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you can try positioniseverything.net
their 3 col rigid layout is quite cool (even though their example, http://www.positioniseverything.net/piefecta-rigid.html causes eye strain)
As for fluid - that's a lot simpler, look at healthfitnessarticlesweb.com for an example (2 col)
advice - use multiple style sheets; one for positioning of elements, one for the aesthetic styles
This fluid stuff is pretty interesting, however..... given his particular market, I somehow doubt any css or html tricks are going to help much at all. Maybe a little...., but not worth sweating over.
The first half of the battle is already done.... content. As long as it's not copied from any other source, he's good to go.
Now he just needs to clean up some meta junk, and get those links.
I'd save the html and css for when he's sitting at #2 or #3, and trying to finally take that #1 spot.
MrStitch,
I'd bet you are wrong and Northie is straight on the money. I have several websites where the websites are in similar formats. HOWEVER, not identical.
THESE issues are not content nor meta tag/description issues that are leading to my demise. I can do a comparative survey to prove otherwise.
Looke at the results> kewword stuffing: hundreds of phrases in the main content and in coding.
You SAY I keyword stuff? Go look and learn.
the last I looked you can try "dallas computer repair". They have networks setup to kill people like me..........
Keywords...meta tags....please............................................................
I ain't new nor brand new.
Dallas Computer Repair
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kimsuz wrote:
I have long suspected the problem may be in coding. I just don't know much about coding, especially CSS stuff which I know I should. I appreciate your post though Northie, now I just have to decipher it, as easy as you have explained it, I am just ignorantly lost. I will research it and learn CSS and source ordering.
I am a bit ignorant to CSS and source ordering too! Northie, or anyone, do you have some good sources for understanding this? I was doing some html transitional validation and it was recommended that I use CSS.
Here is our current line of code: <body bgcolor="#003399" leftmargin="0" topmargin="0" marginwidth="0" marginheight="0">
and got the errors:The 'marginheight' attribute is not valid for this tag:
E620 The 'topmargin' attribute is not valid for this tag:
E620 The 'leftmargin' attribute is not valid for this tag:
E620 The 'marginwidth' attribute is not valid for this tag:
<body bgcolor="#003399" leftmargin="0" topmargin="0" marginwidth="0" marginheight="0">
14 E620 The 'height' attribute is not valid for this tag:
E620 The 'background' attribute is not valid for this tag:
I can't understand Dreamweaver. Why does it let me select these attributes if they are not valid?! Sorry, had to vent!
So, any help with this or references would be greatly appreciated so I can get my pages validated!
hi Kim - sorry I can't help you with Dreamweaver allowing you to select invalid attributes
but
I can help you fix your page
remove those attributes from your body, and add this style
style="margin: 0"
This page will help you out
http://www.w3.org/TR/html4/index/attributes.html
TombOfTheMutilated.NET - Destroying The Minds of America's Youth Since 2001
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Thanks so much, that fixed my one validation error. I've been looking at the attributes link you sent me from W3C, trying to fix the following now:
<table background="images/msn_index_bkgd.gif" width="800" style="height: 165" border="0" align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" >
but it doesn't say anything about using background in tables, only bgcolor. Would bgcolor="images/msn_index_bkgd.gif" be the right thing to use here so it will pass validation or do I have to use style again somehow? Sorry, I'm struggling a bit through this.
Overall, the validation tool seems to be so picky. I mean why wouldn't the above highlighted be okay?
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Remove this part:
background="images/msn_index_bkgd.gif"
Use this instead
STYLE="background-image: url('images/msn_index_bkgd.gif');"
In general, when you find those proprietary attributes that the validator complains about, you can just remove it and then get the same effect with the style attribue
TombOfTheMutilated.NET - Destroying The Minds of America's Youth Since 2001
Whoa..... not what I expected, honestly.... was just trying to help. sheesh
And I didn't mean to imply that those guys were wrong. What I meant was, that I just can't imagine that the on-line market for computer repair in Texas is so competitive that you can't possibly break the top ten with something.
Could it be an issue? Yes. However, what those guys are talking about is page layout, in regards to getting your content to the top of the page. It is a factor, but I'm just saying that those types of tactics would seem more at home in a largely competitive market.... like Viagra.
Anyways, i went and did a search on google for your search term. The guy in the number one and number 2 slot can get reported for spamming the engine. Never seen so much junk on a page before, hahahahah
Number three is a directory (meh... is that really considered competition?)
Number four at least looks legit, but has a ton of yahoo directory links. Could be an old site? Perhaps it has a lot of trust value in conjunction with those yahoo directory links. Other than that, the linking profile is really nothing to drool over.
