SEO Frequently Asked Questions - 9 Through 16

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9. Should I use hidden text on my website to help rank better?
10. Will using dynamic pages harm my rankings?
11. Do filenames and directory structure matter?
12. What is a "reciprocal link"?
13. What is "PageRank (PR)"?
14. What does "cross linking" mean?
15. What are "inbound links"?
16. How can I find how many inbound links I have?

Should I use hidden text on my website to help rank better?
The use of hidden text, or any form of text that is only intended to be viewed by spiders while being kept invisible to users is strongly discouraged. Many websites in the past have been banned from search engines for using hidden text. Many search engines consider this to be "unethical" and it can easily be detected, so avoid using it.

Will using dynamic pages harm my rankings?
The use of straight forward dynamic pages, as in using the extensions .php, .asp, etc.. will not harm rankings. Using "query strings" in the URL's will however have a negative effect on rankings. The use of "'param=yes&other=no" will make it extremely difficult for search engines to crawl your website, so difficult in fact that most search engines will refuse to even crawl the website in order to conserve bandwidth and other expensive resources.

Do filenames and directory structure matter?
Many say that filenames do not directly matter, I have proven in the past however that they are part of the ranking algorithm in many major search engines. For optimal performance I suggest that filenames should be no longer than 15-20 characters in length and should contain the keywords for the content of the page, with words being delimited with dashes "-". Directory structure too is important, with directory names including at least one target keyword and the directory structure should be kept as close to the root as possible i.e. www.site.com/page.htm is much better than www.site.com/folder/folder2/page.htm.

What is a "reciprocal link"?
Let's imagine there are 2 websites, one is "Site A" and the other "Side B". If Site A provides a link to Site B and Site A simultaneously provides a link to Site B, then the 2 respective links are known as "reciprocal" links given that each site links to the other.

What is "PageRank (PR)"?
PageRank' is actually a trademarked term. The trademark belongs to Google Inc. and refers to the "rank" of a website as determined by Google's ranking system. The PageRank (PR) of a website is determined by the number of inbound links a website has. The more inbound links that exist, the higher the PageRank, generally speaking that is!

What does "cross linking" mean?
Crosslinking is the term used to define a volume of sites that provide links to each other for the purpose of increasing link popularity. The sites are sometimes owned by one person or firm and have little or no other purpose that to be part of the link farm.

What are "inbound links"?
Inbound links are nothing more than links coming to a given website from an external website. For example, any links on this website to Google.com are considered to be inbound links to Google.

How can I find how many inbound links I have?
In reality there is no real way to calculate the exact number of inbound links in. The best way to find inbound links to your website is to use either Google or AllTheWeb / FAST. With Google, it is possible to search for inbound links by using the search query "link:www.example.com", this will search for all links to the site www.example.com. On AllTheWeb, you can check for inbound links to a site by using "link.all:www.example.com".

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