It has long been contended by SEO “experts” that Google penalizes duplicate content by shunting it far down in the listings. I found this not to be the case, as all of my content for this site was recycled from Wikipedia or Press Releases. In spite of the duplication, many of the pages on the Game Demos Online site were getting top ranking on page 1 of Google’s search results.

This changed rather quickly, and presently most of my site has dropped to other pages on Google – sometimes so far down the listings that I can’t find it in search results that only a week ago were putting me on page 1.

The site was still getting decent traffic and earning money though, so I traced the referring sites and discovered that it’s still getting page 1 rankings on Bing and Yahoo, as well as a multitude of small aggregate sites that appear to be completely automated.

My theory regarding the drop in Google rankings is that Google’s indexing bots noticed that all of the articles were linked to the same external affiliate program, which caused Google to view the site as a “feeder” site and thus made it less relevant to the associated keywords. I’ve attempted to fix this by placing the affiliate link on a single page on the site, and including a link to that page in the articles instead of linking directly to the affiliate program from each article. Only time will tell if it worked.

I find it interesting that Yahoo and Bing didn’t downgrade the site based on the fact that it’s a feeder. This implies to me that Bing and Yahoo’s algorithms still have a lot of catching up to do – not that I’m complaining.

Conclusion: If you’re making a “feeder” site that directs traffic to a single off-site Affiliate, and you want high rankings on Google, it’s best to “cloak” your outgoing link by hiding it within a single post/article, then linking to it instead of directly off-site in each post. This doesn’t seem to matter for Bing or Yahoo, but will likely change as they continue to improve their offerings.

For now, Bing and Yahoo’s lack is our gain – though potentially a loss for Internet users in general if it means that irrelevant sites keep coming up at the top of search results because people like me have gamed the search engines for profit. These experiments are necessary though if I’m to improve my grasp of SEO, so I’m not going to lose any sleep over it (what sleep? I spend half my nights scheming anyhow).

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I created a site: www.gamedemosonline.com intended to drive traffic to an affiliate program.

The site is backed by WordPress, and uses a few SEO plugins to achieve its results:

• All in One SEO Pack
• Web Ninja Auto Tagging System
• Fuzzy SEO

By simply posting press releases and wikipedia excerpts along with game titles and cover images, the site is on page 1 in Google for the following key-phrases, with almost no links to it and zero advertising:

• jasf jane’s advanced strike fighters demo download
• ncis game demo
• ncis video game pc demo
• goldeneye reloaded demo download
• dawn of fantasy demo download
• other new key-phrases daily

It’s interesting to note that the video game industry is HUGE, and competition for search engine rankings on video game related keywords is also huge. This is only the first week, and I’m posting new games every day, so I imagine a number of other search terms are going to start popping up in my site stats dashboard. I’m not going to tell you how much traffic this translates to, but suffice it to say I’m gratified and my work hasn’t been in vain.

I can’t help but think that this simple set of plugins would work equally well, if not better, for any number of industries. They’re all available in the “Plugins -> Add New -> Search” interface in the WordPress Dashboard

On another note, I know this might seem to be a violation of the principles I espoused in SEO: Finding The Delicate Balance, but it’s really not. Why? Because I believe in the product. The site I show here may be somewhat misleading in that it draws traffic with the promise of free downloads, but if the user actually signs up for the free trial of the affiliate deal it promotes they get more than what they were offered. Free downloads of full version games rather than just a demo, so I don’t feel bad about it.

In fact, I like the affiliate deal so much I signed up for it myself.

©Savage Lullabye » Articles

The free trial lasts 5 days, so I’m being truthful about “Game Demo Downloads” and “Free” in my site’s copy.

Many of the pages on this site rank on page 1 of Google’s search results for the games in question. That’s what SEO is all about – getting high rankings for free.

The free version is fully integrated with PayPal, and allows you to create up to 5 membership types, including “free”, and set options controlling the amount of access granted to each.

You can also use s2Member to control access to paid downloads, or charge for access to particular pages regardless of membership level, or use other PayPal integrated third-party plugins on the same website without interfering with Instant Payment Notification. s2Member gives you a custom IPN URL and intructions for integrating it with other plugins or custom code.

The granularity of control s2Member gives you over prices and kinds of access is pretty impressive, and is something you might expect to pay through the nose for. By releasing it for free with PayPal integration, WebSharks is hoping to snag users who prefer other payment options.

Let’s face it, PayPal is seen by many as “Mickey Mouse” credit card processing, so chances are that they do a brisk business. I know I’ll be recommending an upgrade to my client, and she’ll be happy to pay.

©Savage Lullabye » Articles

WordPress MU is a built-in capability of WordPress that allows you to host multiple blogs on the same server using sub-directories or sub-domains, which means I could map “anyblog.savagelullabye.com/” or “www.savagelullabye.com/anyblog/” and have it show up instantly with a pre-chosen set of plugins, available themes, etc. It also allows you to share users and content across multiple blogs with the addition of a few extra plugins that take advantage of the MU functionality.

