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OnlyTopResults
SEO Yellow Belt
Joined: 07 Jul 2006
Posts: 28
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 Posted: Thu Jul 27, 2006 5:45 pm Post subject: Have I got this silo structure right? |
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I am preparing a project which will take many, many months to build (maybe years) and so I would REALLY appreciate any feedback confirming I am on the right track at the outset.
THis is my first IM project and so I have decided to pursue a niche about a topic I know very well (I have an MSc in biology). The diagram I refer to below depicts how I see a series of health-related websites will grow over time. The top level main Portal probably won't appear for many months, until 3 or 4 of the subsidiary themed sites (Arthritis, Cancer, Diabetes, etc) are in place, each with their own good PR and traffic. My 2 questions are:
1) Have I got the silo logic right? See diagrams "Linking strategy 1 and 2" at http://www.abouthealth.merlin.uk.net/ Strategy 1 seems like a direct interpretation of the silo concept, but it seems like the bottom of silo2 (Colon Cancer) just points off to nowhere. In Strategy 2 the last page in the Colon Cancer silo links back to the Cancer home page. Which of these is correct?
2) When I have 20+ pages beneath (say) the Breast Cancer home page, that page will start to look very untidy with text links to every subsidiary page. How do you suggest a way around this? I had thought of just having perhaps 10 main site pages and then considering the other pages as articles - but how do I cater for 100+ articles over time from a navigation point of view? An article map of some kind? I had thought perhaps a right hand menu (after initial indexing) with text links to the main 10 pages and an 11th link to an article sitemap might be a neat solution. This is just guesswork though and I really need to get the basic building blocks right at the beginning - this could be a very BIG project over time. Of course I am going with a subject I can write about, rather than a subject that may attract high click through rates. However I haven't the funds to outsource articles in another niche, so will concentrate on what I know.
Thanks
Adrian
Last edited by OnlyTopResults on Fri Jul 28, 2006 5:36 am; edited 2 times in total |
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Ahri22
SEO Blue Belt
Joined: 01 Jun 2006
Posts: 163
Location: Australia
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| Posted: Thu Jul 27, 2006 8:18 pm Post subject: Re: Have I got this silo structure right? |
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| OnlyTopResults wrote: |
1) Have I got the silo logic right? See diagrams "Linking strategy 1 and 2" at http://www.abouthealth.merlin.uk.net/ Strategy 1 seems like a direct interpretation of the silo concept, but it seems like the bottom of silo2 (Colon Cancer) just points off to nowhere. Which of these is correct?
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Hi Adrian,
To ME your silo diagram looks right, but I'm definitely not the expert here  From what I understand of The Plan though, it appears pretty spot on.
| Quote: |
2) When I have 20+ pages beneath (say) the Breast Cancer home page, that page will start to look very untidy with text links to every subsidiary page. How do you suggest a way around this? I had thought of just having perhaps 10 main site pages and then considering the other pages as articles - but how do I cater for 100+ articles over time from a navigation point of view? An article map of some kind? I had thought perhaps a right hand menu (after initial indexing) with text links to the main 10 pages and an 11th link to an article sitemap might be a neat solution. This is just guesswork though and I really need to get the basic building blocks right at the beginning - this could be a very BIG project over time. Of course I am going with a subject I can write about, rather than a subject that may attract high click through rates. However I haven't the funds to outsource articles in another niche, so will concentrate on what I know.
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This is what I have done for one of my sites (Not a site built according to the plan, incidentally!) I basically had a list of links to articles on the site and then a More... linking to a page where all the articles are listed. However, when the Google update occurred most of the articles linked to from the home page received a PR4, whereas the pages linked to from the other page had lower PRs (0, 2, 3). (Even though the page they were linked from is PR4).
However, I also don't know what else you'd do when you've got over 10 or so articles...to have more looks very unweildy! I guess one way of handling it would be to break down your silos into smaller sections... For example, in your image you've got categories like: symptoms of bc, treatments for bc, survival rates etc. Perhaps these could become the top pages of smaller silos (I can't draw a diagram here, it's in my head ) So you'd have breast cancer at the top of one main silo, and below that you'd have 3 or 4 other silos, all on specific aspects of breast cancer, and you'd then have these pages linking to your articles. Make sense??
Also, that way your breast cancer pages will only ever link to other breast cancer topic pages (ie silos) and you wouldn't be linking them to colon cancer at all. This may make the theming even stronger!
