Reynolds SEO Analysis Report

The follow report concentrates only on the tangible mechanics of dealer web sites that are the responsibility of the vendor. Much of SEO may be an art, but the foundation of a web site is not. It is the DealerComp position that a dealer web site vendor should deliver a product that is compatible with how major search engines work.

Indexation is the #1 fundamental SEO evaluation attribute, and that is how we begin our analysis. If a search engine cannot see the pages on your web site, it certainly cannot serve those pages up in the SERPs (search engine results pages). Indexation is usually an indication of the web site architecture of the vendor. Dealers can (and have) done things to prevent search engines from indexing their web site pages, but a pattern of indexation indicates how the architecture performs. That is what the following graph and an analysis of other sites built by the same vendor begin to illustrate.

Huffienes Hyundai is the example Reynolds dealer in this Indexation comparison.

DealerComp only lists attributes that are clearly the responsibility of the vendor. Unlike other Automotive SEO reports, DealerComp does not consider search engine rank to be the sole responsibility of the vendor – rather it is a dealer responsibility to see that proper keyword selection and implementation are executed.

The following attributes generally indicate the organization of the vendor – how uniformly their client sites are maintained, and give insight into the web site architecture. Architecture and maintenance are both critical to good SEO.

DealerComp is currently tracking the Reynolds web sites listed in the table below.

• Reynolds web sites have no Robots.txt files (NP = not present). Because search engines now, by defulat, look for sitemap.xml (which Reynolds does not provide) for clues to index web sites (and Reynolds uses a sitemap.aspx file), a robots.txt pointing to the sitemap.aspx file is critical. Because these changes to a vendor website are so simplictic to implement, Reynolds gets a 1 = worst rank, for not doing the bare minimum to help their dealer compete online.
• As just mentioned, Reynolds web sites do not have Sitemap.xml files. A sitemap.xml tells search engines how to navigate the pages of the web site. It is considered good SEO and is recommended by Google and other search engines. Because it is so simplictic to implement a sitemap.xml file, Reynolds gets a 1 = worst rank.
• Indexed Pages are reported by Google on 11/04/2009. The overall indexing of Reynolds web sites are below average. Many automotive dealer websites have more than 500 pages indexed. Poor indexation is probably a result of the previously mentioned SEO deficiencies; 1) no robots.txt file, 2) no sitemap.xml file.

Scores are relative on a scale of 10 = Best, 1 = Worst

• W3C Score indicates Reynolds sites have a critical error, there is no canonical control (see Google’s canonical explanation). Also lacking is character declaration. Character declaration is not a critical omission. W3C explanation why character declaration is increasingly important.
• URL Score indicates that page content is reflected in the URL indicating how search engine friendly they are. Today this seems to be an increasingly critical attribute to getting good page rank on search engines. Reynolds URLs rank poorly for SEO friendly URLs. Read more about SEO friendly URL formation.
• Reynolds web sites generally lack H Tags. H tags that are found, seem to have been tweaked by an in-house SEO. Reynolds default H tags are sub-par. See DealerComp H Tag best practices.
• Reynolds web sites have too many images and mostly empty Alt tags. Alt tags that are not empty are typically generic keywords that are marginally helpful in dealer search rank. Another unfortunate lost SEO opportunity! Some adroit in-house SEOs have improved their Alt tags – bravo!

Overall Analysis

Reynolds web sites get indexed well enough, but the architecture is as old as the company and that’s what hurts. The infrastructure “fixes” described here, could be implemented in a weekend, but…don’t hold your breath. To Reynolds credit, their customer service tries to accommodate any SEO effort. But that’s the extent of the story.

Everything about the architecture hampers almost all search engine optimization efforts. An in-house SEO professional might try (some have), but the chances of being SERP competitive are slim when competing with a state-of-the-art dealer web site.

Dealers using Reynolds web sites would get best results by proactively managing keywords in the Title tag, Alt tags, H tags, and all other meta tags. A few of you are. Keep up the good work!

Analysis by DealerComp.com – Best of Automotive SEO reports compiled by request.