[thelist] "spamminess" site check - realtymort.com

[Stuart Young]

Steve Rider wrote:
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We've hovered around 80th place when searching for the phrase "chicago 
apartments" (it's primarily a building management company).  Google 
redesigned their algorithm in November, and suddenly the page is 
nowhere to be found!  It pops up if I search very specifically (as in 
the specific company name) so we're still in the database, but we don't 
show up anywhere under various types of keyword searches.

More generally, do you all know of a good source of "search engine 
optimization" advice?
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Hugely famous topic on the WWW right now, you can't fail to find massive amounts of detail on this subject if you look. The Google update has been named the Florida update by Webmasterworld, a search engine optimisation specialist site.
http://www.webmasterworld.com/ 
check out their Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) glossary to understand all the terms SEO professionals talk about in their forums.
http://www.webmasterworld.com/glossary/

SearchEngineGuide and Search Engine Watch are good SEO websites.
http://www.searchengineguide.com/ 
http://www.searchenginewatch.com/ 
The front pages of both sites are jam packed full of articles, resources and tips on the Florida update.

Some of the best articles explaining the Florid update I've found are:

Been Gazumped by Google? Trying to make Sense of the "Florida" Update!
http://www.searchengineguide.com/lloyd/2003/1125_bl1.html 

Florida Fever: The Google Update Uproar
http://www.searchengineguide.com/hotchkiss/2003/1204_gh1.html

Q. I heard Google's dropping pages that show signs of search engine optimization. Do I need to deoptimize my web pages?
http://www.searchenginewatch.com/searchday/article.php/3286101#deoptimize 


P.S. I was lucky, my commercial sites went up in the Florida update not down and out.

cheers

Dr Stuart Young,       +64 (0)9-815 4321 Ex 8656
<syoung at unitec.ac.nz>     
Lecturer, School of Computing and Information Technology,
UNITEC Institute of Technology, Auckland, New Zealand
http://hyperdisc.unitec.ac.nz/staff/syoung.htm
I would provide a URL for my official staffpage, but its too long and complex