Search Grotto

Dejan Marketing and Google’s Hypocrisy

Last updated: 8/26/2019

I’m not Google’s biggest fan and I think it’s a little scary what they can do. So I was interested (but not surprised) to hear that they tanked a website of a well-known SEO person, Dejan Marketing, with a manual action.

Evergreen Content: The Content Forest Audit

Last updated: 8/19/2019

Evergreen content makes even more sense than you think.

It’s a perfect metaphor for always-useful content. But do you know that it can imply so much more, and even give you a new way to organize the pages on your website?

Stop Using Flagship Content & Cornerstone Content

Last updated: 8/18/2019

The terms “flagship content” and “cornerstone content” should not be used as synonyms for “evergreen content” and I’d like to tell you why.

Actually, “flagship content” has another, more specific meaning we should use instead. Read on.

Best SEO Practices: An Expert’s Approach – ReportGarden Interview

Last updated: 8/19/2019

I did an interview by ReportGarden in November 2016. This is a copy of it because I enjoyed it and I like having my own source for it. Yes, this page canonicals back to theirs.

Google Knows Where You Sleep & What Your House is Made Of

Last updated: 8/19/2019

I don’t know of any murder cases where the killer stuffed the victim’s body into a wall to hide it. Maybe because it never happens… or maybe because every time it’s happened, the killer has gotten away with it.

I mean there’s really no way to be sure, right?

Well, not yet. But it’s conceivable that in the near future, you could find out what’s in your walls just by Googling it.

Serving XML in JSP Sitemap Files

Last updated: 8/19/2019

Important Update: This post is from 2014 and uses the old Search Console. I have not tested JSP sitemaps in the new Search Console.

A client of mine, which I will anonymize by telling you that they’re a capybara life insurance company, uses a CMS that makes it impossible to generate an automated XML sitemap file. Or any XML sitemap file. Or any XML files at all…