Advice for a Newbie to SEO

[Katie]

First and foremost, you guys are all super awesome. Even when I'm not actively commenting, I'm reading all of the tips you give each other and it's really so great.

Enough with the flattery

A good friend of mine is wading his toes in the SEO practices and designing of the website of the dealership that he works as the Internet Sales Manager for.

If you could, take a sneak peak here: http://www.defilippobrothers.com/

...and give 1 tip of advice to him. I figure reaching out and helping is what you guys do, so I'm ready to hear it, and so is he, surely.

(Hi, Brian!)

[bandersen]

Hi guys! I would appreciate any help as Katie mentioned! She is awesome and has been a great help, and feedback is always appreciated! Also, please don't hesitate to ask if there's anything I can help with!

[MattScalcione]

From an SEO standpoint, here are two simple tips for the homepage:

-Set up 301 redirects to prevent duplicate pages. Great example:
Defilippo Brothers :: Used Cars Prospect Park PA,Kennett Square PA,Buy Here Pay Here Autos,Philadelphia,Used Cars Philly,Buy Here Pay Here Dealership Chester County PA,In House Auto Financing,Used Cars,Used Trucks,Used SUVs,Bad Credit Delco,Buy Here has a PR of 3
Defilippo Brothers :: Used Cars Prospect Park PA,Kennett Square PA,Buy Here Pay Here Autos,Philadelphia,Used Cars Philly,Buy Here Pay Here Dealership Chester County PA,In House Auto Financing,Used Cars,Used Trucks,Used SUVs,Bad Credit Delco,Buy Here has a PR of 2

They are the same page with two different URLs. Consumers will bookmark and link-back to these two separate homepages which splits your link backs up and decreases the potential authority a unique homepage would hold.

Length of meta Title / Desc on homepage:

<title>Defilippo Brothers :: Used Cars Prospect Park PA,Kennett Square PA,Buy Here Pay Here Autos,Philadelphia,Used Cars Philly,Buy Here Pay Here Dealership Chester County PA,In House Auto Financing,Used Cars,Used Trucks,Used SUVs,Bad Credit Delco,Buy Here Pay Here Cars Delaware County PA,Buy Here Pay Here Car Loans,Auto Finance Delaware County,BHPH Car Lot Wilmington PA,Buy Here Pay Here Car Loans PA,Used Car Lots PA,</title>
<meta name="description" content="Used Cars Prospect Park PA,Kennett Square PA,Buy Here Pay Here Autos,Philadelphia,Used Cars Philly,Buy Here Pay Here Dealership Chester County PA,In House Auto Financing,Used Cars,Used Trucks, Used SUVs,Bad Credit Delco,Buy Here Pay Here Cars Delaware County PA,Buy Here Pay Here Car Loans,Auto Finance Delaware County,BHPH Car Lot Wilmington PA,Buy Here Pay Here Car Loans PA,Used Car Lots PA">
<meta name="keywords" content="used cars prospect park pa, kennett square pa, buy here pay here autos, philadelphia, used cars philly, buy here pay here dealership chester county pa, in house auto financing, used cars, used trucks, used suvs, bad credit delco, buy here pay here cars delaware county pa, buy here pay here car loans, auto finance delaware county, bhph car lot wilmington pa, buy here pay here car loans pa, used car lots pa">

Whooaaaa holy meta tags! These need to be shortened and some thought needs to go behind them. Title tag is what displays when users search for criteria that matches your pages. They are like 120 chars long at max (dont quote me I didn't check on that number) and the description is the teaser snippet that displays under the title. Description is primarily to tell the searcher what your page is and incite a click.

This does not make me want to click:
"
Used Cars Prospect Park PA,Kennett Square PA,Buy Here Pay Here Autos,Philadelphia,Used Cars Philly,Buy Here Pay Here Dealership Chester County PA,In House Auto Financing,Used Cars,Used Trucks, Used SUVs,Bad Credit Delco,Buy Here Pay Here Cars Delaware County PA,Buy Here Pay Here Car Loans,Auto Finance Delaware County,BHPH Car Lot Wilmington PA,Buy Here Pay Here Car Loans PA,Used Car Lots PA "

Hope these help, this is definitely just scraping the tip of the iceberg..

[JoePistell]

Get fast or be last, Improve site loading time. See: Pingdom Tools

You've claimed your Google Local accnt, grab up the others (to improve your local authority) Listing Snapshot | GetListed.org

Make that Toll free number up top big n fat!!

[Dominic Belfiori]

Wow, some great advice has already been given! I would also recommend trying to get some more relevant content on your site. What you have on their now is great, but having lots of relevant content is very important from a SEO standpoint.
(also maybe, change the text color to something brighter, maybe the same color as your yellow headers?) -- I only say this, because i have some troubles reading it, so others might too

Hope this helps ^_^

[Katie]

Whooaaaa holy meta tags!

Hey Matt, I noted this as well. I shot over a list of possibilities to Brian and I think I might not have specified that they weren't ALL for use, just simply suggestions.

I did get a laugh out of "HOLY META TAGS!"

[CAORYAN]

1) Set up a google webmaster account
2) shorten your meta titles to 60 characters.
3) Shorten your meta descriptions to 160. Anything beyond that won't show.
4) Make your meta titles unique for each page
5) Make you meta descriptions unique to each page and use your keywords from title
6) Make sure you have an XML sitemap submitted to google and a sitemap on your site for visitors
7) use cookies....google has recently said that cookies help find those hard to reach pages. May not be a problem on this website because it is fairly small but i would so it anyway.
8) Make sure all your images are named and your alt tags are filled out.
9) Content - have at least 400 to 800 words per page
10) Utilize interlinking. If you mention a brand link it to your vehicles that sort for that brand.

I LOVE that you archived your sold inventory. Brilliant! You are doing pretty good if you get this list knocked out. Work on conversion and you will be great! Oh, you should probably add chat. I am sure your friend at carchat24 can help....you should do it.

[Nathan Carr]

Black text on a blue background hurts my eyes!

The menu links are offcenter and look goofy in Firefox.

As for general SEO value most of it has already been mentioned. Get the meta description and Title fixed up pronto!
Other than that make sure you keep an eye on your header tags. Be sure to stuff those with some keywords.


Good luck!

[bandersen]

Hey everyone! Thanks again for all the input! Our website was built and hosted by a company called Auto Search Technologies. So the meta structuring was all handled by them. We basically provided various key words (which were mostly done prior to my being employed here) and they do the rest. All the sold inventory is archived, so we have quite a database built up there.

As far as appearances go, I did change the black text on the blue background. That was my own oversight, but hopefully that makes a difference! The menus that are off center is also handled through the Auto Search Tech., and I spoke with them today regarding that. They say they are "working on it," so hopefully that issue will be resolved too!

And Joe, thanks for that link to GetListed, that is a GREAT tool!

[JoePistell]

banderson,

Try: https://adwords.google.com/select/KeywordToolExternal

drop your web address in there and see what search phrases google sees are connected to your site. Your home page nails it.

At a quick glance, Google doesnt see your make pages: Defilippo Brothers :: Autos Asearch : Auto Listings

A quick trip to: site:http://www.ujobucredit.com - Google Search shows me a LOT of VDPs but no "Make" pages

Ask for a site map too.