Cheers
Fiona |
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OnlyTopResults
SEO Yellow Belt
Joined: 07 Jul 2006
Posts: 28
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| Posted: Fri Jul 28, 2006 6:06 am Post subject: Re: Have I got this silo structure right? |
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| Ahri22 wrote: |
Hi Adrian,
To ME your silo diagram looks right, but I'm definitely not the expert here From what I understand of The Plan though, it appears pretty spot on.
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Thanks for that Fiona - I guess that Strategy 1 IS the correct interpretation, though Strategy 2 does kinda "close the circle". Maybe things aren't always supposed to be so neat !
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This is what I have done for one of my sites (Not a site built according to the plan, incidentally!) I basically had a list of links to articles on the site and then a More... linking to a page where all the articles are listed. However, when the Google update occurred most of the articles linked to from the home page received a PR4, whereas the pages linked to from the other page had lower PRs (0, 2, 3). (Even though the page they were linked from is PR4).
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Yeah - I can identify with THAT diminishing PR problem! It's just inexplicable when you consider that most of the keyword-rich text is on the deeper pages! You would have thought that the PR of the home page would have been carried right through to the pages where there was even more relevant content. Most frustrating! I wonder if changing the link word "More" to a keyword phrase would help? Just a thought.
| Quote: |
However, I also don't know what else you'd do when you've got over 10 or so articles...to have more looks very unweildy! I guess one way of handling it would be to break down your silos into smaller sections... For example, in your image you've got categories like: symptoms of bc, treatments for bc, survival rates etc. Perhaps these could become the top pages of smaller silos (I can't draw a diagram here, it's in my head ) So you'd have breast cancer at the top of one main silo, and below that you'd have 3 or 4 other silos, all on specific aspects of breast cancer, and you'd then have these pages linking to your articles. Make sense?? |
Eee lass .. that's making my head hurt even more
I wondered about having just one deep page, with link navigation at the top, taking you to the start of the diferent articles (with a "go to top" link at the end of each article. You can see a fancy example at http://www.usatoday.com/marketing/questions.htm#sendFeedback
So in this way ALL of your keyword-rich text is on the same level and ought to keep its PR value. HOWEVER, the disadvantage is that you only have the 4 Adsense opportunities on the whole page ... not a sensible idea from an income point of view 
| Quote: |
Also, that way your breast cancer pages will only ever link to other breast cancer topic pages (ie silos) and you wouldn't be linking them to colon cancer at all. This may make the theming even stronger! |
Yes - I can see the value of that. That's seems to be the key point to always fall back on. It all works fine with a site of less than 20 pages or so, but if we are truly to add a page a week then this article navigation within a given topic needs sorting. I mean the topic "breast cancer survival rates" really can't be expanded beyond the original page, whereas perhaps "treatments for BC" could be expanded to perhaps 10 pages - so some form of sub-navigation is needed.
Thanks for your thoughts Fiona, will scribble some more pretty pictures!
XX
Adrian |
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Charles Heflin
Administrator
Joined: 16 May 2006
Posts: 337
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| Posted: Fri Jul 28, 2006 7:08 am Post subject: Re: Have I got this silo structure right? |
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| OnlyTopResults wrote: |
1) Have I got the silo logic right? See diagrams "Linking strategy 1 and 2" at http://www.abouthealth.merlin.uk.net/ Strategy 1 seems like a direct interpretation of the silo concept, but it seems like the bottom of silo2 (Colon Cancer) just points off to nowhere. In Strategy 2 the last page in the Colon Cancer silo links back to the Cancer home page. Which of these is correct?
2) When I have 20+ pages beneath (say) the Breast Cancer home page, that page will start to look very untidy with text links to every subsidiary page. How do you suggest a way around this? I had thought of just having perhaps 10 main site pages and then considering the other pages as articles - but how do I cater for 100+ articles over time from a navigation point of view? An article map of some kind? I had thought perhaps a right hand menu (after initial indexing) with text links to the main 10 pages and an 11th link to an article sitemap might be a neat solution. This is just guesswork though and I really need to get the basic building blocks right at the beginning - this could be a very BIG project over time. Of course I am going with a subject I can write about, rather than a subject that may attract high click through rates. However I haven't the funds to outsource articles in another niche, so will concentrate on what I know.
