167 replies to this topic

[toyicebear]

One of the cornerstones of seo'ing a osc shop is to add individual tittles and meta tags for the different pages.

There are mainly two different ways this is being done, by manual incertion or automatic creation.

The manual versions are headed of by Header Tags Controller while the automatic ones are headed of by C-Dynamic Meta Tags.


1. Header Tags Controller

This contribution lets you incert individual meta tags for all your products and categories in the add product/categories part of your admin, it also contains a separate section which lets you incert meta tags for other singular pages on your site.

The system also comes with a basic fill tags system, where you can automatically fill all the products and categories with meta tags.

Install
The install is medium advanced and slightly time consuming , but most should still be able to install it by just following the included instructions.

Pros:
- It lets you incert meta tags manually for your products and categories.
- The contribs mods of your shops files also include other seo optimizing details for your shop side files.
- It lets you define meta tags for all the static pages on your site too.

Cons
- The install is to complicated and time consuming for some.
- If you have a shop with a large number of products and/or uses import of products feeds to fill your shop there is alot of work in adding the meta info manually for all the products.
- The autofill function is way to basic and ads only the product name as tittle tag, meta description and meta key words.

Conclusion

This is a very good seo tool for shops with a small amount of products or larger shops where products have not been entered yet.

Link to contrib....


2. C-Dynamic Meta Tags

This contribution incerts meta tags automatically for your shops products and categories (and new products, specials ++), in addition it lets you add meta tags for your index page and general tags manually.

The meta tags can also be cached for shortest possible execution time, lower server load and faster page load time.

Install

Install is very easy and straight forward.

Pros:
- Very easy install
- Easy on server resources due to caching
- Creates all your meta tags automatically for any amount of categories/products.

Cons
- You can not enter your product/category meta tags manually
- The category part of the automatic meta tags function is very basic.

Conclusion

This is a very good seo tool for those who have a pre-populated shop with many categories and products or for those who fill up their products using feed import as well as it is a very easy server load which is more and more important teh larger your product/category numbers get.

Also its a good tool for those who whant to have meta tags and tittles but who do not want to manually incert them.

Last but not least if the header tags install is to much for you, then the easy install of this one will probably appeal to you.

Link to contrib....


In the next post i will have a closer look at some of the other meta tags contributions too.

Edited by toyicebear, 20 March 2006, 05:46.

[toyicebear]

A small note in regards to cdynamic meta tags....

There are 2 optional versions , one without any db import and one which requires import of db values.

This is the last version without db import, cDynamic Meta Tags v1.4 , 11 May 2005 . (This one is also completely multi-lingual)

[toyicebear]

3. Meta Tag Controller Support

Automatic meta tags generator , has provisions for most of the standard osc pages as well as generates automatic met tags for products and categories. (Made to complement the Search Engine Friendly Urls contrib, but can be used with standrd urls and/or other seo url contribs)

Install

Very easy , just one file upload and changing of one line in the files where you want meta tags.

Pros:
- Very easy install , anyone should be able to make it work.
- It works straight out of the box together with the Search Engine Friendly Urls contrib.

Cons:
- No manual adjustments
- Slightly basic metas

Conclusion:

A very good alternative for those who just want to have the shops metas up and running fast and easy.
(Also the only meta tags contributions which work without modifications together with the Search Engine Friendly Urls contrib)


Link to contrib....

Edited by toyicebear, 20 March 2006, 06:02.

[Vger]

Meta Tags, whilst not being totally redundant (yet) as far as Search Engine placement is concerned, are not the 'must have' tool they once were. Of much more importance for Webmasters would be installing Ultimate SEO URL's, though this only works on Apache servers with Mod Rewrite available.

Vger

[toyicebear]

Vger, on Mar 20 2006, 12:30 PM, said:

Meta Tags, whilst not being totally redundant (yet) as far as Search Engine placement is concerned, are not the 'must have' tool they once were. Of much more importance for Webmasters would be installing Ultimate SEO URL's, though this only works on Apache servers with Mod Rewrite available.

Vger

Meta Tags are still a factor in the placment of your pages, though its true that its not as esential as it used to be. (Though the relevance of choosen keywords in relation to the pages actual content still does mather)

The actual point which still is very esential is individual tittles for your pages, all the mentioned meta tags contribs above will give you just that too.

If you are interested in SEO URL's have a look at the contribs/formats available by clicking on the link named SEO/SEF urls in my signature under.....


Today the search engines aim to be more "smart" and to be able to filter the search more and more on content only , and also they try to filter out content based on more organic human criterias in such a way as also trying to recognice content which is human made content and not just machine made seo optimized content.......