Number five could be a little tougher to over come, depending how you look at it. The site has a ton of links, only because of all the websites that they host. The good news is that it's a sub-page that is ranking well. Again, here we have a trust factor that probably comes into play. Also, they don't have hardly any links going to that subpage at all. I'm no expert, but I would think that there is a tad bit of hope to beat that.
Site number six.... spam like the first couple.
Number seven, very similar profile to number 5. But a vast majority of links seem to come from it's own domain, and the page that is ranking is a subpage with very few links. Again, I wouldn't think this would be hard to beat... but I'm no expert.
Number eight is yahoo's directory. Don't know what to tell you there. Never really tried competing with yahoo before. hahaha
Number nine has on-page hidden text. Report them asap, and be done with it.
Number 10 is that one directory again.
Number 11 is another site with tons of spam
Number 12 has hidden on page text, spam spam spam
Number 13 is a directory with no content
And everything else is simply junk sites, directories, and piles of spam sandwiches. (I don't think I've ever seen so much spam in the top twenty..... ever)
But even if we completely ignore the fact that your competition is a bunch of spam junkies, it still doesn't explain a few things......
First, your site does in fact rank well in yahoo and msn, just not google.... #79 i believe.
When I do a site: command in google, I get nothing. However, when I use my FF toolbar to check for cache, i in fact get a cached page of your site from google. Maybe someone here would be kind enough to tell us why we're seeing this. Is there a difference between 'indexed' and 'cached'?
Both of those things together tell me that you could be tripping a filter (or there really is about 70+ spam sites identical to those in the top twenty).
Also, whats the age of your site?
In the end, the first step, will be filling out an extremely long spam report to google. Remember, be nice... report each site on a separate line, with appropriate urls, and exactly what you found on each page. Make it light and easy to read.
If google is not automatically catching the spam now, then they won't catch it later. And those sites certainly aren't going to remove their spam because they feel sorry for you. Take the offensive!!
Since we're on the subject of CSS, i might as well throw in here random stuff like article on automobiles. Or ancient Egyptian architecture.
OOO - I know... how about the impact of the 'Smurfs' on 80's pop culture and their degenerate children? 
I did some looking, and found this article about cached and indexed pages....
Cached and Indexed
I wonder if the site operator will show you indexed pages, as the cache is something else.
If the site is in fact not being included in google's index, then I suspect your site is tripping some kind of filter. Perhaps there really is something about your menu layout that is causing problems. Could be something as simple as one single word in the wrong spot.
It sucks, but thats just the way it is... or could be.
Thanks for helping MrStitch. I wasn't trying to jump you or say your wrong, but as you've seen, it ain't playing out to simple fixes (but fuzzy logic?). I am going to endeavor into CSS (about time) and see if that doesn't clean up some mess that Google believes is foul play or may tend for G to look at it like a junk site.
And for reporting those guys for spam...done it several times, brief and directly to the point. It has never worked for me, no changes to the spam sites. They disappeared about a month ago and have within the last few days returned. A prime example of keyword stuffing. No? That is why I don't think it is my content nor lack of, nor duplication. All content is mine (nothing to brag about...for sure).
The site is about 5 months old being moved from pcvd.bravenet.com (there for a 1.5 years) where at times I was #1. I moved it with a 401 redirect where at the time the site slipped into oblivion from G.
So yeah, I think like you do, that something is there that is tripping a filter. Thanks for taking the time MrStitch. I think my best move is to go to CSS and ditch the drop down menus. It would be a little education for me and if the turn out is good then I have learned a good, costly lesson, but hey its just slave labor here making it happen or not. I just wish the master had a brain in his head (he beats us too but please don't report it).
Dallas Computer Repair
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401 or 301 redirect????
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MrStitch wrote:
401 or 301 redirect????
401 is not a redirect at all, its an error
TombOfTheMutilated.NET - Destroying The Minds of America's Youth Since 2001
401 redirect. I should have used the 301.
404 is an "error page not found".
The proof is in the pudding Mutilated> http://www.pcvd.bravehost.com
(and what the heck is the proof in the pudding anywho?)
Dallas Computer Repair
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Could you still use a 301? Is it possible to go back?
Entirely possible that if a person used the wrong redirect, that you could be handing yourself a duplicate content penalty, or something else that google deems as black hat.
Well, I deleted that site?!?! And remade it. There could only be a few pages that could be somewhat duplicate but they should have been changed significantly enough to not be charged as duplicate which was not intended but just upgrading.
I just deleted the site, then on the index page of the old site I have the 401 code (alone) leading to the new site. I just checked and the site started on Aug-1-06
Dallas Computer Repair
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I'm not an expert on redirects, but maybe someone here would be willing to help out with a better option.
