If you are like me, you like to have your Metatags like description and keywords filled with relevant content..

You could have Metatag generators for you website, or overviews of the content with a component like OpenSEF.
But what if you don’t use OpenSEF but sh404SEF?
In that case you could register and download the Joomla Metatag component form iJoomla.

But if you just want to see what pages still are in need of content for these Metatags.
In that case there is now a very simple but effective and easy to use modules, with two versions, one for the Joomla 1.0.x versions and for Joomla 1.5…

It is written by Dan Rahmel who also wrote two Books about Joomla!
and

And it is easy to install.

The module is installed as a normal module, but it is only for the administrator.
That is why it is listed under the Administrator part of the Modules and has to be published and positioned on the cPanel, which means that it will be visible on you administrator homepage (the first one after you login)

After publication you find the items without the Description and Keywords listed on a separate Tab on the Administrators page.

You can download the version you want from JoomlaJumpStart.com where you can even find more information on Joomla and the insights of Dan Rahmel.

There are people who will tell you that Metatags like the Description and Keywords are useless these days.. for Search Engine Optimization that is.

But try to work on writing good solid page descriptions and use just up to a maximum of 10 keywords in the keyword field.
Use the keywords you have used in the page, and in the Title and wait for the next index round of Google.

The Descriptions field mostly show up under you page title and should be written as a small advertisement to bring you the visitors you want.

Want to read more? Check out Joomla & SEO Blog.

I have been running a test-site installation of the new Joomla 1.5 RC 1 to see what improvements there have been made for SEF and SEO.

There is a difference between SEF and SEO, you can read more about that on  Search Engine Friendly or already Search Engine Optimized but I will not go into that much more here, as the point of the exercise was the see what changed / improved.

First thing you notice is that the Basic URL without the SEO Option set is still the same as before.

Next  you go into your Global configuration and look up the Seo Settings…
That has changed a little, and has a new option, which is really great!

Did you see it? There is an option that says “Use mod_rewrite” ! and the best part is that is works!
So now if you don’t know how to, or can not use a .htaccess file because of provider restrictions, you can still have SEF URLs like this one..

You see there is now an index.php between your domain name and the SEF URL.

Full SEO Options

You can set both settings and use an .htaccess file to get ride of the index.php so that the full (SEF) URL looks like:

Hmm.. maybe they should call it SEF Settings? But it is a great improvement that you can use the SEF URLs without a special component.

Does that mean that we don’t have to use a SEF Component anymore?
No, they are still very valuable for several functions like URL rewrites… yes those still apply, because you want more control over the how the URL is formed.

The SEF function of RC 1 uses the Title Alias for the URL, so you can play a little with that, but that takes away a possible use of the alias for HTML Title rewrites…

Also you want to control the 404 Sef function and landing page, with Joomla 1.5 RC 1 there is good basic 404 page with the right headers, so old URLs will be removed form the search engines.

Also SEF component is able to prevent Rewriting URLs if a Components doesn’t support them and breaks with te standard URLs.

The Duplicate Metatag problem 

What you would see with the “Old” Joomla was that the Global Metadata was inserted into the HTML code together with the Article Metatags like description and keywords.

The problem seems now to be resolved, so if you now fill an article with The Metatags Description and Keywords (and you know you should) than ONLY those tags are in the source code!

From a Search Engine Optimization view, this is a very good thing… problem is that you still get the Global description on every page you don’t fill the parameters, so pleas leave the Globals empty and let the search Engines pick there own excerpts. 

You see, there is still a need for a nice Metatag generator if you have lots off pages or multiple editors.

Overall SEO conclusion for Joomla 1.5 RC 1

You have a better Content Management System than before from a Search Engine Friendly and Optimization point of view.
The basics are in Place to get any new website based on this Joomla 1.5 version to get better results, just by activating the SEO Settings on a bare minimum of SEF URLs.

Its a very big improvement that it can work without the .htaccess files that so many people are struggling with, so that every website can have nice URLs to work with, so set that configuration option to ON.

As I will do some more testing, expect more post on these and other items, but please be patient, as I want to Inform you based on experiences, and time is limited..

So if you want to be up-to-date, and you liked the post, use the RSS Feed to keep up..

