Have you ever wondered if your server and htaccess files are set correctly?
Where you aware that some very simple changes could really help with your SEO?
When we do site reviews, the most common thing we find is to do with multiple home pages and sites.
This ties in with some of the most common problems, Google indexing.
So how do we improve Google Indexing and help with spidering?
At this point, a warning is most definately the order of the day.
WARNING - this should only be carried out by knowledgable web masters.
Here are a few pitfalls when working with htaccess.
It may appear is if on ftp, there is no htaccess file. Be vary careful here, it may be that your login does not have permission to view hidden files. Just because you can't see it, that does not mean it is not there.
The htaccess file can sometimes control the entire domain, changes can lock you out and bring your site down
OK, so if you are comfortable with amending the htaccess, here is some code to add to the bottom of your files. In some cases this may need to be inserted within the file as opposed to the foot.
Pinnacle Cart Example .htaccess
RewriteEngine On
RewriteBase /
RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} ^yoursite.co.uk
RewriteRule (.*) http://www.yoursite.co.uk/$1 [R=301,L]
RewriteRule ^products/([0-9a-zA-Z\_\-]*)\.htm([l]?)$ index.php?p=product&product_code=$1&%{QUERY_STRING} [L]
RewriteRule ^catalog/([0-9a-zA-Z\_\-]*)\.htm([l]?)$ index.php?p=catalog&catalog_code=$1&%{QUERY_STRING} [L]
RewriteRule ^pages/([0-9a-zA-Z\_\-]*)\.htm([l]?)$ index.php?p=page&page_id=$1&%{QUERY_STRING} [L]
RewriteRule ^site_map\.htm([l]?)$ index.php?p=site_map&%{QUERY_STRING} [L]
Options +FollowSymLinks
RewriteCond %{THE_REQUEST} ^.*/index.php
RewriteRule ^(.*)index.php$ http://www.yoursite.co.uk/$1 [R=301,L]
RewriteCond %{THE_REQUEST} ^.*/index.html
RewriteRule ^(.*)index.html$ http://www.yoursite.co.uk/$1 [R=301,L]
RewriteCond %{THE_REQUEST} ^.*/index.htm
RewriteRule ^(.*)index.htm$ http://www.yoursite.co.uk/$1 [R=301,L]
ErrorDocument 404 /pages/404.html
This assumes your home page is index.php. If it is index.htm or index.html or default etc. then alter accordingly.
The above will remove duplicate home pages and will redirect non www to www. The big plus here is that you will now only have one home page.
This will now be the focal point of the domain and all the link value which was being lost and or diluted will now be focussed on one single page.
Google Webmaster Tools has been trying to get you to do this for a long time, this is not a cheap trick or a hack. It is a genuine set up config that should be done on every site.
Another little point, in your robots.txt file you should have a sitemap declaration.
At the bottom of the file, add the following line;
Sitemap: http://www.yoursite.co.uk/sitemap.xml
Where sitemap.xml would be the xml version of your sitemap.