How Does Google Choose Post Titles For Search Results?

When Google crawls a page on your website and indexes it to show in search results, it usually picks up the meta title (or default title) of the page that you have set. But this isn't always the case, and Google can, and sometimes will, ignore your title, and write its own. Preposterous, yes? I wouldn't want my titles overridden by a bot! So when and why does Google do that? And how does it choose titles for search results?

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Remove all Structured Data Errors on your Blogs!

This post is a confirmation to prove that the unique SEO method that we published last month to fix hatom errors has done us wonders and have solved all errors on webmasters for both our network blogs and our clients. Microformat markup errors are amongst the most complicated errors and fortunately we managed to find a fix for blogger blogs. We are now moving towards solving hatom errors in Wordpress blogs and will release that tutorial pretty soon. Please check below the screenshots to see the amazing drop in errors for missing:author , missing:updated and missing:entry-title fields:

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How To Get The Most Out Of Your Category and Tag Archive Pages?

Most content websites use categories and/or tags to classify information. Correctly classifying the information on your website is extremely important, not only for the users' benefit, but also from an SEO perspective. It can help you create powerful archive sections on your website that can rank well. In fact, building a good information architecture is one of the newest SEO techniques to learn in 2014.. Most websites have default or basic archive pages, which are mostly by robots or 'noindexed' so that search engines won't pick up on duplicate content. Today, we'll talk about getting the most out of these pages.

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Pinterest Announces Guided Search For Easier Content Discovery

Search engines are great for answering specific questions. For example, a tutorial for building Android apps, weather conditions in a city, and so on. But don't you sometimes feel at a loss to pinpoint what you're looking for, and randomly sift through the internet for a chance encounter? Perhaps you need some creative ideas for your upcoming vocations. But there never existed a search engine that could help you with such stuff.

Until now.

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Difference Between 3G and 4G Mobile Technology?

Wireless telecommunications has made huge leaps and bounds in technology over the years. The world now relies on mobile telecommunications, without which the entire social infrastructure can collapse. Gone are the days of old cellular GSM - the world has moved on to next-gen wireless networking. We often hear the terms 3G and 4G with respect to mobile telecom. What exactly are they? And how exactly do they differ from each other?

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When is the Best Time To Post on Facebook, Twitter and Pinterest?

One of the most important social media tricks I've learnt over time is to maintain a schedule. Not only will it bring consistency to your work, but will also save you valuable time. But sharing stories according to a schedule itself won't give you much of an edge, unless you know when exactly to share them. So it's not just a matter of doing some work; it's a question of when to do it. Knowing when your audience wakes up and checks Facebook can work wonders for your social reputation.

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How To Use Google Plus To Increase Website Traffic?

Many of you might have noticed a declining percentage of visitors sent from Facebook to your website everyday. This is because Facebook Pages are losing their reach, and can not account for as much of web traffic as they used to. Not surprisingly, Google+ seems to be catching on, and for Pages that utilize Google+ to maximum effect, the amount of traffic sent to their home website seems to be growing significantly.

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Now Get Real-Time Interactive Web Notifications From Twitter

Many of you might have noticed the recent changes in the Twitter profile page redesign. It looks oddly familiar to Facebook's profile design. But under the hood, there are a lot of changes. Twitter is trying to be more instantaneous. Following up on the recent changes to the profile design, Twitter has announced real-time notifications! The feature will roll out across all accounts gradually over the coming weeks.

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How To Protect Against The Heartbleed Bug?

The Heartbleed Bug is a major security threat that has effected millions of websites around the world. It has the potential to expose users' private information, including passwords, financial details and instant messages, among other thing. While many big websites have applied patches to fix it, a deeper look into the security loophole has revealed that your privacy might be compromised at this very moment, and hackers could have access to your personal information through your home routers!

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What Is The Heartbleed Bug? Everything You Need To Know

What is this 'Heartbleed' everyone is suddenly talking about? I won't blame you if you're as clueless as I was when I first heard about it. The term suddenly exploded as if out of nowhere, and had me thinking; meh, it's probably another messaging app that someone has discovered a bug with. But no. Heartbleed is a major security bug that was discovered Codenomicon, a software security firm, and a member of Google's security team. It is a serious security threat that has the potential to expose users' private information, including passwords, financial details and instant messages, among other things. So if security is one of your concerns, you need to read this!