Want to read more? Check out Joomla & SEO Blog.

As you might know, the number one factor for Search Engine Optimization is the Title Tag of you page.

But you want your page title to be short and strong, building it with one or two keywords to provide a good reference to the content of the page.
The Joomla Page title is show as the first part of your page.

The HTML Title Tag is something different, it is the text shown in your Browser Title bar and is indexed by Google and shown in the Search Results Pages.
It is contained within the titletag < title > Title description < /title > in the source code.

For Joomla this was standard the page title you provided… was… because now you have the opportunity to change just the HTML Title !!
This functionality as already a  feature of the paid SEF patch from Joomlatwork.

And now, there is a Plugin for Joomla that provides you with the following opportunity:

Change the Alias of the Title in your Joomla page and have it shown as the HTML Title…
Thus you can bring in more keywords or better crafted Titles to improve your rankings..

Here is an example Basic Optimization is the Joomla page title, but with the Plugin the Title now says “Basic Optimization for Joomla websites”.

I think you can find some pages on your website that can profit from this new Plugin JooFox Content Title

One word of caution, if you are using a SEF Component and have configured it to use the Title alias for URL rewrites, you better not use this one… because rewriting your Titles in that case changes your URL as well.
And that would be worse..

Also if you use the Paid SEF Patch (which has a great installer..) you don’t need this Plugin, as you already have that possibility.

For all Joomla websites, this should be a great opportunity to get more and better Titles for your pages, without have to change the content and URLs of you Joomla Page titles!

So here it is again, the JooFox Content Title Plugin from http://www.antoniodeluca.info/ go get it and start optimizing you Page titles…

Want to read more? Check out Joomla & SEO Blog.

I found a module today bij http://www.joomlaworks.gr/ called “Ultimate Content Display” which is working great.

What is does? It can display content from sections or categories in a simple to place module position.
But the best part is, it can change the articles it shows by setting some parameters!

So why is this so exciting? Because you can now have ”fresh” content on for example your Frontpage simple by adding this module.
Think about it… you can show returning visitors articles they otherwise may have never seen.
But also you have fresh content on you homepage every time the Googlebot, Yahoo or Live robots visits…

You can have the content in a list form, or a slide / fader with time settings and many options more.
I will write an extended how-to use and copy the module on www.pathos-seo.com later next week.

You can see the module in action on the Frontpage (on the bottom of the page)  of www.pathos-seo.com where it says Random content.

The Module you can download from www.joomlaworks.gr

Want to read more? Check out Joomla & SEO Blog.

Joomla SEF and SEO Questions? When you have questions about Joomla with regards to making Joomla Search Engine Friendly, and the next step, making it Search Engine Optimized, where do you go the get answers?

Well, you found this Blog and the website www.pathos-seo.com I hope…

But that is where you can rad all about it, with How-To’s and hopefully some great insights in improving your own website.

For getting answers to questions you might have with specific situations this is of course not a great solution.|
You want to post a question and get an answer as quick as possible…

Now you have several options to do that, main source of Joomla information is the forum at forum.joomla.org
If you have a more specific question related to SEF and SEO with Joomla your have recently got two extra specific forums to post your question:

The Joomla SEO Forum at Alledia
The Joomla SEO Forum at Joomlashack

Both Forums are great resources of getting more information in how to solve problems with your Search Engine Optimization for your Joomla website.

And yes, before you ask, I try to visit and answer Joomla SEO and SEF question on these Forums.

P.s. For the Dutch readers, you can go to SEO-SEF Google Forum on www.dutchjoomla.org

Want to read more? Check out Joomla & SEO Blog.

I was looking at search-ranking-factors at SEOmoz.org and they not only have made a very good list to look for Search Engine Optimization factors.
They also have a list of negative factors and there is a top five of negative factors.

Here is the short list:

• Server is Often Inaccessible to Bots
• Content Very Similar or Duplicate of Existing Content in the Index
• External Links to Low Quality/Spam Sites
• Duplicate Title/Meta Tags on Many Pages
• Overuse of Targeted Keywords (Stuffing/Spamming)

Looking at these factors its easy to see where thing go wrong in a standard installation of Joomla (before version 1.5)

Duplicate Content 

First one is the Content similar to Duplicate or Existing in the Index:
This is because in a standard installation there are version in the standard HTML, PDF versions and print versions of each page of your website.

