Mr Branding

Wednesday, September 28, 2016

Pagination and SEO: Best Practices & Common Issues

Pagination for SEO

This article is part of an SEO series from WooRank. Thank you for supporting the partners who make SitePoint possible.

If you’ve got a large site, or even a smaller site that has some pages with longform content, you’ve probably had to deal with pagination at some point. There are several reasons you’d want to paginate your content: You’ve got a series of related articles, a page with lots of search results, your ecommerce site has a large list of products in a category or you’ve got a discussion forum housing several comment threads. In this article we’ll go over some best practices for implementing pagination for SEO, some common problems that arise from pagination and how to resolve those problems.

Pagination Best Practices

When to Paginate

Human usability is the main reason you would want to paginate your content. When you get beyond a few pages worth of links, it starts to get daunting for users. Plus, these pages can take a long time to load, which is a big no-no for both user experience and SEO. The other main reason to paginate content is to limit the number links on one page. It’s generally considered best practice to keep the number of links on a page to 100 or fewer (even though Google dropped this guideline a few years ago), although that’s far from a hard limit. Some reasons to keep the number of outbound links below that number include:

Having a large number of links on a page affects robots’ crawl efficiency, and could result in having more valuable pages passed over in favor of less important pages. You can guard against this using sitemaps, but those aren’t ironclad.
Link juice is divided evenly among all the links on a page. So the more links you have, the less each one passes. Since you can’t use "nofollow" links anymore to direct link juice, limit the number of links on a page to maximize the value each one passes.
Pages with lots of links generally have pretty thin content and aren’t the most legitimate-looking pages on the web. That doesn’t mean your pages are spam, or that search engines will automatically come to that conclusion, but paginating long lists of links will help show that your page is legitimate.

View More/Less Results & View All Page

Giving users the ability to view more or less rows per page can have big positive impacts on your human usability, but can cause headaches for SEOs. If you aren’t careful, you’ll end up with duplicate content getting crawled by search engines if each view more/less option uses a different URL. Use javascript to reload the page, displaying the new number of rows at the same URL.

You can also avoid the whole pagination duplicate content altogether by using the "noindex" meta robot tag and a View All page. Add the noindex tag to your paginated pages’ <head> like this:

<meta name="robots” content=”noindex”/>

Then, add the robots meta tag to your view all page, with "index" as the content value. This technically isn’t necessary as it’s the default unless otherwise indicated, but giving crawlers a push in the right direction doesn’t hurt. Test and submit your sitemap via Google Search Console’s sitemap tool.

Test/Add Sitemap

Use HTML5’s History API to change the URL as new pages are loaded. So when a user reaches the bottom of page two, the page two URL would switch to the page three URL when that content has loaded. The same is true for the opposite: Scrolling up to load page two content will switch the URL back.

Infinite Scroll

Using infinite scroll is a popular way of dealing with content, particularly for long articles and social media pages. It’s also really useful for mobile pages and very user friendly, but it’s not so friendly for search engines. However, there are some ways you can offset that unfriendliness so you can use infinite scroll without hurting your SEO too much.

If your paginated content uses separate URLs, include them in your sitemap. This will ensure that search engines find, crawl and index your content, including the pages loaded via infinite crawl that they otherwise couldn’t access.

Use rel="prev”/”next” to Avoid Duplicate Title Tags & Meta Descriptions

When properly implemented, pagination generally doesn’t result in duplicate page content (unless you’ve decided to use view more/less and/or view all features). However, it can cause problems with two very important SEO factors: title tags and meta descriptions. Use Google Search Console to find instances of duplicate title tags. Find all your duplicate title tags and meta descriptions in the HTML Improvements section under Search Appearance.

HTML Improvements Google Search Console

The rel="prev”/”next” tags are implemented in the </head><head> of the page, and are used to indicate the preceding and succeeding pages in the pagination chain. So, for example, the second page in the chain, example.com/page2, would have the tags implemented like this:

<link rel="prev” href=”http://ift.tt/2cWRddj;

<link rel="next” href=”http://ift.tt/2dlx6cv;

These tags will tell search engines that the pages at the indicated URLs are all linked together, so they won’t see their shared title tags and meta descriptions as duplicates. They’ll also consolidate their indexing properties like link juice, and possibly send visitors from search engines to the first page in the series.

If your paginated series uses URL parameters, for example sorting or filtering, you can also use the canonical tag like so:

<link rel="canonical” href=”http://ift.tt/2cWRvAX;

<link rel="prev” href=”http://ift.tt/2cWRddj;

<link rel="next” href=”http://ift.tt/2dly5Jx;

Unbroken pagination chain

Common Problems With Pagination

If you’re using rel="prev”/”next” annotations, implementing pagination is pretty straightforward. However, you can still take a few wrong turns that will impact how search engines crawl and access your content.

