a better chance of coming higher in search engine results pages, as high page rank can boost your search result. PageRank is calculated from many different criteria, but inbound links are one important factor. PageRank has very much declined in importance in the last few years, with only one update in the last 12 months (as opposed to the usual 4 per year). It was only ever meant as an indicator of search popularity, not a result of link popularity.
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Is it OK to use Flash?
As with JavaScript, it is too difficult for search engines to understand. Some sites use Flash introductions with a skip button. Pages with flash intros greatly reduce their rankings and it is best to stop using such intros. Sites that use Flash for navigation’s and interaction etc. are encouraged to use HTML navigation instead and HTML text where possible. At Flosee, we have a Flash-o-phobia as it has been proven to reduce the effectiveness of any SEO campaign. There are many techniques available which can duplicate most Flash effects without the penalties of being unreadable to search robots, and wherever possible we would recommend you to use these.
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How do Flosee keep up with what search engines are looking for?
Flosee is comprised of professionals dedicated to the research, technology and innovation required to stay on the cutting edge of search engine trends. We are constantly studying each search engine’s rules, regulations, behaviour and processes as well as assessing our own techniques and their effectiveness.
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What is cloaking? Do you use this technique?
Cloaking is the technique of delivering a particular Web page to a search engine, while serving a completely different Web page to the end user. Search engines commonly overlook – and in some cases even ban – web sites that employ this practice. We are aware of the search engines’ views on cloaking and therefore do not employ this unethical technique.
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40. How can I contact you?
Click here to contact us or call us on 01473 80 88 45 for a FREE Consultation.
