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E-Marketing Performance Blog

Double Check Your Dynamic Website

Search engines don’t have the trouble indexing dynamic sites that they once had, but dynamic sites still can present a myriad of issues. If you need to implement a dynamic system be sure to do your homework to find one that is search engine friendly. One of the best ways to test a dynamic system for search friendliness is to use a search spider simulator to navigate through a site. If the spider can easily navigate to every page then the biggest roadblock has been averted.

Reduce Variables

It’s always best to eliminate excessive amounts of variable characters such as “?”, “ID”, or “=” in the dynamically generated URLs. In the past, these often acted as stop characters, forcing the search engine spider to move on to more friendly URLs. This is no longer the case, today. However, if a URL has too many variables, then the search spider may have cause to be more wary and index fewer pages of your site with each visit. Also, note that you should not force user IDs on your visitors until after they have added products to your shopping cart.

Implement Mod Rewrite

If possible you should implement a mod rewrite on your dynamic URL strings. The mod rewrite is a server side function that changes dynamic URLs into more search engine and user friendly URLs while still allowing the dynamic system to function properly.

www.mysite.com/product.htm?categoryID=45682903_ProductID=34394098

becomes

www.mysite.com/honda/battery_charger/

This post is part of a continuing series on the topic of:
Designing a Money-Making Website

Sub-Topic: Avoiding Common Web Design and Marketing Mistakes

Previous Posts:
Trash the Splash Pages
Don’t Use Frames
Avoid All-Flash Site Designs
Don’t Put Important Text Within Images

Search for all posts on Designing a Money-Making Web Site, including this and the following sub-topics:

Building a Professional Website that Achieves Your Goals
Creating a Marketing Focused Website that Sells

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