Ask the Expert

Have a question about search engine marketing, but can't find the answer? Don't look any further. You are on the right place. Here all your SEO questions will be answered by industry experts.

Currently Scott Buresh, CEO of Medium Blue, Navneet Kaushal, founder and CEO of PageTraffic and Roger Janik, President and Founder of ServerSideDesign.com have been sharing their insights, best practices and tips with you. Enjoy!

December 9, 2013
I am creating 3 web pages and optimizing each for similar but different searches. Is the okay to have similar content on these pages or same content in some parts of the page? Is it true that Google does not like similar or duplicate content?

Duplicate content has high chances of getting penalized by Google. If you have same content (exactly the same) on 3 web pages with same title tag, same picture, it may not be acceptable to Google. But if, you have three different blog posts that are closely related, make sure to have unique content, different title tag, and some different phrases on each.

We can take this as an example of the power of good SEO-friendly blogging. It encompasses generating micro-focused pages for long tail keywords and this is why blogging is considered to be so powerful. While the individual, short blog posts can rank well for searches, a blog as a whole can act as an inbound traffic generator for your site.

Find out more about Navneet Kaushal

December 2, 2013
I have a list of 15 keywords that I would like to target my website for. How these keywords should be placed with the content.
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November 25, 2013
How can one find out if he has been affected by Negative SEO?
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November 04, 2013
Is it true that moving up listing or say Search Engine Optimization in Yelp also results in an improved Google SEO Optimization?
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October 28, 2013
What is the importance of title tags for images in SEO? In the case of an image, is an image title as important as the ALT within the HTML code for the image?
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October 21, 2013
Recently, I decided to keep a check on how my site's keywords are ranking with the help of Firefox's Rank Checker. When I checked the rank of a keyword, it ranked #150 and a week later, it ranked #6. I thought it might be a mistake, since the keyword ranking jumped 144 spots. When I checked back after 2 days, the ranking dropped down to #165. I am unable to figure out the reason behind such an extreme increase & decrease in the ranking.
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October 14, 2013
What is the ideal word limit of blog page on a website? Should I allow my readers to comment? Are comments good, bad, or neutral for SEO?
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October 7, 2013
Google has recently released the new algorithm Hummingbird, which is a move towards semantic search. Is the new algorithm an indication of the start of the end of keyword-based SEO?
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September 23, 2013
Are links within our own page (to other pages on the site) counted as "link juice"? If two blog posts, Part I and Part II are written and on posting Part II, it is linked back to Part I, is this considered as link juice?
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September 16, 2013
Content such as specifications or features of a product will be same across every website selling it. So, how can we handle the content that will be duplicated across several sites?
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September 9, 2013
Is it true that affiliate sales program with other websites help in link building? YouTube and other social networking sites have no follow attribute. Is this less effective?
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September 3, 2013
I have just created a website and it has not shown up on search engines. I want to know, how much time does it take for results to show up (especially in Google)?
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August 26, 2013
Is content or article spinning bad for SEO, specifically after the Penguin update?
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August 19, 2013
I had set up a personal Google+ page for my business and completed the authorship. Since, Google+ business pages are now available, should I change the authorship of my business website to Google+ business page?
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August 5, 2013
We clear cookies and history in order to prevent Google from presenting us the information customized according to our search history, as the practice leads to more accurate search results. But, is this is a way to factor in the history and cookies that is not being cleared by general searchers? Is this a thing to worry about?
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July 29, 2013
Is it true that Google can remove your website from searches, if it doesn't like what is going on with the site? If Panda finds out that you have copied the content from another site, can it penalize you? And if your website is penalized, do you need a new URL and fresh content for the site?
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July 23, 2013
I want to add specific locations into the keywords but I am really confused if it should be the complete spelling of the state or just the abbreviation? Does it really matter?
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July 9, 2013
How to create an XML file sitemap? There's no www.abcxyz.com/robots.txt page in my website, which means no site map exists. So, how should I create the site map and publish the XML file.
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July 9, 2013
How to create an XML file sitemap? There's no www.abcxyz.com/robots.txt page in my website, which means no site map exists. So, how should I create the site map and publish the XML file.