The point being, the most important part of the seo mix is to write correct high quality content for your pages and product descriptions.

Edited by toyicebear, 20 March 2006, 13:33.

[Jack_mcs]

toyicebear, on Mar 20 2006, 12:41 AM, said:

1. Header Tags Controller

//snipped

Cons
- If you have a shop with a large number of products and/or uses import of products feeds to fill your shop there is alot of work in adding the meta info manually for all the products.
- The autofill function is way to basic and ads only the product name as tittle tag, meta description and meta key words.

These are not correct.
- To fill the tags, you simply need to click on a few buttons in Fill Tags.
- That is exactly as it should be. The misconception is that since you can put a long list of words in your meta keywords tags, for example, that you should do so. That is the complete opposite from the truth. The best optimization for your products, in most cases, is to have one keyword and that keyword should be the name of the product.

Quote

Conclusion

This is a very good seo tool for shops with a small amount of products or larger shops where products have not been entered yet.

Again, not true. How many products there are or whether the products have previously been added have no effect at all on how well it operates.

Jack

[toyicebear]

Jack_mcs, on Mar 20 2006, 02:32 PM, said:

These are not correct.
- To fill the tags, you simply need to click on a few buttons in Fill Tags.
- That is exactly as it should be. The misconception is that since you can put a long list of words in your meta keywords tags, for example, that you should do so. That is the complete opposite from the truth. The best optimization for your products, in most cases, is to have one keyword and that keyword should be the name of the product. Again, not true. How many products there are or whether the products have previously been added have no effect at all on how well it operates.

Jack

The fill tags function for the Header Tags contribution is not ideal...

1. It works well for the tittle tag...

2. It is not sufficent for the meta description.

The meta description should be a short condensed version directly reflecting the page content description

3. It is not sufficient for the Meta Keywords.

The meta keywords should be a short list of the relevant words/search strings . The choosen keywords/strings should also be in the visible part of in the page description.

Edited by toyicebear, 20 March 2006, 14:46.

[Jack_mcs]

toyicebear, on Mar 20 2006, 09:45 AM, said:

The fill tags function for the Header Tags contribution is not ideal...

1. It works well for the tittle tag...

2. It is not sufficent for the meta description.

The meta description should be a short condensed version directly reflecting the page content description

3. It is not sufficient for the Meta Keywords.

The meta keywords should be a short list of the relevant words/search strings . The choosen keywords/strings should also be in the visible part of in the page description.

2 - The product name is a short condensed version directly reflecting the page content description.
3 - The products name is a short list and it is in the product description.

You're falling in to the trap that says "Because you can do it, it must be the correct way and I must do it that way." This is not how to optimize a page for best results. When the SE's visit a page and see the title, meta tags and page content all referring to the same thing, they realize immediately what that page is about. When you are start watering-down that mixture with other keywords or longer descriptions, you hurt that the ranking for that page, generally speaking, of course.

Jack

[toyicebear]

Jack_mcs, on Mar 20 2006, 02:56 PM, said:

2 - The product name is a short condensed version directly reflecting the page content description.
3 - The products name is a short list and it is in the product description.

You're falling in to the trap that says "Because you can do it, it must be the correct way and I must do it that way." This is not how to optimize a page for best results. When the SE's visit a page and see the title, meta tags and page content all referring to the same thing, they realize immediately what that page is about. When you are start watering-down that mixture with other keywords or longer descriptions, you hurt that the ranking for that page, generally speaking, of course.

Jack

If you only aim for one keyword/string that might actually work out...... BUT anyone who have tried Adwords or Overture (Now Yahoo search) can tell you that you can not only count on that someone looking for your product will search for the exact tittle of the product. Usually they offer you a suggestion of quite a few related and relevant keywords/strings to add bids on, and after trying it out most can atest to the effectivnes of alternative keywords/strings.

By having a description tag and a slightly wider but ofcourse relvant key words selection your chances of catching some of the alternative search keywords/strings used is much higher.

ofcourse adding a keyword in the meta tags which is not present in your pages text will not help you and might actually hurt your ranking, so keep the keywords/strings to what is already present in your pages text.

[Jellybelly]

I wanted to say thank you for posting this thread. I have read it and I have to say it is very helpful. My site had no metatags and was nearly impossible to find in the search egine. I utilized the information you provided and it is working beautifully. Thank you so much.

