Mediaboss Marketing

A core element of mobile SEO is to determine where the mobile content will reside in relation to that of the standard desktop orientated site. This debate was even broached ayear ago.

With the large enterprise companies we work with at Covario, our position has been to recommend the one URL or same URL approach over the m. subdomain.

The one URL approach for mobile has also been recently echoed as a preferred choice by bothBingofficially andGoogleunofficially.

This approach requires user agent detection to trigger different rendering of the page based on the mobile device type which can also include the DocType and HEAD section of the code. Google specifically affirmed this is not cloaking back in theirSearch Engine Optimization Starter Guide.

The key is to change these sections for feature phones and smartphones as Google has two different mobile crawlers for these devices since the search results between feature phones and smartphones do differfrom each other, as well as from the standard desktop search engine ranking results.

To be proactive, it is best to do this as well for tablets and TV rendering, which should get specific crawlers from the search engines in the near future.

In the end, why is this single URL approach better for mobile SEO?

Using a subdomain for your mobile rendering is a close 1B option to the one URL strategy and could be the preferred direction in many circumstances.

If you are only going to have a limited mobile site thatdoesnthave a one-to-one relationship to your desktop instance, then having a subdomain for mobile would make sense.

Also, if your site already has a long established mobile subdomain the advantages of bringing it to the one URL does diminish.

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One URL To Rule Them All For Mobile SEO

Technical SEO topics such as pagination are near and dear to my heart. This article will build upon and update my previous treatment of pagination and SEO.

Ive written and presented often on pagination for SEO. Why so much attention on this subject?

The reason is simple: it can be a big, hairy deal for sites. Its right up there with faceted navigation as one of the most problematic crawling and indexing issues for large-scale SEO. Its a tactic (actually a set of tactics) that our teams are continually evolving, testing, and refining.

So it was double prizes when Google announced the HTML 5 element rel next/prev for pagination.

There are three primary tactics that we use for SEO pagination:

Each of these is detailed below.

Ive already detailed this technique in full, so Ill skip the nitty gritty. The important thing to realize is that using this method does not directly transfer any equity from a series of component pages to the primary, canonical page. Rather, as component pages get crawled and link back to the canonical page, that equity is (hopefully) transferred as a second-order effect.

We would generally not recommend using this method for pagination today, except for fringe cases. Its perfectly fine and will not hurt a site; on the contrary, it will greatly help a site that has SEO pagination problems. But, there are now even better methods as well discover.

The classic SEO pagination method uses noindex but does not directly consolidate equity.

The most elegant method is to utilize a View All page. In this approach, all component pages rel canonical back to the View All.

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The Latest & Greatest On SEO Pagination

DECATUR When David Lanterman took over ownership of the Lincoln Theater 4 in January 2011, he knew changes were coming and not just to the 90-year-old movie house.

Aside from cosmetic work to refurbish the building, his greatest task as owner has been one that is facing all operators of small, independent theaters: the movie industrys switch to digital film and projection equipment. But even though he knew the switch was coming, that doesnt mean the $70,000-per-screen conversion costs were any easier to bear.

We knew that the switch was coming, but it gained so much speed in the last year that it forced us to make it happen much sooner than I initially expected, said Lanterman, who resides in Lincoln. I thought we would have a good three years or so, but there was more pressure than expected. It wont be possible to run a theater on only 35 mm in a few years as more and more films are released on digital. Youre going to have to change or close. And many will close, especially the small places.

The outlook is the same for independent theaters all over Central Illinois and, by extension, around the country. Many simply dont have the funds necessary to make the initial investment to acquire the digital film equipment. Others, such as the Lincoln Theater 4, have made the transition successfully and hope to recoup their investment in the next few years through compensation programs with studios and digital equipment companies.

Lantermans theater began all-digital shows March 2.

The case of the Lincoln Theater 4 is particularly unusual, however, as the buildings four screens already had been outfitted with digital equipment when he took over, but he was unable to assume the lease on these projectors from the previous owner. Instead, the theater returned to older 35 mm projectors that were fortunately still on hand until Lanterman could afford to bring back the digital equipment.

I couldnt have even bought the digital equipment they had here if I wanted to, so we had to wait, he said. Were able to do it now because of our community support, which has been beyond even what I was hoping it would be. The people have a sense of ownership, a realization that this is our theater. Our attendance is up around 25 percent from what it was at last year.

Not all small theaters have the resources to make the initial conversion, however. Some, such as the one-screen Onarga Theatre, are turning to their customer base in hopes of raising the entire $65,000 needed to stay in business. If the ongoing fundraiser fails, then another small town will lose its theater, leaving customers to drive 30 or 45 minutes to larger cities such as Champaign or Kankakee to see a movie at a national chain. And yet, owner Randy Lizzio is optimistic.