Continue reading %Pagination and SEO: Best Practices & Common Issues%

by Greg Snow-Wasserman via SitePoint

Quick Tip: How to Install .deb and .tar Files in Linux

In this quick tutorial, I explain how to install programs in Linux using terminal commands. This particular tutorial uses Linux Mint 18 (Cinnamon 64-bit), but the commands provided below are universal to other versions of Linux, such as Ubuntu. For those of you who are new to Linux, chances are you'll be familiar with the in-built Software Manager:

In-built Linux software manager

In a nutshell, the Software Manager allows for easier installation of a variety of programs by simply searching for the program available, and then installing it from the manager. For instance, if a user wanted to install GIMP through the Software Manager, it would simply be a matter of locating the program and installing:

Installing GIMP

However, installations in Linux can regularly get more complicated than this, in that it's often necessary to install programs directly from the source code. Here, I explain how to install two particular types of extensions that often give newbies to Linux quite a headache. (It certainly did for me when I was starting out!)

We're going to look at the methods to install both Debian (deb) and Tarball (tar.gz) files through the terminal, and the two respective examples that will be used in this tutorial are Dropbox and VeraCrypt. The usual disclaimers apply: these two programs are only used for illustration purposes, and I'm not endorsing or promoting any particular products in this article.

1. Installing Dropbox through deb file

Installing deb files comes with varying degrees of difficulty. In other words, some programs that consist of deb files allow for direct installation, while those that contain many separate deb files typically must be installed through the terminal. Let's look at the Dropbox example in installing the deb file.

Firstly, we're selecting the Ubuntu 64-bit version (or the appropriate one for your system):

Choosing the Dropbox Ubuntu 64-bit version

Next, we're prompted to install the package directly:

The Dropbox installer

While this particular deb file was easy enough to install, there are situations where we have to install the deb file directly from the terminal. For instance, instead of installing directly, the program could have prompted us to extract deb files to a particular location and then install from there.

Using Dropbox as an example, suppose that we were hypothetically prompted to extract files and then install. For illustration purposes, let's call this folder Dropbox_deb, which is stored in our Downloads folder. Under this scenario, we would:

a. Set our directory to the Dropbox_deb folder in Downloads:

cd ~/Desktop/Dropbox_deb

b. Install the .deb files using the following command:

sudo dpkg -i *.deb

Continue reading %Quick Tip: How to Install .deb and .tar Files in Linux%

by Michael Grogan via SitePoint

Choreographer.js – Library for Managing Complex CSS Animations

Choreographer.js is a simple library to take care of complicated animations.

by via jQuery-Plugins.net RSS Feed

Here’s How to Uncover Your Next Great Business Idea

Thinking About Business Ideas

I’m going to let you in on a secret…

… Entrepreneurs are not geniuses.

You might look at famous entrepreneurs and think "I could never have an idea like that.” You’re wrong. And that’s a good thing. The truth is that you do already have an idea for a viable business, you just don’t know it yet. In this guide, we’re going to explore what those ideas might be, and how you can uncover them.

We’re going to start with a simple premise — that you can create a good business idea from what you already know and love. We’re going to explore your skills and interests, and see if we can combine those into something interesting. It might not be a world shattering premise, or even something you decide to execute on, but that’s not the point. What it will do is teach you how thinking objectively about your approach and skills can get you into the habit of coming up with promising ideas and give you the confidence to do that, and keep doing it.

We’ll start with your own skills, talents, interests, and experience, because it’s something you already have a great deal of knowledge about. You don’t need to do any research to find out what you already know and like — what we’re going to do is combine these in interesting and unusual ways, to see if anything fascinating and business-worthy comes out.

I’ve designed this guide to be easy to use, but it’s up to you how you use it. Feel free to mix and match, jump around, and use it in a way that’s comfortable for you. Remember, it’s the way you think about and use this process, rather than the outcome that’s important.

By the time we’re done, you’ll be able to:

Understand all your main skills and how you could use them in business.
Create a list of the things you care about.
Work out the interests and skills that are most important to you.
Create shortlist of ideas you can explore further.

Let’s get into it…

We’re going to:

Explore and list your key skills
Explore and list your interests
Prioritize the things that are most important to you
Combine your skills and interests to create business ideas
Explore next steps

Explore and List Your Key Skills

Grab a pen and some paper, and start writing down your key skills. What is a skill? Well, essentially it’s:

Something you’ve learned to do or are naturally good at.
Is something you can actively "do" or practice.
Might have been learned in a formal setting.
Gives you a capability to achieve something.

Explore the various areas of your life and work to find skills you’re good at. These don’t just need to be "hard" skills like computer programming or carpentry — they can include “soft” skills like parenting or being a good party planner.

Write down anything you think is relevant. This doesn’t have to be an exhaustive list, but you should aim for a fair number of skills. Try to get a good selection across work, academia, your personal life, your social life, and your hobbies.

Be precise in capturing your skills. Instead of saying "The Arts," you might say ”Oil Painting” or instead of “Parenting” you might say “Child Development.”

Examples of Skill Areas

Here are some of the areas you can think about when you’re exploring your skills list.