Thanks
Adrian |
Either strategy you have laid out is good. To avoid un-tidiness you should make sub-silos:
cancer.com/breast-cancer/causes-of-breast-cancer/
causes-of-breast-cancer-article1
causes-of-breast-cancer-article2
causes-of-breast-cancer-article3
causes-of-breast-cancer-article4
causes-of-breast-cancer-article5
cancer.com/breast-cancer/symptoms-of-breast-cancer/
symptoms-of-breast-cancer-article1.html
symptoms-of-breast-cancer-article2.html
symptoms-of-breast-cancer-article3.html
symptoms-of-breast-cancer-article4.html
symptoms-of-breast-cancer-article5.html
cancer.com/breast-cancer/treatments-for-breast-cancer/
treatments-for-breast-cancer-article1.html
treatments-for-breast-cancer-article2.html
treatments-for-breast-cancer-article3.html
treatments-for-breast-cancer-article4.html
treatments-for-breast-cancer-article5.html
Etc, etc...
Causes of breast cancer is a different theme than treatments for breast cancer and could have its own sub-silo under the main breast cancer silo to keep things more tidy and organized.
There may be more themes under each sub-theme as well. Think of it as keeping a file system. Keep all related themes grouped into folders and sub-folders and sub-folders of sub-folders, etc.
Does this make sense?
The point is to keep all related articles in one folder/silo to avoid bleeding your theme off to other topics that the search engines don't consider related.
Articles on causes of breast cancer probably don't belong in the same silo as survival rates for breast cancer.
Breast cancer is a huge theme with many sub-themes and many potential sub-sub-themes... do you catch my drift?
Fiona is right in her thinking  |
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OnlyTopResults
SEO Yellow Belt
Joined: 07 Jul 2006
Posts: 28
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| Posted: Fri Jul 28, 2006 8:23 am Post subject: Re: Have I got this silo structure right? |
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| Charles Heflin wrote: | To avoid un-tidiness you should make sub-silos:
cancer.com/breast-cancer/causes-of-breast-cancer/
causes-of-breast-cancer-article1
causes-of-breast-cancer-article2
causes-of-breast-cancer-article3
causes-of-breast-cancer-article4
causes-of-breast-cancer-article5
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Thanks Charles - I can see the logic, but my (and Fiona's) difficulty is with the navigation issues. In the above example I would normally expect to see an intro paragraph talking generally about "causes of breast cancer" then (say) the 1st 4 lines of text from article 1 with a "More ..." link to the underlying article. Same repeated for other articles ... as shown at http://www.drdating.com/library/category/love/articles. Looks great - but here's the rub ... while the DrDating home page has a PR5, this articles page is PR0. The home page does show a site-wide map for spidering, yet these pages don't get ranked at all. This is exactly what Fiona described earlier.
I can see that ignoring the need for any sub-navigation and just showing the article1 page content with a single link to article2, etc, (as in your Golf example) might well work from a spidering point of view - but a visitor will find the absence of a menu is unusual and annoying.
| Quote: |
Causes of breast cancer is a different theme than treatments for breast cancer and could have its own sub-silo under the main breast cancer silo to keep things more tidy and organized.
There may be more themes under each sub-theme as well. Think of it as keeping a file system. Keep all related themes grouped into folders and sub-folders and sub-folders of sub-folders, etc.
Does this make sense? |
Yes - it's almost as if you need to start thinking about the structure from the BOTTOM of the silo, starting with the keyword phrases that have been identified and then working upwards, deciding where things converge along the way.
I'm "almost there" - I have uploaded a 3rd sketch (please scroll down) to http://www.abouthealth.merlin.uk.net/ which shows how I have interpreted what you have said above, but how to add sub-navigation between articles without losing PR remains unclear to me.
Thanks for tremendous support folks!
Cheers
Adrian |
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tonystai
SEO Yellow Belt
Joined: 01 Jun 2006
Posts: 22
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| Posted: Fri Jul 28, 2006 9:50 am Post subject: Pagerank and Theme are Unrelated |
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Adrian,
Remember that Pagerank and Theme are completely seperate and somewhat competing strategies.
If you wanted the highest page rank possible, you would try to link your most profitable pages from your home page to avoid pagerank bleed. Of course, you also can't link to every article from your home page because you begin causing pagerank diffusion by having too many links. Here's the kicker - just because you get a high pagerank won't mean high SERP. Remember that pagerank is still just a small part of the algorithm and is only determined by links - not content.
