Facebook, Twitter, and other social networking sites
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We are running into some issues that would be great to have some input on. During our web site optimization for Google and other search engines we have been presented a problem.
One of the things that Google and other search engines rank web sites based on is social networking traffic. We are not big fans of Facebook, Twitter, and many other social networking sites.
The question is what do you think of us adding 'social networking' to product pages? We have been advised to do this and would prefer not further promote the use of many of these web sites.
You can see what the person we hired to do this has done by looking at the bottom of the following product page:
https://www.thinkpenguin.com/gnu-linux/bluetooth-wireless-optical-mouse
Does anybody have a reccomendation on how we can utilise this without encouraging users to join?
I believe the FSF or associated projects have added "if you have an account at these sites help promote us... but please do not sign up if you don't". We may be open to this approach. Any suggestions on how to impliment that (if we move it to the top) in a limited ammount of space without hindering the design element?
Feedback is aprechiated. We are open to any suggestions you may have.
On 09/01/12 18:33, name at domain wrote:
> We are running into some issues that would be great to have some input
> on. During our web site optimization for Google and other search engines
> we have been presented a problem.
>
> One of the things that Google and other search engines rank web sites
> based on is social networking traffic. We are not big fans of Facebook,
> Twitter, and many other social networking sites.
I've nothing against 'social networking' per-se. What I do have
reservations about is the contribution of the stock versions of such
buttons to the proprietors' "huge data" stores i.e. tracking the user
across the web. IIRC stopping these buttons doing this was on the EFF's
wish list for the New Year.
I would expect the faif part of your clientèle the have a similar
negative view of such things. Many of my non-faif friends are aware of
the huge data problem and take a dim view of it, and suitable
precautions, as well.
All I'd ask is that you take a look at what the first two pages of your
target searches are doing and make a decision based on the balance of
your sales.
Leny
There are other things you could do with your site first, though, like custom page titles and SEO optimised URLs. Both are easily done in Drupal.
I can't imagine that having those buttons there alone will have an effect. So for you to get the desired effect people will have to click them. The usual areas where those widgets are used tend to be the top and bottom of the content area. If you move them to the top of the page - not sure if that's what you meant - and you make them inconspicuous then people might miss(not click) them and they won't be all that useful.
A problem with those widgets, as I'm sure you are aware, is that they (can) track you even if you don't use them and even if you don't use Facebook at all. Even if someone is not concerned about that, ALL users to the site will be subjected to that unless they use an add-on that blocks/kills those widgets - again, defeating the purpose.
On the other hand, you could try what the FSF does where it sends their own URLs to the specific social site's URL that captures sharing. However, that's a long-winded approach for users who are used to the direct click on the page.
I understand the need to get better/more traffic to your site and I support your desire to do so, but I get the feeling that it might be seen as "selling out" slightly. People who tend towards 100% Freedom most likely will object to using such elements on the website.
If Facebook traffic, for example, is that important to Google, then perhaps you should open a Facebook page and do some marketing there and let people like/share whatever you do on there? Then only have a link on the site to your Facebook page where you post your products and let people like it there. I don't know if that's the easiest or most effective approach, though.
Unfortunately this is a difficult issue. Do you have an SEO person on your team/available? They should be able to analyse the searches that end up at your site and help you make adjustments to your content. Also, if you can get people linking to you that would boost your presence too.
What you could do is add a "How did you hear about us" field somewhere on your site. Registration will be the easiest unless you add custom panes to the Ubercart checkout but that's a lot more work. That should aid you in analysing your demographic. Like to see if most of your customers come from, for example, Free-related sites (like the distros or FSF or whatever), word-of-mouth, search rankings, etc.
I am a member!
We do have an SEO optimization expert who specializes in Ubercart (our content managment platform) working on this issue. It is his advice that we add the social networking links to the site. He is working off my input and adjusting to some of our largely unique requests. It is not one particular thing we are doing.