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July 2, 2013
Is this true that Google doesn't search all blog formats like WordPress? Moreover, does Google tracks Facebook posts and shares?
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June 17, 2013
What is the importance and benefit of a landing page? The SEO company working for me has asked me to purchase multiple domain names to be used as landing pages.
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June 4, 2013
What is more valuable; getting a link from the home page or the blog or landing page?
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May 29, 2013
There is so much told and talked about title tags on the Internet, but I am unable to understand if I should be putting the name of the company in the title tag? If yes, should I put it on the left or the right side?
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November 05, 2012
I wanted to know are there any other ways to get good positions in local searches, apart from Google Places? And some insights on this ‘citation’ process?
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October 23, 2012
I was wondering if I have an EMD optimized website, is it a good strategy for SEO? Will it help me rank better in SERPs?
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October 1, 2012
Please clarify one thing. Are outbound links damaging for SEO or not?
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September 17, 2012
I have a website with many pages, each targeting to a separate audience. No wonder, I am confused about my home page! How can I drive all my audiences towards my home page with the greatest SEO Title tag?
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September 3, 2012
What is the right length of names (keyword rich) we can allot to images? How do we separate the words in the name- with hyphens or dots?
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August 27, 2012
I wanted to know whether XML sitemap rectify poorly optimized pages alone.
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August 20, 2012
What impact does personalized search have on SEO and ranking?
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August 13, 2012
How important is site load time for SEO?
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August 6, 2012
Someone told me that having multiple H1, H2 tags make for great SEO. Is it true?
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July 30, 2012
I have been writing a lot on my blog and I wanted to know how can I get my picture to show up on Google+.
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July 23, 2012
I wanted to know if I use a number of pictures in my blogs will it be good for SEO
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July 16, 2012
I wanted to know how I can get Google to index more pages?
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July 09, 2012
Is there any difference between www.mysite.com and http://mysite.com?
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July 02, 2012
Which is the better practice- to have the blog as a part of the domain (mysite.com/blog) or should the blog be on external sites like blogger/tumblr (blog.mysite.com)?
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June 25, 2012
I wanted to know about web hosting. Should I host right out of the city I am based in, or can I do that from any city of my country?
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June 18, 2012
Do header tags- H1 and H2 have an impact on rankings?
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April 23, 2012
How can I get Google to index more of my site’s pages?
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April 16, 2012
Can you share some tips for international link building?
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March 12, 2012
How to track my backlinks?
My site shows up in search results all very well, but a search of ‘link:www.domain.com’ comes out fruitless. Other tools do show a list of backlinks, however, after Yahoo Site Explorer where else can I search for the backlinks to my site?
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March 05, 2012
Google not updating my meta tags!
I need help with my Meta tags description. Only two weeks ago, I changed the meta keywords and meta description on many subpages. But old Meta data is still showing in webmaster tools, diagnostic, html suggestions and other places. Why is this happening and can I fix it somehow?
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February 06, 2012
I have few queries about the SEO title tags:
  1. What should be the ideal length, punctuation concerns while writing titles?
  2. Whether title tag is always displayed in search results?
  3. Additionally, is it possible to get a list of un-optimized title tags?
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January 30, 2012
I want to see what my competitor is up to and also the amount of traffic he is getting. Are there any free tools I can use for the same?
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August 22, 2011
Mobile SEO - What can be done for the benefit of mobile search – to have my site appear higher in the search results?
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August 15, 2011
What is the difference in SEO efforts for local search vs. national? What, if anything, is unique or separate regarding optimizing for a local only business (such as for a neighborhood plumber) rather than for a national catalog company shipping to all 50 states? If I only do local business – do I need SEO, and if so, what type?
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July 18, 2011
What is the Google Plus 1 button and how will it affect my site rankings?
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May 23, 2011
What is more important to do - Social Media or SEO?
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May 16, 2011