[Jack_mcs]

toyicebear, on Mar 20 2006, 10:05 AM, said:

If you only aim for one keyword/string that might actually work out...... BUT anyone who have tried Adwords or Overture (Now Yahoo search) can tell you that you can not only count on that someone looking for your product will search for the exact tittle of the product. Usually they offer you a suggestion of quite a few related and relevant keywords/strings to add bids on, and after trying it out most can atest to the effectivnes of alternative keywords/strings.

By having a description tag and a slightly wider but ofcourse relvant key words selection your chances of catching some of the alternative search keywords/strings used is much higher.

ofcourse adding a keyword in the meta tags which is not present in your pages text will not help you and might actually hurt your ranking, so keep the keywords/strings to what is already present in your pages text.

Yes, if you are targeting other keywords on the page, then you would need to add them. I guess it depends upon what you are aiming for. When I optimize a page, it is optimized so that that page gets the highest position possible. When you add another keyword, unless a lot of text is added to the page, which usually not the case with products, you lower the position you get for the first keyword. So, while you may reach another set of people, depending upon what they typed in, you will be reaching a smaller set of people for both keywords. I'm not saying it is perfect, or even the best method, but I know how well it works when left alone. If you monitor your logs and find that a lot of people are coming to your site looking for "Red Shoes" instead of the "Shoes" product you have listed (an example, of course), then you should either add a new product named "Red Shoes" or change the name from "Shoes" to "Red Shoes."

Jack

[toyicebear]

Jack_mcs, on Mar 20 2006, 06:08 PM, said:

Yes, if you are targeting other keywords on the page, then you would need to add them. I guess it depends upon what you are aiming for. When I optimize a page, it is optimized so that that page gets the highest position possible. When you add another keyword, unless a lot of text is added to the page, which usually not the case with products, you lower the position you get for the first keyword. So, while you may reach another set of people, depending upon what they typed in, you will be reaching a smaller set of people for both keywords. I'm not saying it is perfect, or even the best method, but I know how well it works when left alone. If you monitor your logs and find that a lot of people are coming to your site looking for "Red Shoes" instead of the "Shoes" product you have listed (an example, of course), then you should either add a new product named "Red Shoes" or change the name from "Shoes" to "Red Shoes."

Jack

If you only want the product name to fill the metas like with the header tags auto fill function, you can actually achive that without installing any meta contrib.

It requires a very small modification of the file product_info.php

Here is how you do it....

1.

Locate this:

Quote

<title><?php echo TITLE; ?></title>

and replace it with this:

Quote

<title><?php echo $product_info['products_name']; ?></title>
<meta name="description" content="<?php echo $product_info['products_nam"]; ?>">
<meta name="keywords" content="<?php echo $product_info['products_nam"]; ?>">

2.

locate this code: (about line 72 )

Quote

$product_info_query = tep_db_query("select p.products_id, pd.products_name, pd.products_description, p.products_model, p.products_quantity, p.products_image, pd.products_url, p.products_price, p.products_tax_class_id, p.products_date_added, p.products_date_available, p.manufacturers_id from " . TABLE_PRODUCTS . " p, " . TABLE_PRODUCTS_DESCRIPTION . " pd where p.products_status = '1' and p.products_id = '" . (int)$HTTP_GET_VARS['products_id'] . "' and pd.products_id = p.products_id and pd.language_id = '" . (int)$languages_id . "'");
$product_info = tep_db_fetch_array($product_info_query);

now mark this code section in the file and right click and choose "cut"

then locate this pice of code at the top of the file:

Quote

$product_check_query = tep_db_query("select count(*) as total from " . TABLE_PRODUCTS . " p, " . TABLE_PRODUCTS_DESCRIPTION . " pd where p.products_status = '1' and p.products_id = '" . (int)$HTTP_GET_VARS['products_id'] . "' and pd.products_id = p.products_id and pd.language_id = '" . (int)$languages_id . "'");
$product_check = tep_db_fetch_array($product_check_query);

Right under this you then just past inn the section you marked previously.


after you have done so it will look like this:

Quote

$product_check_query = tep_db_query("select count(*) as total from " . TABLE_PRODUCTS . " p, " . TABLE_PRODUCTS_DESCRIPTION . " pd where p.products_status = '1' and p.products_id = '" . (int)$HTTP_GET_VARS['products_id'] . "' and pd.products_id = p.products_id and pd.language_id = '" . (int)$languages_id . "'");
$product_check = tep_db_fetch_array($product_check_query);
$product_info_query = tep_db_query("select p.products_id, pd.products_name, pd.products_description, p.products_model, p.products_quantity, p.products_image, pd.products_url, p.products_price, p.products_tax_class_id, p.products_date_added, p.products_date_available, p.manufacturers_id from " . TABLE_PRODUCTS . " p, " . TABLE_PRODUCTS_DESCRIPTION . " pd where p.products_status = '1' and p.products_id = '" . (int)$HTTP_GET_VARS['products_id'] . "' and pd.products_id = p.products_id and pd.language_id = '" . (int)$languages_id . "'");
$product_info = tep_db_fetch_array($product_info_query);

Thats it.....now all your products will have the products name as tittle, meta description and meta keyword. (Just like if you had been using header tags and the auto fill function)

Edited by toyicebear, 21 March 2006, 08:14.