On the other hand, using themes/silos presents a longer term solution that helps the search engines determine your importance to your theme/sub themes. You will be better served in the long term by having great themeing and likely beat out higher pageranked pages because the SE's know that your articles are themed tighter around the main theme of the search phrase.
The best thing to do is try to aquire deep-linking, not just links to your home-page. Personally, I think this hasn't been emphasized enough. To the SE's, it's great to have links to home pages but it is much more natural to have links to all the main pages in your site and an occasional link to a low level page.
Some popular sites will have higher page ranks on internal pages compared to the home page because of deep linking. Not only does this look more natural but it re-inforces the theme of the internal pages. You want to get a link to a breast cancer internal page with the anchor text of brest cancer rather than the home page of cancer with a link of cancer.
Currently the best way to get links to your internal pages is to submit articles and use a resource box where you control the anchor text and the location of the link. Personally, I use http://www.articlemarketer.com/special20060725.php?a_aid=5cf3c1ea. The current special is $100 off the lifetime membership.
Hope that helps...
Tony |
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OnlyTopResults
SEO Yellow Belt
Joined: 07 Jul 2006
Posts: 28
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| Posted: Fri Jul 28, 2006 10:52 am Post subject: Re: Pagerank and Theme are Unrelated |
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| tonystai wrote: | Adrian,
Remember that Pagerank and Theme are completely seperate and somewhat competing strategies.
If you wanted the highest page rank possible, you would try to link your most profitable pages from your home page to avoid pagerank bleed. Of course, you also can't link to every article from your home page because you begin causing pagerank diffusion by having too many links. Here's the kicker - just because you get a high pagerank won't mean high SERP. Remember that pagerank is still just a small part of the algorithm and is only determined by links - not content. |
You're absolutely right there Tony - and the PR vs SERP penny just dropped (thanks!)
| Quote: | The best thing to do is try to aquire deep-linking, not just links to your home-page. Personally, I think this hasn't been emphasized enough. To the SE's, it's great to have links to home pages but it is much more natural to have links to all the main pages in your site and an occasional link to a low level page.
Some popular sites will have higher page ranks on internal pages compared to the home page because of deep linking. Not only does this look more natural but it re-inforces the theme of the internal pages. You want to get a link to a breast cancer internal page with the anchor text of breast cancer rather than the home page of cancer with a link of cancer. |
Yep - that's where the meat of the article will be - and that's what will drive the Adsense ads too, more so than top level, more general pages.
Cash is tight Tony, but I'll have a go with their 3 month subscription and see where that gets me.
Thanks for some very helpful insights.
CHeers
Adrian |
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OnlyTopResults
SEO Yellow Belt
Joined: 07 Jul 2006
Posts: 28
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| Posted: Sat Jul 29, 2006 10:58 am Post subject: Re: Have I got this silo structure right? |
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| OnlyTopResults wrote: |
I'm "almost there" - I have uploaded a 3rd sketch (please scroll down) to http://www.abouthealth.merlin.uk.net/ which shows how I have interpreted what you have said above, but how to add sub-navigation between articles without losing PR remains unclear to me. |
I am hoping Charles will float by here and nail this last issue for us all. To quote Russell in http://www.theme-zoom.com/pfdogs/the-plan-step-one.html, when looking at the cabellas.com website ALL of the keyword rich content was at the bottom of the silo. In the cabellas example that's typically 4 levels down from the homepage. Now I WAS going to say "see how the PR of each level diminishes with each step down" but it seems the latest Google dance has resulted in the portal homepage being given a PR0 rating! Are we to just disregard PR when buillding silos and just concentrate on focused themes? It seems we can't do BOTH.
The other navigation issue I'd like to raise again, is that since the basic Plan calls for us to submit pages with just single links from page to page (apart from the home page), this will look mighty strange to the human Editor on each directory. We are all used to seeing a navbar and the absence of one will surely make acceptance by Directories harder to achieve. The addition of a Navbar with the "nofollow" attribute will surely provide the Editor with what he/she would regard as normal, while that attribute would mean those links were ignored by the bots who would spider via the page text links. We get the best of both worlds this way?
If we DID do as described above, would it really matter whether the menu was on the left (normal) or right of the screen?
Any input gratefully received.