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Facebook Announces Major Overhaul To News Feed - Bad News For Pages

So I guess Facebook has, unwittingly, become our theme of the week month, though not without reason. Facebook marketing strategies are becoming a hot topic, as more and more businesses are wondering why their Facebook Pages are losing reach, while Facebook seems to be going stronger than ever with its advertisements. In a fresh wave of enhancements to the social network, Facebook has just announced a major overhaul to its news feed which aims to "reduce stories that people frequently tell us are spammy and that they don't want to see." Page admins, prepare to bear the brunt!

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What You Need To Know About Facebook Ads?

Facebook has become an integral part of most online business, especially when it comes to marketing a brand to a social audience. It is the largest network on the web, with the widest reach, and is an ideal hub for those looking to exploit a market based entirely off of social interaction, given Facebook's controversial privacy policies. If you're an online business looking to further your campaign with the use of Facebook, then there are some important things you should know about Facebook ads.

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How To Surface Your Business's Contact Information in Google?

A lot of people use Google every day in order to find information about businesses that they deal with. These can be online retailers, or local restaurants. Often, they're looking for specialized information about a business, such as a contact number, email or physical address, or opening/closing hours (for a physical walk-in business). If you run a business, you can help Google recognize the most important information about your business, and make it more likely to surface that information to searchers looking for your business.

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How Does The Facebook Newsfeed Really Work?

Facebook Pages today are faced with a much tougher challenge of keeping their boat afloat owing to the evolution of the Facebook newsfeed algorithm. Facebook weighs in a lot of quality factors, which collectively decide how many people can a post reach. This, coupled with the ever-intensifying competition for feed space means that Pages have to fight for every inch, like literally! Following up on our recent post about Negative Feedback and its impact on Reach, we'll discuss the whole newsfeed ranking process in a bit more detail.

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How to Add Numbered Page Navigation Widget for Blogger

In Blogger, we have the option to set the number of posts we want to display per page by going to the Settings menu > Posts and comments > Show at most ? posts. Once the number of total posts in our blog exceeds this number, we will see "Older Posts" and "Newer Posts" navigation links in our home page and archive pages footer as Blogger doesn't have any built-in function on page numbering. But page numbers instead of older and newer posts links could help our blog visitors to navigate quicker (jump from one page to another page or click on a specific page) and know the total number of posts published. Here's a tutorial on how to add numbered page navigation using Javascript to a Blogger/ blogspot blog. You can select any one of the 7 different styles that I have mentioned below.

Adding Numbered Page Navigation to Blogger

You can add this widget in just two steps.
1. Adding The CSS.
2. Adding The Script.

Now let's see how to add the CSS style for page navigation.

1. Adding The CSS

Step 1. Go to Blogger Dashboard > Template > click on the Edit HTML button:

Step 2. Click anywhere inside the code area and press the CTRL + F keys to open the Blogger search box.

... type or paste the following tag inside the search box and hit Enter to find it:

]]></b:skin>

Step 3. Now choose one of the following numbered page navigation styles and copy the code just below it. Just above ]]></b:skin> paste the code of the style that you want to use:

Style 1

 #blog-pager{clear:both;margin:30px auto;text-align:center; padding: 7px;}
.blog-pager {background: none;}
.displaypageNum a,.showpage a,.pagecurrent{padding: 3px 7px;margin-right:5px;background:#E9E9E9;color: #888;border:1px solid #E9E9E9;}
.displaypageNum a:hover,.showpage a:hover,.pagecurrent{background:#CECECE;text-decoration:none;color: #000;}
 .showpageOf{display:none!important}
#blog-pager .showpage, #blog-pager .pagecurrent{font-weight:bold;color: #888;}
 #blog-pager .pages{border:none;}

Style 2:

 #blog-pager{clear:both;margin:30px auto;text-align:center; padding: 7px;}
.blog-pager {background: none;}
.displaypageNum a,.showpage a,.pagecurrent{padding: 5px 10px;margin-right:5px; color: #F4F4F4; background-color:#404042;-webkit-box-shadow: 0px 5px 3px -1px rgba(50, 50, 50, 0.53);-moz-box-shadow:0px 5px 3px -1px rgba(50, 50, 50, 0.53);box-shadow: 0px 5px 3px -1px rgba(50, 50, 50, 0.53);}
.displaypageNum a:hover,.showpage a:hover, .pagecurrent{background:#EC8D04;text-decoration:none;color: #fff;}
#blog-pager .showpage, #blog-pager, .pagecurrent{font-weight:bold;color: #000;}
 .showpageOf{display:none!important}
#blog-pager .pages{border:none;-webkit-box-shadow: 0px 5px 3px -1px rgba(50, 50, 50, 0.53);-moz-box-shadow:0px 5px 3px -1px rgba(50, 50, 50, 0.53);box-shadow: 0px 5px 3px -1px rgba(50, 50, 50, 0.53);}