To prevent this, you should disable this functions in your Global Configuration under Content, disable the PDF and Print buttons.

Duplicate Title and or Meta Tags on Many Pages

All tough the Duplicate Title will not that easily happen, the Meta Tags can be a problem.  

If you use the standard Metadata fields in the Global configuration you could really have a problem with this.
These value’s are given to each page in your website…
Even if you use the separate Fields of each page to give a separate description and keywords!

You can simple check this if your site is indexed by Google, just do a search in Google like site:www.example.com and see what is in the description fields.. it might surprise you.

The best way to prevent this is to leave your Metadata fields empty and fill your page Descriptions and Keywords.
Even if you don’t wont to use that, leave all fields blank and let the search engines take the excerpts from your pages.

Overuse of Targeted Keywords (Stuffing/Spamming)

I wrote a post about this problem a while ago Joomla and Keyword stuffing and its of course related to the same problem as the one above.

The simple solution is to leave the Global Metadata fields blank.
Because Joomla will ADD the meta keywords to the list of keywords in your Global configuration.

You could install the free SEF patch from Joomlatwork.com to overcome some of these problems.

With the solutions used to prevent the above you can overcome some of the Negative Ranking Factors.
All it takes are some simple configuration changes and empty the Global Metadata fields,  so make sure you don’t let your website fall into the Top 5 factors… 

Want to read more? Check out Joomla & SEO Blog.

I just received an email telling me that “The Little Joomla SEO Book” just has been translated into Russian…

Now that is what I like about the Internet and sharing Knowledge, so that people can help each other, even in other languages.

If you are Russian, you can go to Russian version of this book available here (translated by Dead Krolik)

At the same time I saw the Images for the SEO Book by Steven from Alledia.
I had the pleasure of proof reading his Joomla SEO Book, and I can highly recommend it if you are ready to make your Joomla site better found in the Search engine’s.

So now you have three alternatives:

• my Little Joomla SEO Book
• Alledia Joomla SEO Book $ 37 with Lifetime upgrade and 100% satisfaction guarantee.
• Compassdesign Joomla SEO Book (registration required)

And of course a big thank you to to Dead Krolik for his translation for the Russian Joomla Community.

Want to read more? Check out Joomla & SEO Blog.

You are always looking at your statistics, to see how people are coming to your website, right? You know you should…

But here is another way of looking at your website and what people are looking for on your site.
You have of course the Global Configuration statistics for Text Search set to on.

And you sometimes look at these searches to improve you website to give your visitors the information they are looking for.

Recently there was a new Joomla module listed on the extension site, its probably one of those extensions that slips through your mind as, well.. just another SEO Plugin..
But it is not, its not even made for SEO, although there could be a slight advantage for Search Engine Optimization.
I will tell you more later on in this post.

This Module uses the Search Keywords that people have used to find your website, and places each of those search words in a special search Block.
I changed some basic parameters in the Module Configuration and see what happens if people use the string “Joomla seo” and hopefully find www.pathos-seo.com :-)

The results in the Module..

Now your visitor can just click on a search word they used to do a further search in your website.

These searches are then stored in your search statistics.

 The Search Engine Optimization Benefits

To be honest, I did not see any benefits at first, just an improvement to your user experience.
But that is also a great, if not even a greater asset the just SEO, for your website.

If you also run the Cache Component you have read about before, you will see that the results stay cached on the site.
Although this seemed a bit strange at first, form a cache point of view it makes sense.
I just reduced the cache time to improve on this special module.

Why is this good for SEO than.. because people are more likely to do a simpel search if tis ready for them, just one click away!
And that may result in more page views, a longer stay on your Joomla website! all good things.
A better user experience might bring them back again and again..

You are now even more able to look at what people are searching for on your site and you can provide the content they want.

The module is simply called Search Engine Keywords on you site and installation is simpel, try it on your website!

P.s. the Cache is also helping to keep your keywords on the page, which is also good for other visitors then the initial searcher that provided the keywords.

O, if you don’t see any keywords, you just got into the no-keywords cached page….
Try this search ”design cars” and look for www.design-cars.com ,it has the same module installed.

