Q&A with Weebly SEO Expert & Head of Organic Growth!

[Erin6]

Hi, friends!

Today, we'll be chatting with Adam Tanguay, SEO expert & Head of Organic Growth at Weebly. He'll be arriving at 9am PST to answer your questions. If you won't be around then, feel free to go ahead and ask!

Thanks, and see you at 9am!

Erin

Weebly Community Manager

[JustImagine]

I am here and here is my question for Adam

When checking my site with one of these free tools, I have this message:

"Your site's IP xxx.xx.xxx.xx does not redirect to your site's domain name. This could cause duplicate content problems if a search engine indexes your site under both its IP and domain name."

What does it mean and how to fix it?

[Atom1]

Hi, @JustImagine. This is tricky because IP addresses can serve multiple hosts. When it comes to duplicate content at a high level the best thing you can do is make sure you register both www and non-www versions of your domain in Google Search Console (Webmaster Tools). Then choose your preferred domain version (either www or non-www) from the site settings section. This should address root domain level duplicate content problems. Also, by setting your domain in this tool you will get information directly from Google about any duplicate content concerns, which should help you diagnose and fix any future issues. 

[JustImagine]

@Atom

Thank you Adam. Can you please clarify what is  "www or non-www" means. Non-www, what is it?

Thanks a lot!

[Atom1]

Ah good follow up question! @JustImagine

"www or non-www" means different versions of your domain so

https://www.weebly.com (www)

or

https://weebly.com (non-www)

This is important because people often link to you from both, so you want to make sure to set the preffered version with Google so you capture any of the link equity and not have any duplicate content issues if they both resolve with content! 

[JustImagine]

@Atom Thank you so much! Will do! You're awesome!

[Atom1]

Hey everyone!

I'm really excited to be here and will do my best to answer all your questions quickly! I run SEO and Organic Growth for Weebly right now and I've been working in the SEO industry for +8 years. I've seen plenty of crazy and interesting stuff, as well as the industry change over and over again. I feel like I have a decent idea of what really works and what doesn't, so hopefully I can provide you with some practical knowledge you can apply right away!

Cheers,

[Erin6]

Yay! Thank you so much for joining us, @Atom!

Now, let's get some questions answered.

Weebly Community: What questions do you have about SEO?

[Brodie]

Hi @Atom!

I would love to get your take on keywords, because I feel like we've heard a lot of conflicting info over the years as to their importance. I remember the days when people put them in their header and footer and even in the body of their page matching the text color to the background color so they were hidden, throwing the kitchen sink at it, really!  We know that modern day proverb "content is king," and it's more about what you're including in the body of your pages and consistent blog posts. But how do you see the importance of keywords now? How has it changed for Google's algorithm and how do you see it continuing to change? And how do our you see our keyword settings in our Weebly sites contiuing to perform?

[Erin6]

Ahh, such a great question @Brodie! I hear this one a lot from folks.

[Atom1]

Thanks for the great question @Brodie

Keywords are still important but correct implementation of keywords for SEO has changed quite a bit. It's not longer about stuffing keywords into every aspect of your page. Google is getting better and better about understanding context around keyword and topics, so it's more important to write high-quality content first about a topic, and worry about keywords second. I call this "keyword drafting" (read more about it here) basically focusing the best content first, and then using keyword research to try and understand the best way to tweak what you've writen to address keywords that people are acutally using to find things on search engines. Google doesn't need to see the exact keyword you've written mentioned a certain number of times anymore to understand relevance. Google can look at the surrounding topical relevance of content to understand what you're covering. To be clear, you still need to use keywords, but it's more important to produce realy, unique and valuable content. 

Keyword settings in Weebly provide a lot of value, the most important inputs are the ability to custom page and blog URLs, Page Titles and Page Descriptions, along with the ability to use text elements on the page to create high quality content throughout the body of website pages! 

[tacotaco]

I was wondering if there's any difference in the SEO capabilities of the "free" sites, as opposed to the paid ones? In other words, does your site have more visibility if you have an upgraded site.

Thanks.

[Atom1]

Great question @tacotaco

The biggest SEO difference between "free" sites versus paid sites is the ability to use a custom domain with your content. With free sites you only use the subdomain (mysite.weebly.com) which is always going to limit your SEO capabilities. With an upgraded site and your own custom domain (www.mywebsitename.com) you can build content, links and SEO signals on your domain and apply that to SEO growth. 

[tacotaco]

I have another question, actually. Does my Weebly theme impact my SEO?

[Atom1]

Appreciate the second question @tacotaco !

A Weebly theme doesn't impact your SEO on it's own. All themese have the same basic components that are great for SEO: They are responsive, load quickly, don't contain blocking resources or unruly scripts, etc. Where a theme does impact SEO is your ability to use the theme to put lots of unique, high-quality content on the page, that's what matters!  

[tacotaco]

Thanks for answering my questions @Atom.

[anthony_e]

Hey Adam!

Do I need to add SEO information on every page, store item, blog that I make?

[JustImagine]

Adam, another question, please.

What is your take on product images URL's and file names? How important it is?

Will Weebly change the way it displays URL's for product images?

Not sure if this question applies to you, but would like to know your opinion.

Thanks!

[Atom1]

Another great question, thanks! @anthony_e 

Yes, I believe it's important to add basic SEO information to every page, store item and blog post. It doesn't have to involve a bunch of keyword research or planning, just a few minutes of work filling out important SEO elements. There's a good chance by doing this you will gain traffic in search that you would have missed otherwise. Then, you can focus on high-value pages to do deeper SEO (more content, deeper on-page optimization, off-page link building and social etc.)

The basic SEO information you should fill out include: Customized page URL, Page (or post) Title, Page (or post) Description and at least a couple hundred words of unique content describing the page! These basics can get you surprisingly far!  

[Erin6]

Here is a question someone asked at a recent Weebly event that we can address here:

Should I be paying for SEO services outside of Weebly?

[Atom1]

Thanks for passing this one on @Erin

This answer really depends on what your SEO goals are. The only SEO tools that I think are absolutely vital for everyone are completely free: Google Analytics, Google Search Console, Google Alerts and Google Keyword Planner.

There are plenty of other very valuable tools but the value comes from saving you time and helping you scale. So it's the cost benefit analysis of time vs. money vs. how much value are you getting from your SEO efforts. Tools like Moz, ahrefs and Buzzsumo can be very helpful as your SEO campaign advances. There are also some very cool app center apps like Site Booster (for streamlining local SEO) and MarketGoo (tracking and optimization) that can give you some more help.