I would think that you could call them, and ask for a .htaccess file with a 301.
Or you'd think a change in the name servers would also work.
uhg.... Seems like there would be SOMETHING you could do.
On the other hand, that old web address didn't have a decent linking profile to begin with. Might prove useful to just wipe it out of existence (getting rid of the redirect page all together).
In the end, it'd look like a brand new site, standing all by itself, instead of getting one of it's few links from a poor redirect.
And in this case, since you don't have many links at all, it's possible that the redirect is hurting (just because there are very few other regular links)
Who knows... but I still smell something bad. Something that says... "God damn... it was right in front of my face the whole time."
Guess??? I am just ignorant. My links are gone or should be for that address. I have tried to change that profile. Will ditch the redirect. I have contacted the owners to let them known I have changed addresses'.
Last edited by thegreatyo (2006-12-20 20:26:32)Dallas Computer Repair
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Probably too late for this, but please don't lose your redirect, if you can change it into a 301 (permanent, Google likes) redirect. Capitalize on your old site that SEs liked.
You can't give up or get bummed at a new, only-5-mos.-old site. It takes time to rise. 79th doesn’t suck for just 5 months, and frankly, with so much spam for your search phrase, folks looking for your service will either be willing to click past the first few pages, or come up with a new term, in hopes of getting to the meat faster. (I’d go with “Computer Repairs” + Dallas, TX if I were searching.) Ever consider submitting your site for the YellowBook links and the like?
And, since SEs like BLs, and you're a computer doctor in Dallas, it seems to me that you have an easy in to get BLs from satisfied customers. Don't any of your customers have their own sites, even if merely personal sites? Easy way to get them to BL to you, while getting something for them -- discounts on services. Just have a policy of giving a 5-10% discount on services rendered, once they include a little, positive review of your services with link on their sites. (Testimonials are pretty for your site, too.) Might even consider setting up referral discount or one free service done, if they bring in X new customers to ya. Doing that, not only gets you more referrals, it also gets you customers more committed to helping you.
Since your business is computer related, by its very nature, your satisfied customers can bring you the best of both worlds (offline and online) -- word-of-mouth referrals, with a little enticement. Putting a little effort into offering these choices increase both kinds of traffic, online and foot. Get enough of that, and suddenly you can watch your site creep up higher on the SEs and find out how much it doesn't matter anymore, if it does.
Also, since your business is for a certain geographic location, you have the advantage of using typical business marketing campaigns also to promote your business online. Do you do consistent PRs (at least, every six weeks?) Do the Dallas media know to come to you as an expert yet? (It might cost you some time/money to schmooze them into calling you and adding you to their article info, but the more they like you, the more they’ll remember you for related info. Have you joined any local business associations? Do you visit forums for frustrated consumers that need your services – not to plop in ads, but to become an expert in your field? Help them, and they’ll remember. Even if they don’t, remember the 10/90 rule – 10% participate in forums, 90% lurk! Marketing should take up 1/3rd of your time in your business. If you’re dealing with SE, keep in mind SEM more then SEO. (Of course, if you do that, SEO is involved with SEM, but don’t get so bogged down in the O that you forget the M!)
You’re goal is to be too busy, not to be the first site on Google. Keep working the marketing plan in as many genres as you can, and then you’ll be too busy to notice, which is on that first page of Google! Number one rule of thumb for businesses should be “Remember the goal. Don’t get bogged down with the side issues.” And, of course, the goal of any business should be “Make money!” LOL
Hope I'm not too late, and I've helped you in unexpected ways.
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Why are the "dallas computer repair" results bad for the end searcher?
Simple, there are a handful of sites that come up that are nothing more than directories. Heck, one of 'em is just some random sites site-map.
Can a searcher physically find what they are looking for via these channels? Yes.... but you can apply that same logic to any search result for any given keyword too.
The point of the thread is to find out why we can't get a fellow SR enthusiasts' site ranked properly within the top 10. Heck, at this point he'd probably take the top twenty.
We are well aware of the linking profile, and I'm sure he's moving forward as we speak.
But even without a decent linking profile, his site offers more relevant content, is properly ogranized, and doesn't include the truck loads of repeat spam and hidden text on his pages that MOST of the other sites have.
I don't believe anyone here would agree that he deserves to be #1, just by looking at the linking profile. But in comparison to the junk sites that are in the top 10, certainly our friend here should be placed somewhere around #6 or so.
Has anyone else here examined the top twenty for that term..... there are some shit sites with little to offer, and small link profiles, spam and hidden text..... and most of these sites have more than one of those issues.
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