Want to read more? Check out Joomla & SEO Blog.

I recently came across a post of Alledia about this new Joomla Cache Component.

And since I want you to have a really good performing website I checked it out for you.

It blew me away…

Point is that you can speed up your website by using the cache funtion of Joomla itself and thus gaining some speed in loading you pages.

This component is going to boost your performance (page loading time that is) not simple by 0ne or two percent… no you see loading times drop by double digits percentages!

But there are some things you need to know before installation:

• The speed gain is for not-logged-in users, that means the visitors to your site, not the members!
• Some Core files are hacked, but the installation makes backup files and there is an uninstall option
• You get a text “Powered By Page_Cache by Ircmaxell” under the Footer of you site, but for just $10 dollar you can buy a license file that takes that away… or hack the component code yourself, which is also okay by the developer (You got to Love this Guy..)

Installing the component 

Installation of the component is pretty easy, you just create or copy a few extra files and change permissions on them before installation.

First create these files or copy them from the originals and rename them

Then upload those to your root and administrator directory via FTP, or JoomlaXplorer.
Change the persmission on the originals and the just oploaded files to 707 (my favorite instead of 777)

Now you are ready to install, you can do that just like any normal component via your controlpanel.

Configuration of the Cache

Setting up the configuration after installation is also very easy.
Just open the Configuration of the component and set the options you want.

Just make sure you put in you cache directory and that it is writable, you can use the joomla standard and fill in “cache/”, don’t forget the trailing “/”.

Its up to you if you want to have the loading time shown as well below the “Powered by” field.

Leave the rest to the standard which will works fine for most of your websites.

The Real Benefits and the Extra Bonus

Af course you want to know about the results..
Well, my home page on www.pathos-seo.com went from a loading time of 1.2 seconds to 0.07 seconds from the cached version and I allready used the standard Joomla cache!

Which you should leave on for your members!!

But the best results was with one of my customers..
They are using the Virtuemart component with a productscoller on the Frontpage.
The products always took some time to load so the scroller part was not filled for about 1 to 2 seconds.. now it is up with the rest of the page in under 0.5 seconds.

One of the bigger issues was that if they update the site, that was also using the Joomla cache, they did not see the update results because the frequently forgot to clear the cache an then relaod the page…

The newly installed component clears the cache if you hit “save”… thus making the changes directly visible! No more mails and Phone calls about not seeing the updates..

Some other results that are reported on the Forum:
Mambohut reported 0ver 97% best decrease of loading time

Alternative for this component

There is also a commercial component from one of the most knowledgeable people on letting you Joomla site perform better The Joomla Performance Booster which cost $ 39,00 and comes with full support.

So if you need first class commercial support this one is a good choice..

And yes, I have all my wesbites and that of my customers now on this Extra Cache Component…
A new must have for your website.

You can Download the component from the IrcMaxell Download section !!
There are also some plugins specific for some other components like JomComment and JoomlaBoard if you use that..

Want to read more? Check out Joomla & SEO Blog.

Looking at Google and Live.com really promoting the use off their Personalized pages makes you think….
And of course the fact that IE7 also has a Feed button on board, means that there is more potential coming from RSS

If every one is creating there personalized pages with content delivered to them, the best way you can stay in touch is by giving them a Feed to put on those pages.

But there is yet another reason to work with Feeds, and that is that they might gain more importance for SEO in the future than You might think, read this post from Arron Wall about Global Links and Subscription data and you will see that it is going to be more important to get readers for your RSS Feeds.

Make sure you have your Feed run via a service like www.feedburner.com to give you visitors an easy choice on there favorite Feed Reader, or even via E-Mail.

Also make sure to have a Full Feed, just to make your visitors aka Feed-Readers happy…

For WordPress, there is a FeedBurner Plugin, for Joomla I suggest your read Overcoming-the-joomla-rss-feed-syndication-problem

So, what are you waiting for, get those Feeds Burning…

Want to read more? Check out Joomla & SEO Blog.

I really, really want a 404 page for my Joomla sites!

I know, you can create one via a content page, if its a static or dynamic, and set that URL in the configuration of your SEF component…
Been there, done that.. even do for most of my sites anyway.

