Bing's "9 Things You Need to Control"

Came across this article in the Bing community site blogs that discusses important aspects to improving your site's quality which, in turn, influences ranking.

http://www.bing.com/community/site_blogs/b/webmaster/archive/2011/11/29/nine-things-you-need-to-control.aspx

Note that the first item, "Rel=canonical" is being addressed to some degree in v8. I'll leave it for Chris to describe how broadly this is implemented.

ocPortal already is capable of automatic sitemap creation if you set up the CRON job (what ocPortal calls the "scheduler").

I believe v8 also addresses the issues with duplicate title tags and meta descriptions. Again, I will defer to Chris to explain how broadly this is supported.

I'd also be interested in seeing Chris's comments on rich snippets and social integration.

The content and other issues are largely up to you with some sharing of responsibility of the UX experience with the ocPortal developer team.

All in all, I believe that ocPortal will score quite highly with the release of v8 whenever that occurs presumably sometime in 2012.


Bob

"rich snippets"

We were the first CMS to integrate this, quite a while back now. You need to turn on HTML5 mode as schema.org requires it for valid markup. I think how to do this is explained in one of our announcements. It's not on by default as HTML5 is not finished yet so it'd be inappropriate for us to enable support for a draft standard.

"social integration"

The v8 non-bundled addons handle this very nicely.

Very good to hear Chris.

Care to comment on how widely implemented "rel=canonical" is. Also the issue with duplicate titles and meta-descriptions. I thought I remember that both those are addressed in v8.
Much of the duplicate content will be resolved by "rel=canonical tags it seems to me.

Bob

All was dealt with.

rel="canonical" is used as discussed, with things like sorting parameters not included so as to limit the number of indexed URLs.

This is really great news as it will consolidate PR on the canonical URLs as well as limit "over-indexing".

Bob

FTR I will voice it here and now (Despite the fact my opinion here and now will not matter an iota) I despise the fact that they are hinting on using social integration as a method to affect PR!!!! This is wrong wrong wrong!!! I for one am not a very big fan of most of the current social sites like the one for Twits and FoolBook and the practice of rewarding (forcing) site developers to integrate any kind of linking system into their domains to these sites encourages monopolistic practice and I don't like it one bit! Bing -> Eat my dirty socks! Nuff said!

Duck-

I'm not crazy about this either but I've seen it coming since MS made their hefty investment in FB. And you can already see the heavy cross-pollination between Google and G+.

The continued investment by venture capitalist into firms like Klout whose sole purpose is to measure social influence is one more reflection of this brave new world.

It's a bit like the other discussion where I posit what might be used in a ranking algorithm. My attitude is that if Google or Bing is providing metrics they either are or are planning to use this metric for ranking purposes. You don't really think that Google provides page loading speed in GA "just because", do you? That's an obvious "user experience" ranking factor that they just have not overtly mentioned outright.

Bob

Well one things for certain the sheep will scatter once they see the wolf! OR so we can hope...

I think you're going to be hoping for a long time.

The search engines have been the gatekeepers and overlords for so long that even large organizations bend to their will. The only thing that might slow things down is government inquiries and don't expect any of those coming from the US. The EC does pay a lot more attention to these issues so there is some small hope, but I think the search providers and big social media sites have  got their story down pat as how this will improve things for all parties.

by the way, that is one reason I asked Chris about social integration in ocPortal. It seems he also saw the handwriting on the wall.

Bob

I'm a big fan of social media (although I never have, and probably never will, understand why people use Twitter) and I agree with Facebook's argument that people are more likely to share, view, and discuss things that they find if it is brought to their attention via their friends. In fact, Facebook is now the number-one place I get and discover most of my news, reviews, memes, products, funny YouTube clips, and other gems that would otherwise be hidden away out of sight deep in the abyss of the Internet. I even find myself clicking on links that I would have otherwise never have sought out myself.

Furthermore, when I visit a website or read an article, my first instinct is to 'like' it, because I know it'll filter back to my friends on Facebook. And if I see that my Facebook account can be used to make comments on these articles in just a couple of clicks, then it actually spurs me into commenting. If I didn't have these handy tools available to me, then I often wouldn't bother to engage with the content, which would mean that my friends on Facebook wouldn't be notified about it. A lot of site-owners are still missing out on free advertising because of their lack of social media integration.

Of course, not every website will be perfectly suited for heavy social-network-integration, but I think it should still be encouraged. I strongly feel that social networks are only going to become more centralised, so it will be in the interests of website owners to get on board and make their content easily-sharable.

