Improving SEO at CBC

Search Engine Optimization

A Presentation to CBC News Online

by

Blake Crosby

Media Production Support

CBC Technology

March 2009

© July 26, 2011 2

What is Search Engine Optimization?

Search engine optimization (SEO) is the process of improving the volume and quality of traffic to a

web site from search engines via "natural" ("organic"

or "algorithmic") search results. - Wikipedia

In other words…

SEO is a tool to use to modify the way your site

appears to search engines so that your site appears

more frequently in search results.

© July 26, 2011 3

Scope of Presentation

•Description of how Google crawls our website

•Rundown of a typical Google search result

•Reported problems/frustrations

•How we’re currently using SEO

•How we should be using SEO

•How to use diagnostic tools from Google.

•Q&A Session

© July 26, 2011 4

How Google Crawls cbc.ca

1. Google starts with an entrance page.

2. It indexes the text and compiles a list of links to follow.

3. It follows a link in the list, indexes the text and finds more links

to follow.

4. Lather, rinse, repeat.

© July 26, 2011 5

Google Search Results (Glossary of Terms)

Search Query

One Box (Google News)

Snippet

Title

© July 26, 2011 6

Problems to solve…

•Results ranking too low

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•Incorrect Snippet Data

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•Missing stories from Google News, but…

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•They appear in regular web search results!

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•Speed of crawling/index too slow

Some users have complained that it takes too long

for news stories to appear in the Google index.

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•Lower page rank for most cbc.ca pages

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How we’re currently using SEO

•We are doing some SEO:

• Using META tags (description, keywords)

• Using unique URLs (sort of)

• We have a HTML site map. (www.cbc.ca/sitemap)

• Using proper heading tags (h1, h2, etc..)

© July 26, 2011 13

What more can we do?

•Provide a news site map to Google

•Ensure proper keywords are used

•Ensure the description tag is accurate

•Encourage users to link to our news stories

•Provide relevant outbound links to other sites

•Use the webmaster tools

•Reconsider story sharing

•Talk to Google!

© July 26, 2011 14

Google News Best Practices

•Be Unique

• Each news story needs to have a unique URL.

•Be Permanent

• Each news story URL must not change.

•Display a three-digit number (dates don’t count).

• A unique number at least three digits must be in

the URL. Exceptions are made for Google News

Sitemaps.

•Links To Articles

• Should be 22 words (not characters) or less.

© July 26, 2011 15

Google News Ranking

Google news ranks which news source appears at the top of a

particular story based on the following criteria:

•Freshness of content

• Being first (breaking the news) isn’t always the best

•Diversity of content

• Make sure your story contains a lot of relevant

information

•Rich contextual content

• Make sure your story contains keywords that people are

likely to search for

© July 26, 2011 16

Google News Sitemap

A Google News sitemap allows you to submit your article URLs (and metadata) directly to Google to be crawled and indexed.

A sitemap will include the following information:

•URL to news story

•Story publication date

•Story keywords

The sitemap will also be used by other search engines as well.

© July 26, 2011 17

Using Proper Keywords

Poor Keywords:http://www.cbc.ca/money/story/2009/03/02/markets.html

“markets,s tocks”

Good:

•Keyword matches word in URL

Bad:

•Only one valid keyword (“s tocks” doesn’t count)

•Article is about more than just market and stocks.

Suggested Keywords:

“tsx, stock market, canada, closed down,weakness”

© July 26, 2011 18


Poor Keywords:http://www.cbc.ca/arts/books/story/2009/03/02/canada-reads-starts.html

“canada reads, book battle, champion”

Good:

•Keyword appears in the URL

Bad:

•Will users actually search for “book battle”?

