Yandex SEOGuide

IntroductionHistory

TipsServices

Linkbuilding

Search Engine Market @ Russia

Google vs Yandex

- Same date of launch- Cyrilic- Matrixnet 2009 vs Panda 2011- Personal evaluators- Custom algorithms- SERP changes- Not only a SE

- wordstat- webmasters- yaca- informational portal

Google vs Yandex (factors)

Yandex GoogleYandex TIC (thematic index citation) 0-270.000 Google PageRank 1-10

measures SITE popularity measures PAGE popularity

it’s the same for the whole domain each page has different PR

internal linking doesn’t affect TIC internal linking affects PR

indexation indexation

every 2 months (except dynamic content) updated constantly

respects robots.txt often ignores robots.txt

Search engine updates

● Made to improve the quality of SERPs○ Content quality○ Duplicate content, spinning, bounce rate○ Link spamming, anchors, kw stuffing

●● Penalties & Rankings

○ Panda (content)○ Penguin (links)○ Yandex AGS 30 (content)○ Yandex AGS 17 (links)

ON-Site Factors (Yandex)

● Title tags● Meta descriptions (difficult to influence rich

snippets)● H-Tags to structure text (H1, H2, H3..)● URL Structure

○ static○ keywords on URL

● Regional domains (.ru > .com) ● Site age instead domain age● Unique and quality content● Keyword usage (variation)

○ semantic○ synonyms and related kws○ grammar

ON-Site Factors (Yandex)

● Domain > Single pages● Likes internal linking● Length of landing pages > 500● Doesn’t like over-optimized pages● Site trust very important● Meta Keywords

Resume:Content is KingCorrect Meta DataHigh Quality Site: avoid 404, ..

Yandex suite for webmasters

● Report a new site:○ http://webmaster.yandex.ru/addurl.xml?lang=en

● Webmaster Tools for Yandex○ http://webmaster.yandex.com/?tab=1

● Link social media profiles on Spravochnik○ display icons on SERP -> increase CTR%○ http://sprav.yandex.ru/

● Wordstat for keyword research○ http://wordstat.yandex.ru/○ great tutorial:○ http://www.russiansearchtips.com/2013/09/tip-of-the-day-save-time-when-doing-

keyword-research-for-yandex/

● Yaca is the Yandex’s directory○ http://yaca.yandex.ru/

Usability

Yandex announced that “site usability” affects the website ranking. Good quality website must be user friendly and have the following criteria:

● Good navigation● Clear structure● Good interface● Good content● As less advertisement as possible● Proper contact details● Valid HTML code

Social Media

It’s not clear how much affects Social Media to websites ranking on Yandex, but they like:

● User generated content○ forums○ comment fields○ blogs

● Russian Social Media ○ VK.com○ Odnoklassniki.com○ Mail.ru

● Active SM Profiles

Off-site: LinkBuilding

Act of getting links in other websites to increase the reputation, visibility (rankings) and authority from a domain.

● Getting links○ blogs○ guest posting○ using SAPE.ru (http://www.sape.ru)

Buying links on Yandex

● 90% of the links registered on RuNet are paid links○ Yandex promised to combat this○ Practice very ingrained on Russia

■ Hard to handle

● Most of the russian sites have a black hat profile○ unnatural / fast link growth○ Site-wide links○ Link spam (link farms, low q. directories, …)

● SAPE can be interesting but taking care about the sites where we are placing the links

Linkbuilding best practices on Yandex

● Links from on-topic sites○ look for topic related blogs / websites

● Links from authority websites○ useful metrics: index & TIC○ use the Yandex toolbar○○ http://element.yandex.ru/chrome/ or http://element.yandex.ru/firefox/

● Links from Russia domains○ For now, Yandex ignore foreign domains

What affects TIC? (quotation index)

● Number of backlinks of your site● Trust level of your backlinks (comes with age, good

directories listings, backlinks etc.)● Relevancy of your backlinks ● Quotation index of backlinks● Quality of content● Number of internal links● Patterns of link building● Patterns of linking to external sources● Geographic location of backlinks● Date of registration in the Yandex directory

○ 150-1000 TIC for private sites○ 1000-10.000 Newspapers, TVs...

Good reads and documentation

● http://www.russiansearchtips.com/● Panna Cotta Linkbuilding report● Panna Cotta Operative LB (Italy example)