My site is also suffering from this. I hope someone here gives a good tip as to how we can overcome this problem.
once again for those suplemental results here is matt cutts video about sublemental results http://video.google.com/videoplay?d...3728&q=matt+cutts+++supplemental+result&hl=en
Mat should have been a politician. He spoke for 5 minutes in that clip without saying anything. Hang on, he is a politician, "google's politician".
even my pr 5 dog blog is in supplemental results. If google looks down on certain pages, why even give them pr?
I'm not entirely convinced that Googles algo knows what a supplemental result is. At least not for the last 3 or so months.
another thing to look at/for is * dupe content - multiple pages with same content and * dupe meta description tags - do a site: command. if all your 'snippets' are the same, you most likely have the same meta description tag on all pages. making this unique through the site can do wonders (for the moment anyway, YMMV, etc...
Time to make use of unique metatags if you have too much menu navigation text in front of the actual content. It may be a lot of work, but if you view the source of a DP thread, you will see that auto generated meta description and meta keywords are used. It is still a valued practice by good websites. Get out from Google Supplemental I have applied the same concept onto a store with 1000+ items, and some of the search results are no longer followed by the supplemetal tag. The CSS top navigation menu was all that the search engine was registering without the metatags, I think in some ways the added metatags help direct the bot to the actual content.
I disagree with the Dup meta tags. I realize google tends to lob these pages in with the supplementals, but IMO that is retarded. Having the same description/title on every page is not the same as having duplicate content on every page. We have several corporate sites that have strict guidelines that dictate the description/metas be the same throughout the site. What if you have NO meta tags? It uses the unique content at the beginning of the page. Ok, so no dup there in the description, but it looks like crap. I really think they should put less emphasis on meta tags, they are doing more harm than good.
Are you disagreeing in that you don't think having unique meta descriptions may be one cause of a page going supplemental? Or that that's a good idea (not something I said. ; ) Thanks.
No, I am agreeing. What I am saying is that that should not be a reason for them going supplemental. Does that make more sense?
Personally, no. Other than they all usually have one or both of the problems mentioned above. I'm sure there are other things (haven't watched/listened to the cutts thing), but these are things I'm noticing. As is Google's way, though, who knows if any of this will hold water tomorrow let alone next month. ; ) -kpaul
Very much so. Sorry about that. I guess too, maybe they could make a tag like the one so your DMOZ description isn't used for snippet? And they may just have a knob twisted too far in one direction - who knows what next month may bring... -kpaul
Directories, and ecommerce based web stores... Not your run of the mill amazon type stores, I am talking about actual php/mysql driven web based stores.
One other thing I should add is, not all DC's are equal in this "supplemental" problem. Some DC's will show sups, while others will not. What's up with that?
I will post again I guess I feel strongly in making sure you have quality unique content and focused links to your site - if you sell holidays dont have sombody selling cows link to you. The more links you can get from direct opposition the better imo Give regular content to the SE's Give clean code Get your content high in the code and remember to sleep and not worry until you wake refreshed again jamie
I took the time to watch the Cutt's video, doesnt really tell much though, apart from saying more people are pissed off with the supplemental situation so they have to dedicate more time towards it. Did I miss something?
No, I do not think you missed anything. I think the general consensus lately has been that anything MC says, is like really not saying anything at all. Sometimes its like listening to Madden commentate on a Monday night. You know the scotch is not out of his reach, and save for the little yellow circles, there is no understanding what he says. I think that Google's algo takes a look from the top down. That is to say that they look at meta. If it is there, and they see something they either do not like, or that is similar to something else, they sup it. If the meta is not there, then they go directly to the content of the page. If the meta is there and nothing is suspect, then they go to the content. I think what they should be doing is always going to the content, then comparing content with meta, if meta exists. My guess is it is easier/faster to look at meta, and ignore content all together if the meta meets a certain threshold which has been deemed suspect.