Setting up MU is simple if you’ve got some experience with Unix and are comfortable using WordPress.

WordPress MU Domain Mapping

This is where the rubber really hits the road. Using this plugin, you can map multiple domains to the same server, and have it serve up different sites based on what the browser asks for. The heading above links to a fairly decent tutorial by the plugin’s author. I’ll link to a few more by others at the end of this rant, just to ensure you find a voice that speaks your language.

There are a few gotchas you’ll need to watch out for. One is that the plugin seems to demand use of WordPress’ default permalink structure, which is known to be somewhat unfriendly to both humans and search engines. In terms of search engines though, this little issue isn’t nearly as important as other elements, and can be tolerated provided you make certain other SEO elements are in place.

Another potential hassle is the fact that most ISPs these days tend to host multiple clients on the same machine, using the same or multiple IP addresses, and they already have their own rules in place for handling requests. This can sometimes interfere with WordPress MU Domain Mapping functionality, depending on your ISPs setup.

The way around this issue is to make sure your server has its own fixed IP address, which can cost anywhere from $ 3 a month and up. Don’t let your ISP gouge you for this, try to get as close to the $ 3 mark as possible. Dreamhost, the ISP this blog is hosted on, is an excellent choice. Depending on your location though, you may find it better to host on an ISP closer to you. Just remember you CAN get a fixed IP for $ 3.95 a month, so don’t let anyone charge you a hundred.

Another gotcha – which is actually a feature but can lead to some confusion – is the fact that all plugins and themes have to be installed from the “Network Admin” and can’t be altered on a site-by-site basis. If you’re hosting multiple blogs for third parties this can be a boon, since it prevents your users from mucking up your server. If your blog network contains only your own sites, though, it can become a bit of a hassle – not to mention confusing – having to switch back and forth between regular and Network Admin views.

The themes thing is especially troublesome, since there’s no way for individual blog users to modify theme files directly. This means that even Child Themes have to be created by the Super Admin.

The final gotcha is a lack of an up-to-date repository of comprehensive documentation. You’ll have to scour the web for snippets of information on message boards and blogs if you encounter a problem that I haven’t covered here or in the links below.

All of that aside though, since anyone capable of setting it up is probably also capable of handling most of the potential issues, this is an INCREDIBLY useful combination of capabilities, for blog owners and network administrators alike.

I’m currently using the WordPress MU Domain Mapping plugin to host a network of directory sites I’m building, as part of the “domain parking advertising” network plan I’ve outlined in other posts on this blog. So far so good.

Here are a few useful documentation links for those who are intrigued:

• WordPress 3.0.4, create network, and domain mapping plugin
• The Author’s Instructions
• The Plugin Page on WordPress.org
• Getting Started With Multisite

10 minutes work with the Goog will net you dozens of other useful links.

Enjoy!

©Savage Lullabye » Articles

HOWEVER …

I do believe there is a place for automated content, for site sections like product showcases, RSS aggregate sites, and the like.

For these purposes, WP Robot fits the bill perfectly. It’s simple to set up, easy to use, and after a quick orientation can produce a tightly focused “Keyword Campaign” or “RSS Campaign” that will snag content and/or products from a variety of sources.

Click to expand

At right you’ll see an image of the “Campaigns” page in WP Robot‘s admin interface (which you’ll find in the WordPress admin).

Rather than talk about it endlessly though, check out the posts in the “Shop” menu up top – it’s not really all that impressive until you realize that it’s a completely automated category that I created in about an hour to learn how to use WP Robot. If I find some more time for it I’ll add more keywords/categories, and the existing keywords could use some tweaking, but I haven’t bothered yet since the point was just to test it out.

If you check back tomorrow there will be more products just because WP Robot will keep adding them until I stop it. Not sure if I’m going to keep the “Shop” section yet, but for now I’m going to leave it up as part of my WP Robot experiment.

Using WP Robot, it’s easy to create tightly focused post categories that maintain themselves automatically, with new posts appearing on a schedule you determine. The implications are staggering – with a little work refining keywords and playing with layout, anybody can create a completely automated blog site that keeps itself current and aggregates information from a variety of sources.

Anyhow, so far so good. I definitely recommend this product to anyone with a network of sites to maintain, or who wants to monetize their blog with affiliate links and products.

©Savage Lullabye

The business model needs some tightening up, but once that’s achieved the system I’m working on has the potential to make this company explode. The feature set of the ATS, combined with the company database, significantly reduces the workload associated with recruiting for any given position, making it possible for a small team to do the same quality work as a larger firm, for a much lower cost.

What better way to show my appreciation for this community than by providing a place for them to continue interacting?

Site describing my adventures with PHP, mySQL, WordPress plugins, SEO, software, and affiliate ads, plus poetry. I post useful articles here regularly, mostly reviews of WordPress plugins and WordPress-related sites.

Savage Lullabye is where I conduct a lot of experiments and let my hair down a bit.