Style 3:

 #blog-pager{clear:both;margin:30px auto; padding: 7px; text-align:center;font-size: 11px;background-image: -webkit-gradient(linear,left bottom,left top,color-stop(0, #000000),color-stop(1, #292929));background-image: -o-linear-gradient(top, #000000 0%, #292929 100%);background-image: -moz-linear-gradient(top, #000000 0%, #292929 100%);background-image: -webkit-linear-gradient(top, #000000 0%, #292929 100%);background-image: -ms-linear-gradient(top, #000000 0%, #292929 100%);background-image: linear-gradient(to top, #000000 0%, #292929 100%); padding: 6px;-webkit-border-radius: 3px;-moz-border-radius: 3px;border-radius: 3px;}
.blog-pager {background: none;}
.displaypageNum a,.showpage a,.pagecurrent{padding: 3px 10px;margin-right:5px; color: #fff;}
.displaypageNum a:hover,.showpage a:hover,.pagecurrent{background-image: -webkit-gradient(linear,left bottom,left top,color-stop(0, #59A2CF),color-stop(1, #D9EAFF));background-image: -o-linear-gradient(top, #59A2CF 0%, #D9EAFF 100%);background-image: -moz-linear-gradient(top, #59A2CF 0%, #D9EAFF 100%);background-image: -webkit-linear-gradient(top, #59A2CF 0%, #D9EAFF 100%);background-image: -ms-linear-gradient(top, #59A2CF 0%, #D9EAFF 100%);background-image: linear-gradient(to top, #59A2CF 0%, #D9EAFF 100%);text-decoration: none;color: #000;-webkit-border-radius: 3px;-moz-border-radius: 3px;border-radius: 3px;}
.showpageOf{display:none!important}.blog-pager-older-link, .home-link, .blog-pager-newer-link {background: transparent;}
a.blog-pager-older-link, a.home-link, a.blog-pager-newer-link {color: #fff;}
#blog-pager .pages{border:none;background: none;}

Style 4:

#blog-pager{clear:both;margin:30px auto;text-align:center; padding: 7px;}
.blog-pager {background: none;}
.displaypageNum a,.showpage a,.pagecurrent{font-size: 14px;padding: 5px 12px;margin-right:5px; color: #666; background-color:#eee;}
.displaypageNum a:hover,.showpage a:hover, .pagecurrent{background:#359BED;text-decoration:none;color: #fff;}
#blog-pager .pagecurrent{font-weight:bold;color: #fff;background:#359BED;}
 .showpageOf{display:none!important}
#blog-pager .pages{border:none;}

Style 5

#blog-pager{clear:both;margin:30px auto;text-align:center; padding: 7px; }
.blog-pager {background: none;}
.displaypageNum a,.showpage a,.pagecurrent{font-size: 13px;padding: 5px 12px;margin-right:5px; color: #3E5801; background-color:#E0EDC1;}
.displaypageNum a:hover,.showpage a:hover, .pagecurrent{background:#FEF6DF;text-decoration:none;color: #E16800;}
#blog-pager .pagecurrent{font-weight:bold;color: #D25E71;background:#FFDEDF;}
 .showpageOf{display:none!important}
#blog-pager .pages{border:none;}

Style 6

#blog-pager{clear:both;margin:30px auto;text-align:center; padding: 7px; }
.blog-pager {background: none;}
.displaypageNum a,.showpage a,.pagecurrent{font-size: 13px;padding: 5px 12px;margin-right:5px; color: #AD0B00; background-color:#FAB001;}
.displaypageNum a:hover,.showpage a:hover, .pagecurrent{background:#DB4920;text-decoration:none;color: #fff;}
#blog-pager .pagecurrent{font-weight:bold;color: #fff;background:#DB4920;}
 .showpageOf{display:none!important}
#blog-pager .pages{border:none;}