[warrenerjm]

toyicebear, on Mar 21 2006, 08:13 AM, said:

If you only want the product name to fill the metas like with the header tags auto fill function, you can actually achive that without installing any meta contrib.

It requires a very small modification of the file product_info.php

Here is how you do it....

Hi Jack & Nick

This makes very interesting reading. You are both very knowledgable about this subject. I have looked at quite a few of the contributions for header/meta tags. They all look very complicated & I was wondering if Nicks last post on the product_info.php would be as good. I pressume I would need to put meta tags for description & keywords etc on the non products page between<head> & </head>. I feel dissy trying to understand which one I should do, which is both good enough to help my ratings & be easy enough for me to install. I haven't touched the .sql database yet, so those contributions confuse me the most.

Thanks for a great thread & I will continue to follow until I am brave enough to try one.

Julie

[toyicebear]

[quote name='warrenerjm' post='820915' date='Mar 21 2006, 09:38 AM']Hi Jack & Nick

This makes very interesting reading. You are both very knowledgable about this subject. I have looked at quite a few of the contributions for header/meta tags. They all look very complicated & I was wondering if Nicks last post on the product_info.php would be as good. I pressume I would need to put meta tags for description & keywords etc on the non products page between<head> & </head>. I feel dissy trying to understand which one I should do, which is both good enough to help my ratings & be easy enough for me to install. I haven't touched the .sql database yet, so those contributions confuse me the most.

Thanks for a great thread & I will continue to follow until I am brave enough to try one.

Julie[/quote]

To follow up some more, folowing the same logic as descriped above about the simplest form of meta tags for other pages too....

This is for the non-dynamic pages like contact_us , privacy , conditions etc.

find this code:

[quote]<title><?php echo TITLE; ?></title>[/quote]

and replace it with this code:

[quote]<title><?php echo HEADING_TITLE; ?></title>
<meta name="description" content="<?php echo HEADING_TITLE; ?>">
<meta name="keywords" content="<?php echo HEADING_TITLE; ?>">[/quote]


Now the tags will be filled with the pages heading tittle......

[toyicebear]

To complete this little meta hack..here is how to do it in the index.php file....

find this code at the top of the index.php file:

Quote

require('includes/application_top.php');

// the following cPath references come from application_top.php
$category_depth = 'top';
if (isset($cPath) && tep_not_null($cPath)) {
$categories_products_query = tep_db_query("select count(*) as total from " . TABLE_PRODUCTS_TO_CATEGORIES . " where categories_id = '" . (int)$current_category_id . "'");
$cateqories_products = tep_db_fetch_array($categories_products_query);
if ($cateqories_products['total'] > 0) {
$category_depth = 'products'; // display products
} else {
$category_parent_query = tep_db_query("select count(*) as total from " . TABLE_CATEGORIES . " where parent_id = '" . (int)$current_category_id . "'");
$category_parent = tep_db_fetch_array($category_parent_query);
if ($category_parent['total'] > 0) {
$category_depth = 'nested'; // navigate through the categories
} else {
$category_depth = 'products'; // category has no products, but display the 'no products' message
}
}
}

Directly under it past in this:

Quote

if (isset($_GET['cPath'])) {
$category_name_query = tep_db_query("select cd.categories_name from " . TABLE_CATEGORIES . " c, " . TABLE_CATEGORIES_DESCRIPTION . " cd where c.categories_id = '" . (int)$current_category_id . "' and cd.categories_id = '" . (int)$current_category_id . "' and cd.language_id = '" . (int)$languages_id . "'");
$category_name = tep_db_fetch_array($category_name_query);
}
if (isset($HTTP_GET_VARS['manufacturers_id'])) {
$manufacturers_name_query = tep_db_query("select m.manufacturers_name from " . TABLE_MANUFACTURERS . " m where m.manufacturers_id = '" . (int)$HTTP_GET_VARS['manufacturers_id'] . "'");
$manufacturers_name = tep_db_fetch_array($manufacturers_name_query);
}

Then find this:

Quote

<title><?php echo TITLE; ?></title>

and replace it with this:

Quote

<?php if (isset($HTTP_GET_VARS['manufacturers_id'])) { ?>
<title><?php echo $manufacturers_name['manufacturers_name']; ?></title>
<meta name="description" content="<?php echo $manufacturers_name['manufacturers_nam"]; ?>">
<meta name="keywords" content="<?php echo $manufacturers_name['manufacturers_nam"]; ?>">
<?php
}
if ((basename($PHP_SELF) == FILENAME_DEFAULT) and (!isset($_GET['cPath']))) {
?>
<title><?php echo INDEX_META_TITLE; ?></title>
<meta name="description" content="<?php echo INDEX_META_DESCRIPTION; ?>"> <meta name="keywords" content="<?php echo INDEX_META_KEYWORDS; ?>"> <?php } if (isset($_GET['cPat"])) {
?>
<title><?php echo $category_name['categories_name']; ?></title>
<meta name="description" content="<?php echo $category_name['categories_nam"]; ?>">
<meta name="keywords" content="<?php echo $category_name['categories_nam"]; ?>">

<?php
}
?>

Now for the last part , in includes/languages/english.php (and/or any other languages you use)

find this

Quote

// page title
define('TITLE', STORE_NAME);

and right under add this:

Quote

// index metas
define('INDEX_META_TITLE', 'Add your shops meta tittle here');
define('INDEX_META_DESCRIPTION', 'Add your shops meta description here');
define('INDEX_META_KEYWORDS', 'Add your shops meta keywords seprated by comma here');

[toyicebear]

Add the above mentioned mod as a contribution with pre-modded files included, it can be downloaded here - Basic Meta Tags

[warrenerjm]

toyicebear, on Mar 21 2006, 11:19 AM, said:

Add the above mentioned mod as a contribution with pre-modded files included, it can be downloaded here - Basic Meta Tags

That's great Nick

As I have already modified my site, I just do the amendments in the instructions. I am going to get a cuppa & read these through thoroughly now.

Like you said, something is better than nothing for the time being.

Thanks
Julie

[Jack_mcs]

toyicebear, on Mar 21 2006, 03:13 AM, said:

If you only want the product name to fill the metas like with the header tags auto fill function, you can actually achive that without installing any meta contrib.

It requires a very small modification of the file product_info.php

Here is how you do it....

1.

Locate this:
and replace it with this:
2.

locate this code: (about line 72 )
now mark this code section in the file and right click and choose "cut"

then locate this pice of code at the top of the file:
Right under this you then just past inn the section you marked previously.
after you have done so it will look like this:
Thats it.....now all your products will have the products name as tittle, meta description and meta keyword. (Just like if you had been using header tags and the auto fill function)

Yes, I've seen that change as well as a few others. The misconception is that doing so will optimize the page properly. Header Tags does more than just change the title and meta tags. Your code supports the point I have been making: You can do it right to get the best optimization or you can do it with the other changes, as you mention, and get some optimization. I guess it is a matter of preference.

Jack

[Jack_mcs]

warrenerjm, on Mar 21 2006, 04:38 AM, said:

Hi Jack & Nick

This makes very interesting reading. You are both very knowledgable about this subject. I have looked at quite a few of the contributions for header/meta tags. They all look very complicated & I was wondering if Nicks last post on the product_info.php would be as good. I pressume I would need to put meta tags for description & keywords etc on the non products page between<head> & </head>. I feel dissy trying to understand which one I should do, which is both good enough to help my ratings & be easy enough for me to install. I haven't touched the .sql database yet, so those contributions confuse me the most.

Thanks for a great thread & I will continue to follow until I am brave enough to try one.

Julie

I advise against such "fixes." Yes, Header Tags can be difficult to install and even cDynamic Meta tags is compared to the above change, but you get what you pay for. There are many other changes required to properly optimize a page. Header Tags uses many of those techniques. Will they make a difference in the end? I think so but it depends somewhat on your keywords and product line. But, my point through all of this, is if you are serious about getting a good index position with the SE's, then you should optimize the pages the best that you can. If we had identical sites and you made the above change to yours and I made the above change to mine but with a few more tweaks to the pages, my site would rank better. That should be the goal when optimizing.

Jack

[Jack_mcs]

I waited to long to edit the above but I had one more thought. For those considering making the above code change, you should instead install Header Tags, but only do the first part (Install_Catalog.txt in the instructions) and then manually run the fill tags script included in the archive. It is a quicker install than the above change and allows you to still take advantage of some of the tweaks of Header Tags. The difficult in the Header Tags install is with the admin section but that is not required for proper operation. It just makes it easier.

Jack