BIG problem with this is, not that I loose my visitor, because I make sure that it looks good and I give several options to choose alternatives to go into the site.

Biggest problem with the this option via Joomla and a SEF or redirect components is the fact that my Error page headers are wrong!!
No, not the text headers, my HTTP headers!
Check yours via this On-line Header Checker.

Yes I can create a separate file and set an Error document setting in my .htaccess file, works also, but not so good for me, I want my CMS to handle this file! 

Now if you use WordPress, you are fine, because WordPress gives you the right headers, and you can manage you Error pages mostly by editing you 404.php page that is included in the Template.

But for Joomla, whatever you do, you always get a status 200 OK, even if its wrong… because every thing goes via the index.php!
I would like to have the ability to edit my 404 page as a special page in Joomla itself, not depending on a SEF Component like Joomsef (who has it Build in….but I don’t like the Advertisements within the Component..) 

On of the problems this lack of a good 404 Error page is that, if you remove pages from you website, or change the URLs, they still keep popping up in the Search results pages…. Joomla says they have a status 200 OK so no need to take them out of the Index!

So if anybody knows how to solve this in an easy way… please leave a comment and I will test and come back on it..

Want to read more? Check out Joomla & SEO Blog.

Here is a Little tool I use to keep up with al the news that comes out on Joomla!, Joomla Components and Blogs…

I hope you already use it, if not, then this post is for you.

It is called Netvibes and it saves me a lot of time… so could you.
You can create an account for free with Netvibes and just try it, it won’t cost you a thing, just time (very precious) but in the end it will save you time.

There are lots of things you can do with Netvibes, like organizing your feeds like the Joomla Blogs onto one Tab.

But you can also work with your own favorites, Flickr Foto’s, Alexa rankings, Gmail,Yahoo mail, yes even POP3 mail accounts, all on one website, organized with tabs, or however you like it, just drag and drop the content you want in the place you want!!.

Isn’t that great, so Web2.0.. and from a Search Engine or Traffic building tool point of view….
Build a tab with all your favorite Joomla Blogs and Websites (including yours) and publish it on the Netvibes EcoSystem to share it with other Netvibes users.

It is one of the best tools I use to keep Informed on-line, and you can access your page from any Internet connected PC, just login!

You could also try the “Personalized Home” pages of Google , or the one from Yahoo or Flake pages, but Netvibes is for me by far the best! Just go ahead and try it out….

P.s. If you want to use Personalize Google pages, Gmail is now free for All !! Just go to www.Gmail.com and sign up.
Even if you don’t want to use it for mail, you still need it for the Google Webmaster Tools which are now out of Beta http://googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.com/

Want to read more? Check out Joomla & SEO Blog.

Maybe you already noticed, but the overture keyword suggestion tool is really working sometimes and most of the time not at all.

But there is hope for you since one of the major players i this field is promoting there own tool:
free keyword suggestion tool from WordTracker

I have tried it, and it works great, and even faster then the Overture tool…
You get 100 related keywords And you can also get a estimate on the daily search volume at the end of the list.

Use the tool and add your results to you Google output that you created.
Form those two tools, you will have some good keywords to target based on what people are really searching for.

But of you don’t want to do the hard work, here is a short list of commercial software tools that can make your life a lot easier.

• Wordtracker
• Keywordelite
• IBP Search Engine Optimization Software
• Total Optimizer Pro

I suggest you use these if you do a lot of research for customers to reduce your time.
If you just are working on SEO for your own website, the above mentioned free tools will do fine.

Want to read more? Check out Joomla & SEO Blog.

There is no “C” in Joomla?, of course there is, You know there is a C !
Joomla is a “C”ontent Management System.
And that is where the majority of your SEO is done!

Content is what they want.

No, You should not look for what you can do to play the the Search Engines, devote your time to focus on your visitors.
Most of the mayor search engines like Google, Yahoo en Live now want you to build quality content for you visitors.

And Building a quality site is just what makes Joomla a great tool to work with.

Looking at Joomla, you have a Content Management System that lets you Build large sites, with the possibility to give you site the right structure.

A structure that you can make out of Sections, which you then divide into categories.
And in those categories you put your content, your pages.

Once you defined you structure, start building, a few pages per week, will get you a site in one year that holds more than a hundred pages!