Robbie-

I actually agree with you which was the reason I commented a while back that I was glad to see that v8 was going to be more "social."

My problem is this sort of forced march by the search providers who are implying that social integration may become a ranking factor. I think this is what really bothers Duck, too.

Social integration on a website like mine carries its own benefits as you have explained but having it considered for ranking purposes just seems wrong to me. It further concentrates leading SERPs into the hands of the few who are in a position to implement social integration. On the other hand, this is just another reason I am happy to have chosen ocPortal as my CMS.

Bob

@Robbie - Bob says what I mean exactly.  I don't deny the fact that social media integration or (or perhaps "Utilization" is a better word) can be important or help a websites growth and involvement (even if I still don't like it much) but I don't think it should be used to increase my Search Engine Rankings. MY REAL friends I all have meail addresses and phone numbers for I don't see the problem in using these tools to spread the word of my site and it's content.  and personally I'd rather read comments to my article on my site not someones dang foolbook! I get rather annoyed iwth foolbook because I dont go on often and it seems everytime I do they've changed something around and what took me a half hour to find last time now takes me another half hour to find again and I was here only 3 - 6 months ago for crying out loud! I also don't like reading all the dumb games people have been playing or the fact that they had a bowel movement this morning or that their girfriend broke their heart etc etc etc etc. Regardless though it should be my choice to  help boost activity on Foolbook or TwitsrUs adn if I choose not to then my page rank should not be penalized.

Well you could argue that you don't have to choose to add keywords to your site, but that would clearly and dramatically undermine your SEO. Every site has to have keywords, just like in the future every site will have to have social media integration/utilisation, because that's where things are heading.

My point is that if the web is moving to a more social/shared approach, then it is reasonable for the search engines to want to rank highly the websites that adopt these latest practices.

As you've said, Duck, you don't like social media, so it's clearly not for everyone, but it is for a LOT of people. Over a billion of them, in fact.

Just one further point: giving people tools to connect their social media accounts to your website doesn't mean that they won't get involved in your website. It actually means that a) you'll get more traffic, and b) it's actually easier for them to get involved if they want to (just a couple of clicks can get you logged in and posting comments on your site via their Facebook account, for example).

Choice is good, but ultimately the search engines have to follow trends, as well as set them, and the current trend is to make things more social.

Robbie-

What you say is true and makes sense as long as the ranking issue is a trailing factor. I don't believe it is the rightful place of a search engine to blaze new trails in making certain criteria important; they should simply be quantifying what has already achieved mass uptake which, in the case of social media, may make sense.

Bob

I don't believe the keyword argument you make falls into the same category with what I am talking about. I know Bob gets what I am saying. I'll give you an example of something in real life which I think it compares to:

I had friends that go to church (can't remember for sure the denomination but I think Catholic) but they asked me to sponsor a gift box the put together to give to underprivileged children in Africa. I am more than happy to. They put into it all kinds of toys and stuff (I think mostly Dollar store trinkets etc) but it is hugely impressive to these kids who have nothing. Well I didn't find out till recently that the kids HAVE to agree to convert to their Christianity in order to receive the gift. I was appalled! Sure tease the little kid with all these great prizes and say if you want it you must promise to come to our church and do what we say! I have never been more disgusted.

 Well that is a very close relationship to what they are doing requiring you to provide these Social integration to your site in order to reward you. It is plain wrong.  I am not saying one might be foolish not consider the Social sites as a tool to boost their site but it should A) be optional (by this I mean no reward extra rank reward or penalty on your choice) and B) your method to utilize those tools should be your choice - meaning I can not put direct links on my site (or tools or what have you ) to them but I can go to FB and start my own buzz about my site from within it or things like that. Since Links to your site obviously increase your rank (and rightly so) it could be wise to use FB to spread links into your site but I should not have to put links in my site OUT to FB which only serves to boost their rank.  If you follow my drift. Don't get me wrong until I find a way to populate my site equally powerfully I will likely use what social connections I can but I want alternatives and I also want choice. I don't want to be "Converted" just to get the box of goodies!

Duck said

I had friends that go to church (can't remember for sure the denomination but I think Catholic) but they asked me to sponsor a gift box the put together to give to underprivileged children in Africa. I am more than happy to. They put into it all kinds of toys and stuff (I think mostly Dollar store trinkets etc) but it is hugely impressive to these kids who have nothing. Well I didn't find out till recently that the kids HAVE to agree to convert to their Christianity in order to receive the gift. I was appalled! Sure tease the little kid with all these great prizes and say if you want it you must promise to come to our church and do what we say! I have never been more disgusted.

As an atheist, this makes me want to vomit.