GaryTheScubaGuy

Originally Posted by GaryTheScubaGuy

Thanks to Todd at http://www.TheCanadianGambler.com for allowing me to post his site for the potential benefit of all of us being able to look at the site to actually see referenced the website...kudos Mate

Here are a few issues I found, but to be fair this is one of the best sites I've seen in a while.

1. There are 8 outbound links to affiliate sites (Brightshare, Alladins and Bet365) using 302's. I would change these to 301's and also add a nofollow.

Yes, this webmaster dared to write a review or an article and decided to link to related products within the article, via a straight link, to the affiliate. Google likely automatically found the links, felt the site was abusing their paid link policy and slapped them with a penalty for it.

(More here; http://www.google.com/support/webmas...y?answer=66736)

This refers to Google treating outbound links as 'paid links' and therefor penalised this guys site.

A more common reason for 302's is Affiliate hijacking (using 302's) which was a big problem in the past (and even TODAY there are issues of this happening because Google has changed policy (yet again) on 301's and the way that they handle them. WebmasterWorld has a great thread I saw a few days ago with specific examples but can't seem to locate and I have a full plate. I'll try to find it again and amend this post after I have finished all the analysis requests (here it is - http://www.webmasterworld.com/google/4327200.htm)…but the end game is this DO NOT USE 302's….period. There is no reason to.

(Here are many examples on Google's own forum; http://www.google.com/support/webmas...g+more%3Aforum)

Google themselves say to use 301, permanent rather than 302 temporary, redirects if you are moving or merging a site, and that's all 302's were really used for previously except hijacking a site. (http://www.google.com/support/webmas...y?answer=93633)

2. Add nofollows to ALL Affiliate links and banners

3. Optimise or redirect your 404 page.

4. Page Titles - This isn't a recommendation, this is Kudos…not ONE instance of duplicate titles. The best example I have seen of unique titles and proper URL structure. You should give lessons!

5. Descriptions - same as above excellent and unique. (except the rtg-slots and rtg-slots/page/2/ pages - plus you have a couple dozen links pointing back to this page as well)

6. Header tags - Great use of H!'s. I would add some H2's if feasible, as testing I have done in the past seems to indicate that Google, as well as others, will periodically ignore H1 tags because its widely assumed that this is a ranking factor and they try to prevent people like us trying to engineer results as much as we try to engineer them.

7. My crawler isn't picking up any images for some reason, but if you don't have alt and title tags on your images I would add them. Especially the branded images. This may help you on branded searches and add influence to the pages as well (in google's eyes)

8. This isn't criticism, just a recommendation - these are your strongest links. I would see about getting a few more.

Source URL: http://www.gamblingsitesdirectory.com/casinos
Anchor Text: canadian online casinos
Target URL: http://www.thecanadiangambler.com
23 Jun 2011

Source URL: http://www.gamblingsitesdirectory.com/casinos
Anchor Text: canadian online casinos
Target URL: http://www.thecanadiangambler.com
23 Jun 2011

Source URL: http://www.goodbonusguide.com
Anchor Text: online casino
Target URL: http://www.thecanadiangambler.com
24 Jun 2011

Source URL: http://www.betsage.com
Anchor Text: online casino canada
Target URL: http://www.thecanadiangambler.com
24 Jun 2011

Source URL: http://www.onlinecasinoreviewer.co.uk
Anchor Text: online casinos canada
Target URL: http://www.thecanadiangambler.com
23 Jun 2011

9. You are on a US server. If you can entertain moving to a Canadian or UK host (if you are targeting the UK) I would. I would also use geotargeting to tell google your primary geotarget is CA or UK. If you are targeting other regions (look at your current analytics to look at your 2nd and 3rd top referring regions). You may also consider building out subdomains and using regional hosting and geotargeting. This will definitely help when users use advanced search metrics like 'Results from…..).

10. You have a bit of house cleaning you can do to improve load time. Optimize images (I knew they were there somewhere) and put your content closer to the top of the page. You can use http://analyze.websiteoptimization.com to identify a few other tips.

Be sure to check back and keep us updated on any improvements!

Hope this helps.

GaryTheScubaGuy

Ps. Almost forgot; although your top 5 links are pointing to the index page, I would build any new ones to internal pages that are branded anchors. Especially Bet365 if it pays and converts like many do, plus the fact in performing a co.uk Google search (I'm in the UK) the top site I get when I do a brand search for bet365 (besides bet365.com's own site) is an Affiliate site that isn't even gaming specific. I see this as an opportunity. For that matter most of the results are Affiliate sites.