Style 7

#blog-pager{clear:both;margin:30px auto;text-align:center; padding: 7px; }
.blog-pager {background: none;}
.displaypageNum a,.showpage a,.pagecurrent{font-size: 12px;padding: 5px 12px;margin-right:5px; color: #222; background-color:#eee; border: 1px solid #EEEEEE;}
.displaypageNum a:hover,.showpage a:hover, .pagecurrent{background:#E5E5E5;text-decoration:none;color: #222;}
#blog-pager .pagecurrent{font-weight:bold;color: #fff;background:#DB4920;}
 .showpageOf{display:none!important}
#blog-pager .pages{border:none;}

Note: if you want to hide the "First" and "Last" buttons add this line below the CSS code:

.firstpage, .lastpage {display: none;}

2. Adding The Script

Step 4. Now find (CTRL + F) this tag:

</body>

UPDATED! Working version for more than 500 posts:

Step 5. Add the following script just above it:

<b:if cond='data:blog.pageType != &quot;item&quot;'>
<b:if cond='data:blog.pageType != &quot;static_page&quot;'>
<script type='text/javascript'>
  /*<![CDATA[*/
    var perPage=7;
    var numPages=6;
    var firstText ='First';
    var lastText ='Last';
    var prevText ='« Previous';
    var nextText ='Next »';
    var urlactivepage=location.href;
    var home_page="/";
  /*]]>*/
</script>
  <script src="http://helplogger.googlecode.com/svn/trunk/page-navigation2.js"/>
</b:if>
</b:if>

Configuration

After installing, you might want to change these default settings:

perPage: 7,
numPages: 6,
var firstText ='First';
var lastText ='Last';
var prevText ='« Previous';
var nextText ='Next »';
}

1) perPage: how many posts will be shown in each page (7). This value has to be the same as the number of posts on the main page. Otherwise, add the same number by going to "Settings" > "Formatting" and type it in the "Show at most" field, then click on the "Save Settings" button.

2) numPages: how many pages will be shown in the page navigation (6)

3) to replace the 'First', 'Last', "« Previous" and "Next »" texts, just type your own within the quotes.

Labels fix:

By default, Blogger will show 20 posts on label pages. To make this widget appear on label pages, we will have to cut down this down to the value that we gave for the perPage variable.

Find each occurrence of the following code snippet:

expr:href='data:label.url'

Replace it with this one below:

expr:href='data:label.url + "?&amp;max-results=7"'

Here 7 is the number of posts to be displayed per page.

Step 8. Click on the Save Template button and that's it! Enjoy!

Celebrating The Success of "Unexplored Success Treasures - 2014"

Entrepreneurship and Youth Awareness, the two different but not indistinct messages the STC Network has been maintaining for the better part of the past 5 years, resonated once again last month on the 23rd of February in Islamabad - and profoundly I must add. "Unexplored Success Treasures", the first event of its kind in Pakistan, was a thoroughly enjoyable experience for organizers, speakers and participants alike. But more than that, it was an eye-opener for the youth and those who wouldn't think outside their 9-5 box! We feel honored in having successfully delivered such a strong and valuable message to such individuals, and hence consider UST 2014 a victory for the STC Network, and for Entrepreneurship (Alhamdulillah)!

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Fix Structured Data hatom Errors in Blogger

Last year we wrote a comprehensive post on understanding what Structured Data is and how it is used to better display your site on major search engine result pages. Today you will find the first tutorial of its kind for Blogger blogs where you will learn how to fix Structured Data errors in BlogSpot templates. In your webmaster tools' Search Appearance tab or while using Google rich snippets tool, you must have come across two or all of these famous microformat markup errors:

1. Warning: Missing required field “entry-title”
2. Warning: Missing required field “updated”
3. Warning: Missing required hCard “author”

Both wordpress and Blogger users are facing this trouble. We will be covering blogger troubleshoot guide today and will cover wordpress Genesis platform as soon as possible.

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Now Check Better Index Status Data in Google Webmaster Tools!

We recently discussed about Google Webmaster Tools, and how you can use it to get your site noticed by Google. GWT is an amazing inventory of tools that help you monitor critical data about your website, and take evasive action (if need be). One of the many important features is the Index Status feature, which reports how many pages on your site are indexed by Google. This index status used to be pretty generic, and showed data from the website as a whole. Now, Google has upgraded it to track indexed URLs for individual sections of your website.

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