I wonder if preventing the tracking will negate the benefits of adding this in the first place. If I understand the FSF approach it sounds like a good one to protect users provided the benefits from it still exist.
Regarding facebook and other sites. He is setting up facebook, twitter, and other accounts for us. One of the things I'm sure he isn't doing is setting up disapora. I'm probably going to ask him about it. If for only one reason. And that is to help offset facebook.
I believe disapora is the exact opposite of other social networking sites. They give users control.
We are working on increasing the number of quality links to the site as well.
If you have any other suggestions please do tell.
The FSF doesn't use the sharing iframes, and they only recommend using the sharing tools to spread freedom.
The fact is when you use their iframes we might be tracked when we visit the web page. Even with Disconnect, Share Me Not, etc. installed, we may still be being tracked.
I personally would take the FSF's approach, or just avoid doing it at all.
I am a member!
Avoiding it entirely is probably not a wise move. We have basically done that for more than three years now. We barely register on the map. Although a hard decision to make it is a decision that has to be made. The question I think is mainly going to be one of mitigation and awareness.
I think he meant the way they do the social buttons.
It's like what the FSF does but on the actual page. So they aren't discouraging people from using Facebook and what not, they are just not using the iframe widget.
I only remembered it now, but there is a slight difference between Liking and Sharing. I'm not sure if that has an effect on search engine rankings, though.
That's what I meant. Seems fine now, nothing is going into a database
Failbook is the ultimate wet dream of Big Brother. It is chock full of horror.
I am a member!
:) I've been doing some further reading regarding the issue and becoming more leerly of it. I thought there was some good points made by one particular person. I'm not going to make a decision as to what to do just yet. I have contacted the expert on the issue and waiting back for his reply.
I was thinking if we don't do it then maybe we will replace facebook, twitter, and the likes with some alternatives that don't have the problem if not for publicity just to show our support. I was thinking Slashdot, Diaspora, and similar.
Whether you decide to move ahead with this or to abandon the idea, I do have a request or suggestion - how about adding some sort of identi.ca button to the collection?
One of the things that I really appreciate about Trisquel is that the OS comes out-of-the-box configured for Free/libre alternatives. For instance, I didn't know about identi.ca, Libre.fm, DuckDuckGo, open.mapquest.com, IcedTea, gnash, etc; until the OS just defaulted to them all. That was a touch that I really appreciated and learned a lot from. So having an identi.ca button present on your site might show people a new alternative that they didn't know about.
As far as my own websites are concerned: I run a high profile fan site and faced a similar dilemma. For a while, the site had a "like" button and link to its Facebook page. But after dealing with Facebook for a while, the problems that it had kept getting worse. So I recently removed the Facebook/like links and deleted the associated Facebook page. I didn't want to encourage anyone who wasn't a member to sign up for Facebook just to be able to follow my site, nor did I want to give current Facebook users any reason to increase their use of it. I may either replace it with an identi.ca link and group; or I'll just use a private RSS feed to the site's own local forum articles.
I've found that having an RSS feed with regular new articles on your own site can also greatly increase traffic, without having to buy into someone else's model.
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Yea- I'm kinda leaning toward not doing it. I'm still waiting for the expert for input. My main concern is *what* are we doing to improve ranking if we eliminate all the things that would otherwise help to improve that ranking.
It may be we just need to focus more on getting linked from other high quality high traffic sites on a regular basis.
Initially I wanted to do everything possible though.
There are some negatives to adding facebook to the site from a SEO stand point. It increases the page load times.
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Here is what our SEO guy did:
https://www.thinkpenguin.com/gnu-linux/penguin-wireless-g-usb-adapter
I'll ask him about adding identi.ca and a few others the FSF mentions at http://www.fsf.org/share.
I'd like there to be icons in place of the links although I'm not sure how we could go about doing that. Most of these companies aren't allowing use of their copyrighted logos in ways that would permit it. Fair use might apply although it is always less clear with commercial entites involved.
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