Qualifications and formal education — e.g. college or university studies, further education, formal tuition and academic training.
Vocational skills — e.g. carpentry, mechanics, engineering, internships, apprenticeships, trade skills, construction, plumbing etc.
Business and career skills — e.g. financial management, administration, HR, sales, operations, projects, marketing, management, leadership.
Soft skills — e.g. social skills, pastimes, research, languages.
Skills learned from hobbies and interests — e.g. creativity, sports, crafts, arts, playing an instrument.
Life skills — e.g. child care, cooking, driving, home improvement.

You can expand on your list by:

Looking at your CV, resume, or LinkedIn profile.
Thinking about your employment history and the skills you needed.
Reviewing your qualifications, certifications, and training.
Seeing the skills you use every day.
Talking to your friends about the skills they think you have.

The important thing is that by the end of this stage, you should have a good list of skills you’re confident in. Below, you can see an example of a skill list.

Skills List

Explore and List Your Interests

Just like with your skills, we’re now going to think about and list your interests. What counts as an interest?

It’s something you choose to do in your spare time, whatever that is.
It’s a pastime, hobby, or a way to enjoy yourself.
It’s something that excites, inspires, or entertains you.
It’s something you care about.

Start thinking about and writing down your interests — you’ll want to put these in a different list to your skills. Explain your interests in the right amount of detail, and remember that sometimes your skills and interests might be the same. That’s fine, capture them in both lists.

Examples of Interest Areas

Here’s some inspiration for the types of areas you can think about:

Business and work — e.g. budgeting, finance, investing, productivity.
Entertainment — e.g. gaming, films, reading, drama, music, theatre.
Technology — e.g. tablets, phones, computers, popular science.
Home — e.g. model making, cooking, bread making, metalworking.
Hobbies and pastimes — e.g. handicrafts, sports, fashion.
Other — e.g. travel, pets, volunteering.

You can expand on your list by:

Looking at Facebook and Meetup interest groups.
Talking to your friends about shared interests.
Keeping a quick diary of the things you do each day for a couple of weeks.

You might not be able to get all your skills and interests noted down in a day, that’s fine. You can revisit your lists once or several times until you’ve captured the stuff you think is important. Below, you can see an example of an interest list.

Interests List

Prioritize What’s Important to You

You’ll have two separate lists, one for your skills and one for your interests. Chances are you’ve got quite a few entries on each list, which is why this step is important — you’re going to prioritize them, so when you start combining skills and interests, you’re not looking at thousands of ideas!

Continue reading %Here’s How to Uncover Your Next Great Business Idea%

by Paul Maplesden via SitePoint

Quick Tip: Add or Remove a CSS Class with Vanilla JavaScript

Sometimes you need to add or remove a CSS class with JavaScript, and you don't want to include an entire library like jQuery to do it.

This is useful in situations when you want your page elements to change in response to user actions.

Example uses include:

Showing or hiding a menu
Highlighting a form error
Showing a dialog box
Showing different content in response to a selection
Animating an element in response to a click

There are two JavaScript properties that let you work with classes: className and classList. The former is widely compatible, while the latter is more modern and convenient. If you don't need to support IE 8 and 9, you can skip className.

We'll start with the compatible version first.

Note: This tutorial assumes some familiarity with JavaScript concepts like functions and variables.

Modifying Classes the Compatible Way

The JavaScript className property lets you access the class attribute of an HTML element. Some string manipulation will let us add and remove classes.

We'll access HTML elements using querySelectorAll(), which is compatible with browsers from IE8 and up.

Add a Class

To add a class, we'll write a function that takes in the elements we want to change and adds a specified class to all of them.

function addClass(elements, myClass) {

  // if we have a selector, get the chosen elements
  if (typeof(elements) === 'string') {
    elements = document.querySelectorAll(elements);
  }

  // if we have only one dom element, make it an array to simplify behavior
  else if (!elements.length) { elements=[elements]; }

  // add class to all chosen elements
  for (var i=0; i<elements.length; i++) {
    if (!(' '+elements[i].className+' ').indexOf(' '+myClass+' ') > -1) {
      elements[i].className += ' ' + myClass;
    }
  }
}

You'll see how the function works soon, but to watch the function in action, feel free to use this CSS:

.red{
  background: red;
}

.highlight{
  background: gold;
}

...and this HTML:

Continue reading %Quick Tip: Add or Remove a CSS Class with Vanilla JavaScript%

by Yaphi Berhanu via SitePoint

Make Forms Fun with Flexbox

I’ll come clean: HTML forms are rarely fun – but they’re a necessary part of web development. Fortunately, some historical difficulties can be alleviated with CSS flexbox. Consider how forms are typically coded without flexbox. What HTML mark-up would you use for the following fields? We would normally use mark-up as such: <div> <label for="name">name</label> […]

Continue reading %Make Forms Fun with Flexbox%

by Craig Buckler via SitePoint

8 Essential Elements of a Social Media Marketing Strategy

Do you need help getting started with your social media marketing strategy? Do you know what to include? Goals and objectives guide your social media strategy to help you successfully connect with your customers. In this article I’ll share what you need to include in your social media marketing strategy so it works from day [...]

This post 8 Essential Elements of a Social Media Marketing Strategy first appeared on .
- Your Guide to the Social Media Jungle

by Houssem Daoud via