I think it can succeed, and the amount of money we raise will continue to slowly rise, said the Onarga Theatre manager of four years. Were going to keep chipping away at the total and hosting fundraisers. I know our meter doesnt look too good right now, but you never know how things will change.

The meter Lizzio refers to represents the path to the necessary $65,000, and can be viewed at the Onarga Theatre website. Currently sitting at about $3,000, its a daunting hurdle for film lovers in the small town to overcome, especially given that Lizzio refuses to raise ticket prices from the $5 range or increase the cost of concessions.

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Cost to go from reel to digital may close some smaller movie theaters

There are tens of millions of e-book lovers, and their ranks are sure to be boosted by the latest iPad along with improved Kindles, Nooks and their rivals.

My sister, a retired fourth-grade teacher, has finally succumbed; Dorothy reads faster by enlarging the words on her tablet. And my wife favors e-books when she stretches out in bed. Clearly, the time has come for a well-stocked national digital library system, not to replace brick-and-mortar libraries but to augment them.

In the 1990s, William F. Buckley Jr. my political opposite wrote two columns supporting my basic vision. He even recommended it to Newt Gingrich. Years later, we still lack a coherent national e-library strategy. (Last week, seven patrons of the Lexington Public Library were waiting for seven copies of the e-book of Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close, Jonathan Safran Foer's novel. In this case, because of legal restrictions and related technical precautions, a digital copy is just like a paper copy only one library patron may check it out at a time.)

Through greater purchasing clout, a national digital library system could give taxpayers far more for their money, adding to the inherent economies of e-books. A first step could be a foundation-financed buyout of OverDrive, the current e-book supplier for many libraries, if the owners agreed.

Frustratingly, Washington does not grasp the full potential of a national digital library system truly serving the masses. In effect, at least unofficially, President Barack Obama's administration has farmed out the issue to a group hosted at the president's old law school, the Harvard-based Digital Public Library of America initiative.

Ideally, its talented people can come up with a well-crafted online strategy to help public libraries and others encourage family literacy, mitigate the fourth-grade reading slump, distribute appropriate text and multimedia content to help upgrade our work force, and stimulate the brains of the millions of baby boomers who soon will be retiring (some, like my wife, with serious mobility limitations). Not one current school librarian or other K-12 educator sits on the 17-member steering committee.

And yet, the national digital library issue is in many ways a K-12, job- preparation and anti-poverty opportunity in disguise. Studies show a strong connection between children's academic achievement and access to books at home.

E-books are just swarms of invisible electrons, but children still could notice them. Librarians and teachers, for example, could post drawings of scenes from e-books on the walls, and they could talk up appropriate local titles mentioning people and landmarks known to the students.

And "recreational reading," whether the electronic or paper variety, could help nudge children and parents toward the more serious variety, and build skills and knowledge of many kinds. Many academics, alas, look down on popular-level books.

This is partly why we need two tightly intertwined but separate national digital library systems, ultimately one academic and one public. Both could be universally accessible to Americans and ideally others, and with plenty of shared content. Separate systems would help avoid or reduce clashes over such issues as scholarly monographs versus best-sellers.

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Commentary: A national digital library system is long overdue

Exclusivity. Its one of those things you cant put a price on. Er, or rather, you can. Usually an ENORMOUS one.

Designer purses, hand-tooled leather shoes, finely tailored suits; in the fashion world, being unique costs big. Same thing for cars . . . most of the time.

Now, if you run out and plonk down 60 or 70 grand on an E-Class Mercedes or 5-series BMW, its going to take all of five minutes before you find yourself parking at the mall next to somebody who bought the exact same car, except in a nicer trim level. So save your money. If you really want to stand out, buy a Nissan.

Specifically, this Nissan right here. Its the Maxima, and its one of those cars that youll only find one or two of in stock at your local dealership, and few out on the roads. Nissan doesnt build or sell a lot of them, although it maintains that its the flagship sedan for the brand.

The problem is two-fold. First, Nissan has at least two flagship cars already: for performance, the GT-R, and for green creds, the all-electric Leaf. The Maxima tends to get overshadowed by these well-publicized giants.

Second, cost. When launched in 2009, the redesigned Maxima SV had a price that lapped right up against the bottom pricing-rungs of the Infiniti G37 sedan. Add Infinitis often-aggressive lease rates into the mix, and the Maxima actually becomes more expensive than a comparably equipped G.

For 2012, Nissan has reduced the price of the Maxima somewhat. As tested, this SV Sport is now $40,230 before freight, and base models start at $37,880, down $1,920 since last year.

Still, thats a lot of coin to spend on a Nissan. Is it worth it? I certainly think so, and heres why.

Design

When sculpting a car, designers often give a name to the style theyre trying to achieve. For the new-for-09 Maxima, the concept was liquid motion.

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Maxima worth the price