15 SEO Pro Tips and Tricks You’ve Probably Never Heard Before

Everyone loves a good tip so here’s a list of 15 that even SEO pros will probably never of heard of:

1) <meta name=”google” content=”notranslate”/>

When Google recognises that the contents of a page is not in the language that the user will likely want to read, they will at times provide a link to a translation in the search results. This meta tag tells Google not to provide this translation for the particular page.

More information: https://support.google.com/webmasters/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=79812&ctx=cb&src=cb&cbid=-1lnqelb48tlwq&cbrank=0

2) noimageindex

This directive is supported with the robots meta tag and the X-robots-tag and tells Google not to index images on the page.

More information: httpss://developers.google.com/webmasters/control-crawl-index/docs/robots_meta_tag

3) <meta name=”googlebot” content=”unavailable_after: 25-Aug-2019 15:00:0 EST”>

This meta tag allows you to tell Google when a page should be removed from the search results. The meta tag is treated as a removal request.

More information: https://googleblog.blogspot.co.uk/2019/07/robots-exclusion-protocol-now-with-even

4) &ie=gb

If you put this at the end of a search result page URL, all keywords will go red instead of bold.

For example: httpss://www.google.co.uk/search?q=seo%20consult&ie=gb

 

5) *

If you type an asterisk in Google Maps search bar, the results will show you every single place Google knows about in that map view allowing you to see all nearby places.

 

6) Robots.txt

If you have User-agent: Googlebot in robots.txt then Googlebot will ignore anything under the User-agent: * section and only go by what is in the Googlebot section.

More information: https://productforums.google.com/forum/#!category-topic/webmasters/crawling-indexing–ranking/5QXvfkwT4p4

7)Synonym Search (~)

This allows you to query for your search term and all its synonyms.

For example: httpss://www.google.com/search?q=~junk+food&btnG=Search

A search for junk food also returns fast food results.

8) Meta Titles

There is no longer a character limit on meta titles. Google now bases it on the width of the title (in px) unless the title is longer than 12 words.

More information: https://www.seomofo.com/experiments/serp/google-snippet-07

9) Google +1 Button

If you have a +1 button on a page blocked within the robots.txt, Google has said that they can ignore the rules within the robots.txt because they assume that you want that page to be publicly available and therefore visble in the search results.

More information: https://support.google.com/webmasters/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=1140194

10) Proximity Operator (NEAR)

This allows you to query for search terms that are within close proximity to each other in a document.

More information: https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ee872310.aspx

11) X-Robots-Tag https Header

You can use a robots https header to act in the same way as a robots meta tag.

In PHP it would be:  header(“X-Robots-Tag: noindex”, true);

This could be used on a PDF or a video to stop it being indexed.

More information: httpss://developers.google.com/webmasters/control-crawl-index/docs/robots_meta_tag

12) Blocked Pages

Linking to a page that has been blocked in the robots.txt (i.e a page that you have prevented Google from indexing because you don’t want it to appear in search results) can get the page indexed. The title used for the page will be the anchor text which you linked to the page using.

More information: https://www.seomofo.com/experiments/spam-search-results.html

13) <meta https-equiv=”refresh” content=”0;URL=’https://example.com/'”>

A meta refresh using a time of zero seconds is treated as a 301 redirect by search engines. However it is better to use a 301 redirect.

More information: https://blogs.msdn.com/b/searchblog/archive/2010/11/30/search-engines-treat-meta-refresh-the-same-as-301-redirects.aspx

14) Following Links

Google does follow nofollow links but won’t pass any link equity. Google will also follow links that are just text links. (i.e. aren’t clickable)

More information: /seoblog/google-and-search-engine-optimisation/can-google-follow-urls-without-hyperlinks

15) Getting Penalised

You can get penalised for the services that you offer.

More information: https://www.seroundtable.com/google-bans-agency-link-buying-15203