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Is This Considered Over Optimization (Internal Linking)?

by dreamtoreality
9 replies
  • SEO
    • |
Say that a review site has 60 posts per category. Every time you land on a post in that category you can see links to all 60 posts in that category in the sidebar. However, each post in the sidebar also uses the exact title of the post and all end in the word "review." Would Google think that this is over-optimization? I mean, linking to posts in this way really does provide the best user experience, as all the posts are on the same page and you can easily visit each brand's category page too. But I can see why it would look kind of spammy.

Thoughts?

For example,

Sony TVs (Clickable Link to Category Page)

Sony TV 1 Review
Sony TV 2 Review
Sony TV 3 Review
Sony TV 4 Review

Samsung TVs (Clickable Link to Category Page)

Samsung TV 1 Review
Samsung TV 2 Review
Samsung TV 3 Review

Sharp TVs (Clickable Link to Category Page)

Sharp TV 1 Review
Sharp TV 2 Review
Sharp TV 3 Review

etc
#internal #linking #optimization
  • Profile picture of the author TheContentAuthority
    Dreamtoreality,

    Unfortunately yes this is something that falls under the category of over optimization. The idea being that yes you sell sony tvs and even though you have reviews on different models, it isn’t really necessary to use the keyword variation throughout your site.

    Here is an article that mentions your situation as one that is classified as over optimization,

    Your Website Might Be Over Optimized If ? - Search Engine Watch (#SEW)

    Best,

    Shawn
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  • Profile picture of the author J3thro M
    I think it's better if you make the category pages (Sony TVs) as a parent page and that would be your landing page. Just write short definitions and a read more linking to its child pages which would be the reviews. Make the review pages as a support for Sony TV that links back to it. I think that would be a silo structure, but I am not sure though. And this would not result category pages into duplicate content. Make the review pages' Title different. Insert something you can think of and don't make everything that has a review on it. Those are just my thoughts. Just wait for a senor to come. Cheers
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  • Profile picture of the author dreamtoreality
    This is what annoys me about Google. I really believe that doing the above would provide the best user experience, but I can't do it as it may be considered spammy.

    Okay, how about something like this:

    Sony TV Review Post

    Sidebar:

    Sony TV1 Review
    Sony TV2 Review
    Sony TV3 Review
    Sony TV4 Review

    Samsung TV Review Post

    Sidebar:

    Samsung TV1 Review
    Samsung TV2 Review
    Samsung TV3 Review
    Samsung TV4 Review

    In other words, you can see a list of posts belonging to the subcategory. Still user friendly but is it over optimized? Would removing the word "Review" make any difference?
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  • Profile picture of the author nik0
    Banned
    I would just go more broad and chose broader titles as well.

    How about

    LCD TV's

    Samsung LCD TV review
    Review of the Sony XL3523
    Sharp HG235 reviewed
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    • Profile picture of the author dreamtoreality
      Originally Posted by nik0 View Post

      I would just go more broad and chose broader titles as well.

      How about

      LCD TV's

      Samsung LCD TV review
      Review of the Sony XL3523
      Sharp HG235 reviewed
      I could do that but would prefer not to, to be honest.

      What's been your experience with what I stated above, nik0? Ever tested something like that?
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      • Profile picture of the author nik0
        Banned
        Originally Posted by dreamtoreality View Post

        I could do that but would prefer not to, to be honest.

        What's been your experience with what I stated above, nik0? Ever tested something like that?
        Well I had my Amazon site got penalized not very long ago.

        And changing the titles to a more natural approach was part of my recover strategy and the site did recover, but impossible to say whether those titles had to do with it.

        In fact I lost some traffic when it recovered, probably due to de-optimizing of things.
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  • Profile picture of the author webdevpro
    I don't think there is anything bad from SE point of view as you are just providing easy navigation to your internal pages. But the way you are try to do will probably looks more like a clutter (more of same king of text with just little variation) and the visiorts may loose interest insted of engaging with your site.
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    • Profile picture of the author CatherineMay
      I share your challenge with providing the best user experience without seeming spammy.

      On my site, I have category landing pages with child posts, and also under the content of each post, I have each related post listed. I don't use the word "review," but nevertheless each post contains the same 2-word keyword phrase, along with other words pertaining just to that post.

      This structure makes sense to me, since at all times the user can see links to related content. But the rankings have been very disappointing, so I guess Google does not see things the way I do, even though all content is original.

      I'm about to remove all the links at the bottom of the posts and see what happens. I have nothing to lose at this point.
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  • Profile picture of the author Beardo
    I would drop the word "review" as it seems to me your site is a review site anyway. That would make it look more natural
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