Do the search engines care how fast my website downloads? Does this affect my rankings?
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March 28, 2011
Is it important to buy a domain that has a good keyword in the URL?
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March 21, 2011
Can I block websites that I do not want to see on the Google search results?
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March 07, 2011
How can I prevent others from plagiarizing my content on the web? I want to ensure that the search engines treat my content as the original source.
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February 21, 2011
How does it serve to benefit a site, (or is it detrimental) to have 2 or more public URLs as other brands, for example - but all linking to the same Home Page for the main site? I have 1 main eCommerce site - but have 5 names so as to garner more business. What are the pros and cons, please?
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February 14, 2011
Our company routinely puts out press releases – talking about what we are doing and products we are introducing to the marketplace and such. How can we – should we – take advantage of these numerous postings for search-engine placement benefits from this? Is this possible, seeing whereas we may not know where all are getting posted? Some we post ourselves at sites for the purpose of listing press releases, and others we might send to various online media; We may not even know if they get posted or not. What should we do that can benefit our SEO efforts with press release postings. Also – does the format we put them out as (PDF, DOC, DOCX, TXT, etc.) make any difference?
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February 07, 2011
I enjoy writing and sometimes that culminates in a pdf. How best can I use them for marketing and linking.
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January 31, 2011
I’ve heard that Google is cracking down on websites that create content for the sole-purpose of attracting traffic and making a quick buck. How can I avoid getting penalized by Google?
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January 24, 2011
I’m having trouble showing up on Google Local Maps; How can I reach the top and get listed?
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January 17, 2011
Will improper SEO techniques hurt my website rankings? What should I watch out for to ensure my site does not get blacklisted from Google?
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January 04, 2011
I always heard that having a lot of links on my site pointing away from my own site to other sites was generally bad for my own rankings and ratings.  Is this correct?
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December 13, 2010
I always heard that having a lot of links on my site pointing away from my own site to other sites was generally bad for my own rankings and ratings.  Is this correct?
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December 06, 2010
I know this is several questions, but how does discussion on a Social Network site about my site, our products or services, benefit me? Must there be a link to us in the posting? How does it benefit me and my site when people blog about us? If this is done in general terms, why is it of value? How does all of this work with Social Networks?
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November 23, 2010
What might be considered fair guidelines for the prices a site owner might expect to pay for the various types of SEO services available? Even a range of price guidelines is helpful, just to know a price quoted is fair.
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November 15, 2010
I was wondering: With all the hype around social networking sites, what good or harm does it do when a site fills itself with numerous buttons and links away from their own site, to click through to all these social network sites. I’m sure it helps all those sites, to have so many links pointing to THEM, but isn’t it best to keep people on your own site as long as possible, rather than making it so easy for them to click away so often? How does MY site and ranking benefit from having so many links pointing AWAY from my own site?
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November 8, 2010
If I asked an SEO expert how they could improve my search engine results in the first 10 minutes - what would they likely do to accomplish that? Or, is that IMPOSSIBLE?
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November 1, 2010
What changes month to month that would necessitate ongoing SEO efforts and investment? Or, may a website owner pay to achieve a quantum leap up in search engine results, and then leave it alone for 6-12 months? Pros & cons please.
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October 25, 2010
Does it really accomplish anything of value at all to invest to push your appearance from page 242 in a Google search up to page 31 - for example?  With no one reviewing that deeply into page results - why bother?  Such as for a plumber in Chicago - if he can not get onto page 1-5, forget it.  Or - am I wrong?
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October 25, 2010
How does a local business get into the very top postings of PAGE 1 of a Google search - listed with the "maps" & directions postings? These even list ABOVE the search results - and are not the PAID ADVERTISEMENT positions but rather SEO placements specific to these MAP results!
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October 25, 2010
In your opinion, what is the best program / your recommendation (application or web-based app) for checking and choosing the best link-building strategy?
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October 25, 2010
"Where can I find the best technical resources on SEO practices?  Beyond theory, where can you learn about technical application? "
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