Cheers
Adrian |
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Charles Heflin
Administrator
Joined: 16 May 2006
Posts: 337
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| Posted: Mon Jul 31, 2006 6:17 am Post subject: Re: Have I got this silo structure right? |
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| OnlyTopResults wrote: | | OnlyTopResults wrote: |
I'm "almost there" - I have uploaded a 3rd sketch (please scroll down) to http://www.abouthealth.merlin.uk.net/ which shows how I have interpreted what you have said above, but how to add sub-navigation between articles without losing PR remains unclear to me. |
I am hoping Charles will float by here and nail this last issue for us all. To quote Russell in http://www.theme-zoom.com/pfdogs/the-plan-step-one.html, when looking at the cabellas.com website ALL of the keyword rich content was at the bottom of the silo. In the cabellas example that's typically 4 levels down from the homepage. Now I WAS going to say "see how the PR of each level diminishes with each step down" but it seems the latest Google dance has resulted in the portal homepage being given a PR0 rating! Are we to just disregard PR when buillding silos and just concentrate on focused themes? It seems we can't do BOTH.
The other navigation issue I'd like to raise again, is that since the basic Plan calls for us to submit pages with just single links from page to page (apart from the home page), this will look mighty strange to the human Editor on each directory. We are all used to seeing a navbar and the absence of one will surely make acceptance by Directories harder to achieve. The addition of a Navbar with the "nofollow" attribute will surely provide the Editor with what he/she would regard as normal, while that attribute would mean those links were ignored by the bots who would spider via the page text links. We get the best of both worlds this way?
If we DID do as described above, would it really matter whether the menu was on the left (normal) or right of the screen?
Any input gratefully received.
Cheers
Adrian |
Do not focus on PR. The only thing I have seen that PR is good for is the frequency in which the Google spider visits a page and crawls it. Being that your sitemap exists on every page, this shouldn't be a problem.
People tend to put too much focus on PR. A PR2 can easily and frequently does outrank a PR3, 4, 5 and 6... Doesn't seem to be a huge contributing factor in rankings. Rankings is what we are all going after. Cabelas ranks highly for specific keywords despite a PR0.
In regard to user navigation, you can add navigation from the start as long as your navigation doesn't bleed the theme of your individual pages and silos. This is an issue that confuses many people so you are not alone.
The Master Plan will go into detail about this subject  |
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OnlyTopResults
SEO Yellow Belt
Joined: 07 Jul 2006
Posts: 28
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| Posted: Mon Jul 31, 2006 7:05 am Post subject: Re: Have I got this silo structure right? |
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| Charles Heflin wrote: |
Do not focus on PR. The only thing I have seen that PR is good for is the frequency in which the Google spider visits a page and crawls it. Being that your sitemap exists on every page, this shouldn't be a problem.
People tend to put too much focus on PR. A PR2 can easily and frequently does outrank a PR3, 4, 5 and 6... Doesn't seem to be a huge contributing factor in rankings. Rankings is what we are all going after. Cabelas ranks highly for specific keywords despite a PR0. |
Phew! Glad to hear that Charles - seemed to me that pursuing PR 'down' a silo was an impossible task! Using sub-directories with almost no text content which lead to final 'deep' product pages with LOADS of keyword rich content seems like the way to organise a silo. That's certainly the Cabelas model.
| Quote: | In regard to user navigation, you can add navigation from the start as long as your navigation doesn't bleed the theme of your individual pages and silos. This is an issue that confuses many people so you are not alone.
The Master Plan will go into detail about this subject |
Yes - the idea of a website (however small) with no consistent navigation takes some getting used to!
Final point on this Charles. I can see that the use of folders to organise content will become a key issue. I have completed my 7 page initial site and am about to start Directory submissions, however I would just like to run this past you?
My current breast cancer site structure has homepage/sitemap/contact/privacy pages in the root and real content pages (top of silo pages) which are named:
causes1.html
symptoms1.html
treatments1.html
new-treatments1.html
survival-rates1.html
These 5 topics will be the ones I will add articles to, over time. Is there any disadvantage with putting them into folders before initial submission? e.g.
causes/causes1.html
symptoms/symptoms1.html
treatments/treatments1.html
new-treatments/new-treatments1.html
survival-rates/survival-rates1.html
By doing this I don't need to disturb the structure after initial indexing. Makes sense?
THanks
Adrian |
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