Posted: 11 March 2010 at 4:50pm | IP Logged

Hi,

I have recently changed my web site as I wanted to stop using Front Page DWT.

Now when I do a google search for my site the first line shows An XHTML 1.0 Standard template.  Not much of an incentive for customers to click through to my site.

How do I fix this?

Posted: 12 March 2010 at 6:32pm | IP Logged

Hi Liz,

Google is constantly updating site information. They may have spidered your page when you were in the middle of making some changes and perhaps they weren't complete.

Can you show us links to your page and also to the Google results?

Make sure (at a minimum) that you have a page title, a page description, and readable text on any page you do.

Posted: 13 March 2010 at 3:53am | IP Logged

Hi Joe,

My web site address is www.neddywear.com.au.

Thanks

Liz

Posted: 13 March 2010 at 11:31am | IP Logged

Hi Liz,

I think most of the problem comes from not having what is called a "doc type" in your page.

doc types are important in order for pages to render properly. They should be added in HTML view at the very top of the page.

Go here to read more about it:

http://www.w3.org/QA/Tips/Doctype

There are different doc types that can be used and the one to use depends upon what code is in the page. For a list of doc types go here:

http://www.w3.org/QA/2002/04/valid-dtd-list.html

Chances are you should probably be using HTML 4.01 Transitional.

They also have a great validator that you can use that will point out errors. You can also use it to change doc types to see what effect that would have as well. When you run your page through it you will see a number of errors produced. The ultimate goal would be to try and fix them however a few may not be possible to fix. Some FrontPage specific code (like themes) you might not be able to fix...but it is best to try and fix all that you can. The validator will point out the errors.

Go here and play around with it and the different options to see..just put the address of your home page in and click check

http://validator.w3.org/

(If this is all new to you it may seem a little complicated and confusing..but it really isn't once you get into it  )

A couple other things to consider that might help as well.

At the tops of your pages you are using an image that says "Neddy Wear Horse Rugs and Horse Riding..etc." if the words that are in that image are important to you..you would be better off having those words be actual text and not part of an image. Search engines do not read words that are parts of images..only actual text.

Another suggestion would be this:

You have the following for description:

<meta name="description" content="horse rugs,combo rugs,saddle bags,hay bags,neoprene boots,float boots,horse fly rugs, fly masks, waterproof horse rugs,riptstop">

That type of format is more like one that would be used for key words. Key Words is another meta..but none of the major search engines will even look at them anymore. All they will look at is the Page Title, Page Description, and the actual text that is in the page. So I wouldn't even bother doing Key Words like that...it doesn't hurt if you do but as I said they are ignored.

A better way to have the description would be actual phrases and sentences rather than simply listing words that describes the page. Maybe 10 to 15 words total. You might want to use some of the words you have now in it..but make it more descriptive as to what the page is about.

Posted: 13 March 2010 at 5:14pm | IP Logged

Thanks Joe,

It looks like I have a lot of work to do but at least I have some direction now. I really appreciate the help.

Regards

Liz