Theme Bleeding (day 6)

The main #1 reason why websites do poorly in ranking in the search engines is a phenomenon called Theme Bleeding.

The basic definition of theme bleeding is a link leading from a specific topic or theme that leads to another theme (or topic) that is not directly related.

Theme bleeding is suicide for your search engine rankings!

You must avoid it at all costs. The major # 1 culprit that causes theme bleeding is user navigation on a website.

I would like to illustrate theme bleeding in a short video. We will go back to the case study sites from the last lesson and I will show you the main reason why Heliguy.com is beating Hobbytron.com for the keyword "rc helicopter" even though Hobbytron.com has 3,300 more backlinks and  higher page rank.

Watch this Theme Bleeding Case Study Video

As you can see from the video Hobbytron is probably losing rankings due to their user navigation at the top of the page. They have over 3000 backlinks as opposed to heliguy.com who has over 200.

Part of the ranking being in favor of heliguy as opposed to hobbyton is theme bleeding, quality of backlinks and silo structure. All of this lends itself to higher rankings in the search engines.

User navigation is vital but there is a way to avoid theme bleeding in your user navigation which I will discuss in the next lesson.

Until next time,

Charles Heflin
Professional SEO Advisor / Consultant
SEO 20/20