skandalon

Tumblelogs have two key features that help users create an enormous backlog of posts in a very short time – “notes” and “reblog”. Through the latter button, users can simple click and reblog content found on another user’s site. This is one of the things that has made Tumblr such a hit among the masses, it is also one of the reasons that it is not in Google’s good graces. Search engines like Google use two key factors when creating rankings for searched sites: content and backlinks. Since Tumblr makes it so easy to copy content found on other blogs, it takes a lot more effort of on the part of a Tumblelogger to achieve a high ranking in results … because reblogging can easily become a duplicate content nightmare.

✖ Via SEO Facts: “Tumblr Takes a Fall in Google Search Rankings”, August 23, 2010

A follow up on my post about Tumblr’s SEO problems. See also Sochable: “Tumblr’s Biggest Strength is its Biggest Weakness to Google” by J.D. Rucker, August 22, 2010.

• Aug 27, 2010 link notes tagged: technology communication social media Tumblr SEO Google search engine blog community

Yeah, Tumblr is definitely a disaster for SEO. I have had massive problems with pages not being indexed on Google. The URL structure is worthless and post titles are virtually non-existent. If you want a blog that ranks well on Google you would do yourself a favor by not using Tumblr.

✖ Via Bjorn Stromberg: “Tumblr and SEO”, May 22sd, 2008

To be fair, it worth reading Topherchris post on the subject of search engine optimization and Tumblr (he works for Tumblr).

I became aware of the problem with this post. It was reblogged as is by a Wordpress blog (Innovation is Dead). If you try a Google search for “Beastness Jaclin”, the Wordpress blog comes up first. My Tumblr post doesn’t even come up (it uses tags, it’s making use of descriptive URLs and, of course, in my settings, I’ve allowed search engines to index my blog).

I’m aware, as Topherchris puts it, that it may be “related to how one’s template is designed and content is constructed”. But it’s a pain nonetheless. I should be able to get good search result for all of my post without having to tinker with my CSS template. After all, simplicity is what made us choose Tumblr in the first place. I wrote to Tumblr support about this. All I got was this:

“We can’t control what Google and other search engines choose to index and show. For further assistance you could try contacting Google or another search engine directly.” (april 22sd, 2010)

Notice they didn’t point me to a source of information, didn’t mention tags or meta-data and didn’t say a word about the template I’m using. Hell, I would have been interested in buying a template that as a good SEO system.

So for the past two months, I’ve been playing with export/import tools : I’d like to move everything from this Tumblr account to a self-hosted Wordpress blog. Granted, Tumblr is easy to use and, for me, it’s a great archiving tool for my personal needs. But as I understand it, I can’t do anything serious on it unless I start doing heavy research on how to modify my template. Which I won’t have to do on a Wordpress blog (I’ve been using this SEO plugin for years and it works great).

I know this post won’t show up on Google, so I’ll publish it on another Wordpress blog I own.

• Jun 05, 2010 link notes reblogged from bjornstar [via] tagged: technology communication Tumblr Google SEO search engine optimization Wordpress Drupal problem index rank