•Story is not about “book battle” or “champion”

Suggested Keywords:

“canada reads, campbell, slean, lewis, withenshaw, books”

© July 26, 2011 19


Good Keywords:http://www.cbc.ca/canada/toronto/story/2009/03/03/speeding-bust.html

“speeding, stunt-driving, toronto, ontario, highway

400, street racing”

•Keywords appear in the URL & story

•Sums up contents of article well

•Keywords most likely used by users performing a

search

•Not too many (not overloading META tag)

© July 26, 2011 20


It’s important to remember:

•Ensure keywords are correct (no typos or spelling

errors)

•No need to supply synonyms (ie: “bc” and “british

columbia”)

•4-6 Keywords are sufficient

•Try to use words that users will use when

performing a search

•Use keywords that are found in the URL, header,

and first paragraph of the story

© July 26, 2011 21

The META Description Tag

The contents of the description tag will appear as

the snippet in search results.

This is important to get users to click on your search

result instead of somewhere else.

© July 26, 2011 22

The META Description Tag

Poor Example:http://www.cbc.ca/news/background/harper_stephen/

<META NAME="description" CONTENT="Stephen Harper">

•Description too small. Google will compile its own

snippet instead.

•In this example, it’s the image caption

© July 26, 2011 23

Inbound & Outbound Links

Google ranks pages based on the number and

quality of links to and from your pages.

Try to link to other sources that have a high page

rank, and vise-versa.

You can adjust the position you appear in search

results based on who links to you.

For Example:

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“stephen harper”

•Wikipedia: 1

•CBC: 16 (second page of results)

“conservative party”

•Wikipedia: 3

•CBC: 5

WHY?

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“stephen harper” (Rank: 16)

•Wikipedia Pagerank: 6/10

•CBC Pagerank: 5/10

•Conservatives website Pagerank: 7/10

Wikipedia article links to Conservative Party in depth. (NOT

Stephen Harper in depth)

•Change article to point to Steven Harper in depth instead.

•Update in depth to point to Wikipedia Article

•Update in depth to point to Stephen Harper bio on

Conservatives website

© July 26, 2011 26


“conservative party” (Rank: 5)

•Wikipedia Pagerank: 6/10

•CBC Pagerank: 5/10

•Conservatives website Pagerank: 7/10

Wikipedia article links to OTHER pages and not in depth.

•Add link to Wikipedia page to point to Conservative Party in depth.

•Update in depth to point to Wikipedia Article and Conservatives website.

© July 26, 2011 27

Improving Pagerank

•Link to pages that have a higher pagerank than

you:

• Link to Stephen Harpers website from in depth &

news stories.

•If possible, get higher pagerank sites to link back

to you:

• Edit Wikipedia articles to cite cbc.ca or add a link

to “see also” section

•The more inbound links the better.

•Use Google Toolbar to find out a sites pagerank

© July 26, 2011 28

Story Sharing and SEO

•Google expects to only find one copy of a story at

one URL

•Story sharing makes available the same copy at

multiple URLs

•Google sees this practice as “spammy” and may

lower the page rank for those pages or cbc.ca

© July 26, 2011 30

To Recap…

•Results ranking too low

• Increase page rank by linking to other pages

•Incorrect snippet data

• Make sure your META description tag is correct

•Missing stories from Google News

• Use a news sitemap

•Speed of indexing/crawling

• Remember: Google News prefers “fresher”

content.

© July 26, 2011 31

To Recap…

Some suggestions:

•Copyedit the keywords field

•Contact DP&BD to set up a Google News sitemap

•Ensure stories have “related” links that leave

cbc.ca. for example: to wikipedia, official sites,

press releases.

•Use inline links (see Arts stories)

•Reduce use of story sharing (or eliminate).

© July 26, 2011 32

Further Reading…

Google’s Own SEO Guidehttp://googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.com/2008/11/googles-seo-starter-guide.html

Google Website Optimizerhttp://www.google.com/websiteoptimizer

Google Support Pageshttp://www.google.com/support/

Search Engine Optimization Bibleby Ledford, Jerri L.

ISBN:978-0-470-17500-2

Improving SEO at CBC

Technology

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