SEO for DrupalNeil Cameron29 October 2009

The optimisation of your site for search engines, with the goal of achieving a high page rank in search resultsWhat is SEO?2/27http://ndev.co.ukNeil Cameron

SEO ≠ magicSEO ≠ expensiveSEO ≠ difficultSEO = contestedWhat isn’t SEO?

The Single, Most Important Thing.URLsMeta DataDuplicate ContentCrawlabilityFurther InfoQuestionsSEO for Drupal

The Single, Most Important Thing.URLsMeta DataDuplicate ContentCrawlabilityFurther InfoQuestionsSEO for Drupal

Step 1/2:Create original, engaging and useful content.The Single, Most Important Thing

Step 2/2:Get it out there. Get it linked.The Single, Most Important Thing

Unfortunately, Drupal can’t help you.The Single, Most Important Thing

The Single, Most Important Thing.URLsMeta DataDuplicate ContentCrawlabilityFurther InfoQuestionsSEO for Drupal

Bad:Good :URLs should be clean and descriptive.URLs

Modules:Path autoAllows for automatic generation of URLsFollowing a set patternURLse.g. [content-type]/[author name]/[content title]

The Single Most Important Thing.URLsMeta DataDuplicate ContentCrawlabilityFurther InfoQuestionsSEO for Drupal

What is Meta Data?Meta Data

Title:Not a true meta tag but important none-the-less.Consider using different title for content and Meta Datae.g.:David Beckham -> Top English Footballers: David BeckhamOctober Meetup -> London, October DrupalMeetup (seminar)Meta Data

Description:Make sure the main pages (front, ‘landing pages’ or ‘channel pages’) have an accurate description.Make sure the description is automated for other content pages.Meta Data

Make sure the main pages (front, ‘landing pages’ or ‘channel pages’) have an accurate description.

Make sure the description is automated for other content pages.

Meta DataModulesNodewordsAutomatically or manually configure title, description and keyword meta information

The Single Most Important Thing.URLsMeta DataDuplicate ContentCrawlabilityFurther InfoQuestionsSEO for Drupal

Duplicate content can cause Sandboxing*But where is the duplicate content?Duplicate Content* See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sandbox_Effect

Duplicate Content

Modules: Global RedirectAutomatic redirection for “index.php?q=”, trailing “/” and “node/NID”. Path RedirectManual redirection, e.g. from legacy sitesDuplicate Content

The Single Most Important Thing.URLsMeta DataDuplicate ContentCrawlabilityFurther InfoQuestionsSEO for Drupal

Make it easy for robots to crawl the sitePart i (sitemap):Create a sitemapSubmit it to Google and BingModule: XML sitemap (warning: buggy)Crawlability

Part ii (content)Use clean HTML code in theme, validate as much as possible (validator.w3.org)Ensure user entered content is clean.If using a WYSIWIG editor, consider ‘HTML purifier’, ‘paste from word button’ or education.Crawlability

The Single Most Important Thing.URLsMeta DataDuplicate ContentCrawlabilityFurther InfoQuestionsSEO for Drupal

SEO == Scam: (http://powazek.com/posts/2090 )Drupal + SEO: http://pagerankandalexa.com/content/seo-drupal-page-optimizationhttp://tips.webdesign10.com/basic-drupal-seo-on-site-optimizationhttp://devbee.com/drupal_seohttp://groups.drupal.org/search-engine-optimizationDrupal Modules:SEO Checklist (http://drupal.org/project/seo_checklist)Pathauto(http://drupal.org/project/pathauto)Page Title (http://drupal.org/project/page_title)Nodewords (meta info) http://drupal.org/project/nodewords)Global redirect (http://drupal.org/project/globalredirect)Path redirect (http://drupal.org/project/path_redirect)XML Sitemap (http://drupal.org/project/xmlsitemap)HTML purifier (http://drupal.org/project/htmlpurifier)Sandboxing: (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sandbox_Effect)Google Webmaster tools: (http://google.com/webmasters/tools/)Google Analytics: (http://google.com/analytics/)HTML Validator: (http://validator.w3.org/)Photo credit: (http://www.flickr.com/photos/timcaynes/2734530841/)About Neil: (http://ndev.co.uk)Further Info

The Single Most Important Thing.URLsMeta DataDuplicate ContentCrawlabilityFurther InfoQuestionsSEO for Drupal

?Questions?