THE SECRET WAY To Make Gateway Pages Work
| Category: E-commerce | Date: 2001-08-31 |
Many people treat gateway pages as a complete waste of time. However, it is too early to kiss them goodbye. Gateway pages can still do a great job for you.
But only if you use them right!
The search engines have been tough towards gateway pages lately. They have introduced "anti-spam" policies that limit the number of page submissions from each domain. They have given higher priority to home pages. They sell all sorts of sponsored links that show up above the actual search results and bury them deep under. Many of them purge their databases on a regular basis to toss out the doorways.
And still, there IS a way to make gateway pages work for you in spite of all these troubles!
How? Read on
Imagine you have an online store selling computer monitors. Type "computer monitors" in any search engine and youll get hundreds of thousands pages. No chance to compete!
But what if you search for "Samsung SyncMaster 700NF"? Or "CTX VL700T"? A handful of truly relevant pages, at best. Which gives us a good chance to get a top 10 or even number one position!
Are you getting my idea? Right, narrow searches!
Of course, you will not optimize your home page for that sort of phrases. But why not create a simple doorway page focused on that specific item and bring people who search for it right to the best place to buy it your website?
Note that this traffic will be extremely valuable. If someone looks for a definite model, do you think they are just window-shopping?
Imagine 100 or 200 simple gateway pages in the engines, each precisely targeted to one product! How many people will they bring to your site?
The idea of creating 100 pages can make you cry. But scare not! I said we are going to make "simple" pages, and I mean it!
Because these doorways will not work in a highly competitive environment, theres no need to bother with keyword densities, neither there is a problem of keyword choice.
Also, I advise you to forget about design. When a search engine spider comes to a page devoted to, well, "dogs", it looks for the word "dogs", not Javascript or Flash. The higher the keywords appear, the better.
So:
- Leave off all scripts, style sheets, even tables.
- Put the products title (and nothing more!) in the TITLE tag.
- Create a short plain English description of the product (or use your standard one). Put the products title right at the start of it and use it in the DESCRIPTION tag. Remember: the description is not very important for your ranking, but it is what the searchers will see in the results. Make them want to click on your link!
- Skip the KEYWORDS tag. Because so many people stuff tons of irrelevant words there, the engines pay little attention to this tag now.
- Start the page with a heading ("h1" is of course the best) and put the products name there.
- Use your standard product description as the body of the page. Make sure the products name appears in the first sentence (e.g. Do not say "this monitor". Say "CTX VL700T").
- Provide a link to your home page, the category page or right to he product page in your database. Say something like "for more information, click here!" Do not use URL redirection the engines track and ban that.
- All right, all right, include a picture of the product :). Link it to your site as well.
Thats it! If you are HTML-capable, it will take about 3 minutes of your time. Even if it brings one customer, I guess it will pay for itself!
After youve built a page for all or most of your products, you might go further trying phrases like "CTX VL700T Monitor" and so on. Just dont spend too much time at it there are so many other great promotion methods!
Now what are we supposed to have after some time? Your amazing home page and category pages that rank high (I hope) for generic phrases like "computer monitors", plus about a hundred of gateway pages to handle all those specific searches! Although each individual page will only bring a narrow stream of visitors, together they will make a river of highly valuable (remember?) traffic.
The last thing I would like to add is: Be careful when submitting the pages. Most search engines only allow a limited number of pages from each domain per day. Everything above the limit will be ignored. The safest method is to submit one page a day. Also, think about how you can get the pages spidered instead of submitting them manually. In some engines, this will give them higher relevance.
Good Luck!
P.S. By the way, if you want some more search engine tips, just email me at engines@artofebiz.com and I will send you some great articles!
About the Author
Alex Buchnev is the owner and editor of ArtofEbiz.com. ArtofEbiz.com gives you links to the freshest articles in prominent e-commerce publications. It will help you find e-business information MUCH faster. Check it out.
:To contact see details below.
http://www.artofebiz.com!
But only if you use them right!
The search engines have been tough towards gateway pages lately. They have introduced "anti-spam" policies that limit the number of page submissions from each domain. They have given higher priority to home pages. They sell all sorts of sponsored links that show up above the actual search results and bury them deep under. Many of them purge their databases on a regular basis to toss out the doorways.
And still, there IS a way to make gateway pages work for you in spite of all these troubles!
How? Read on
Imagine you have an online store selling computer monitors. Type "computer monitors" in any search engine and youll get hundreds of thousands pages. No chance to compete!
But what if you search for "Samsung SyncMaster 700NF"? Or "CTX VL700T"? A handful of truly relevant pages, at best. Which gives us a good chance to get a top 10 or even number one position!
Are you getting my idea? Right, narrow searches!
Of course, you will not optimize your home page for that sort of phrases. But why not create a simple doorway page focused on that specific item and bring people who search for it right to the best place to buy it your website?
Note that this traffic will be extremely valuable. If someone looks for a definite model, do you think they are just window-shopping?
Imagine 100 or 200 simple gateway pages in the engines, each precisely targeted to one product! How many people will they bring to your site?
The idea of creating 100 pages can make you cry. But scare not! I said we are going to make "simple" pages, and I mean it!
Because these doorways will not work in a highly competitive environment, theres no need to bother with keyword densities, neither there is a problem of keyword choice.
Also, I advise you to forget about design. When a search engine spider comes to a page devoted to, well, "dogs", it looks for the word "dogs", not Javascript or Flash. The higher the keywords appear, the better.
So:
- Leave off all scripts, style sheets, even tables.
- Put the products title (and nothing more!) in the TITLE tag.
- Create a short plain English description of the product (or use your standard one). Put the products title right at the start of it and use it in the DESCRIPTION tag. Remember: the description is not very important for your ranking, but it is what the searchers will see in the results. Make them want to click on your link!
- Skip the KEYWORDS tag. Because so many people stuff tons of irrelevant words there, the engines pay little attention to this tag now.
- Start the page with a heading ("h1" is of course the best) and put the products name there.
- Use your standard product description as the body of the page. Make sure the products name appears in the first sentence (e.g. Do not say "this monitor". Say "CTX VL700T").
- Provide a link to your home page, the category page or right to he product page in your database. Say something like "for more information, click here!" Do not use URL redirection the engines track and ban that.
- All right, all right, include a picture of the product :). Link it to your site as well.
Thats it! If you are HTML-capable, it will take about 3 minutes of your time. Even if it brings one customer, I guess it will pay for itself!
After youve built a page for all or most of your products, you might go further trying phrases like "CTX VL700T Monitor" and so on. Just dont spend too much time at it there are so many other great promotion methods!
Now what are we supposed to have after some time? Your amazing home page and category pages that rank high (I hope) for generic phrases like "computer monitors", plus about a hundred of gateway pages to handle all those specific searches! Although each individual page will only bring a narrow stream of visitors, together they will make a river of highly valuable (remember?) traffic.
The last thing I would like to add is: Be careful when submitting the pages. Most search engines only allow a limited number of pages from each domain per day. Everything above the limit will be ignored. The safest method is to submit one page a day. Also, think about how you can get the pages spidered instead of submitting them manually. In some engines, this will give them higher relevance.
Good Luck!
P.S. By the way, if you want some more search engine tips, just email me at engines@artofebiz.com and I will send you some great articles!
About the Author
Alex Buchnev is the owner and editor of ArtofEbiz.com. ArtofEbiz.com gives you links to the freshest articles in prominent e-commerce publications. It will help you find e-business information MUCH faster. Check it out.
:To contact see details below.
http://www.artofebiz.com!
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