And building a page is easy in Joomla, push “new” in you content overview and start writing…

Use all the features that you can, from Title to Metatags Information, its all there.

Writing to Boost your ranking

You saw the way you can build and structure your site.
Try and do your writing the same way:

Your Writing is Your Best SEO

Make sure you write your headlines with passion, and make your paragraphs easy to identify.

Use short sentences where possible and look at the overall page impression.
Can you “scan” the page? Can you find your keywords in the bolded paragraph headings.

Use H2 and if necessary H3 HTML headers, But use the H1 not more then One or two times on a page.

But the most important thing you can do, is to write information that your visitors are looking for.
Whether your write about product, services or Information or a special subject, always but out the best you can.

Look at yourself, what do you want to read about if you are looking on information on you sites topic.
And then write about it!!

Want to read more? Check out Joomla & SEO Blog.

I have been writing about using the Description Metatag in Joomla before on several Blogs.

So I thought I will tell you about the importance of this special Metatag here as well.

Joomla Meta Info Tab 

As you might know, there are two special fields that show on the Meta Info tab in each content item in Joomla.

First you have the Description, followed by the Keywords.

If you read about Metatags on the Internet in relation to Search Engine Optimization, a lot of people will tell you not to spend any time on it.

I am telling you to take the time to learn how to write good page descriptions and put in some keywords from the content as well.

Most important item here is the Description Metatag !!

If you look at the Search REsults Page (SERP) in Google and other Search Engines you will see the content of these description tags showing up right under the Title tag.

Just try and do some searches on your own… later afcourse…

There seem to be even some studies to confirm the following:
- People are more likely to click on the Link that has a good description than on the top links, especially if this is “above the fold” , that means in the first screen part, seen without scrolling.

Here you see the Importance of a good description Metatag, as that is what is mostly show.
Google however also likes to take some excerpt of the content just below the relevant text they found on your page.

Description Metatag and Getting the Visitors

If the content of your Description Metatag is shown so prominently in the Search results, then this is where you can get the advantage over your competitors.

People look at the page title to see if its relevant to there search, right after that the read the text underneath the title.

So make sure you write your text for this tag as good as you possibly can, including the keyword(s) you try to target.
Just think of this text as a small advertisement for free from the search Engines…..

Look at Your Description Tag as a free advertisment

Lure your visitors to your rich content page, but don’t write a fake description that does not cover the page content !! 

Just like any good advert, deliver what you promised !!, the competition is just one click back…

You should make it a second nature, to think and write the Meta Info directly after you wrote your page content.
This way the subject of your writing is still fresh in your head, and then its easy to make a little to the point excerpt of your page.

Keyword Metatag

This one has lost a lot of its power early in the search engines history.
People wrote the keywords several dozen or more times into the tag, thus creating the need for search engines to reduce the value.

Some I..d..ts eh, less informed Search Engine Optimization specialists, still use this techniques called Keyword Stuffing or Spamming.
Which is great if you want to get out of the Google and other indexes.. 

You can still use this keywords Metatag, but use it the right way.
Just put in between 5 and 10, at the most thirty (on big pages) keywords, that are in the content of the page.
Don’t try to put in something like ”nude” if that is not the topic of your page.
You could even hurt your page rank that way, as this is also seen as spamming.

Metatag Generators

If you are using OpenSef on your Joomla site, your can find the pages that are missing these tags with the SEO Assistant and then choose the Metatag Generator.

You should not use the automatic generation for the tags, because you most certainly do a better Job writing them yourself.

But if you want to start with one to see how it works, fine, let it run for a few pages and see what comes up, it might save you some time.

There are some other Metatag generators for Joomla out there, but please write your own if you want top quality, you have read why its important..

P.s. if you want the tags to perform the way they should, you MUST install the SEF Patch from http://www.joomlatwork.com/ !!
If you don´t, then please, please look how the description tags come out in the source code of the page and change the Tags in the Global Configuration to the bare minimum, as it is attached in the source code ahead of the page description…
Sometimes is even better to loose the Tags from the Global config alltogether.

if you want to see how your page and descriptions show up in Google, try to search “site:www.example.com”  replace with your own domain name.

Want to read more? Check out Joomla & SEO Blog.