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Google have created the Google Webmaster Quiz, for anybody who may want to give it a go!
I thought I would expand on some of the questions that Google asked, as Google only provided an extended answer to a couple of questions.
Firstly, redirects are mentioned more than once, so for those who may be unaware of what these are, a redirect is a method that allows a particular web address to point to somewhere else.
A 301 Redirect is a response that can tell a search engine like Google that the address it is looking for has permanently changed to a different address. Knowing this, Google can stop looking at the old address, and pass any PageRank it may have to the new page.
4: Your homepage has 287 errors in the W3C validator. What is the maximum number of URLs that Google could index from your site? - All.
While web standards and valid HTML & CSS are recommended by Google, and indeed many other people, Google does not make it a requirement for any web page to be valid HTML. Google knows that there are many sites out there that aren't valid, but still have great content. Just because your site isn't valid, doesn't mean Google won't index it.
That being said, I would still recommend you take the time to find these errors and correct them, as invalid code might not be indexable, but don't worry about Google deliberately not indexing you because of any validation problems.
5: You bought multiple domain names and want them to all show the same website. What should you do with them? - Use a 301 redirect.
It's not an alien concept for people to obtain more than one domain name for their desired web site, because they want to protect the brand name, or cover possible spelling mistakes, and have them all access the same site. Previously, site owners who have multiple domain names would use a concept known as mapping, where by each domain name would seem to be its own web site, but would load the same web pages.
Rather than doing this, Google recommend picking your preferred domain name, and having a 301 redirect from all the others to point to your main domain name, so that Google knowns they are not separate web sites. If Google thought they were separate, and different people were linking to different domain names, Google wouldn't be able to give your site such a boost in its index.
8: Your site changed all URLs from .php to .asp, what do you need to do? - 301 redirect the old URLs to the new ones
For the same reason as above, if your old links and new links have people linking to them, Google won't necessarily known they are one in the same page. Use a 301 redirect from your old web addresses to the new addresses so Google knows anybody who still links to the old address is destined for the new addresses.
7: You need to prevent Google from indexing any content in the new folder /private-files/. What's the best way to do this? - Use server-side authentication (username/password) for this folder
You may think using the Disallow command within the robots.txt file would be the best answer, but Google recommends using authentication because it's much stronger against other crawlers too. If something is private, it should be password protected. After all, it's not just Google that might try to get to this private folder.
11: Which of the following is NOT against Google's Webmaster Guidelines? - Running tests on a site that result in some users seeing one version of a page and other users seeing another version
This might sound confusing to some people, because the answer could sound like clocking, where Google is provided with one page design / layout, and users are shown another, but this isn't what Google is trying to say here.
Some people might know of this process as A/B Testing, where slightly different content or designs are shown to a different group of people, either randomly or categorized in some way. The reactions to these differences are monitored and compared to see if one design type or hyperlink text works better than others.
The BBC recently used A/B testing to see which link button generated more interest, and found one was a stronger winner than the previous under-performing button, and as a result changed the link text they were currently using.
Freeola might use this to test the selling of their Domain Name service, with different banner designs or link text to a few people, and seeing which generated the most results, before deciding on a permanent design.
13: What does it mean when a robots.txt file contains "User-agent: *" and "Disallow:"? - Allow all search engines to crawl your site
14: What does it mean when a robots.txt file contains "User-agent: *" and "Disallow: /"? - Don't allow any search engines to crawl your site
At a first glance, both questions 13 and 14 may appear to be the same. The only difference is the addition of a forward slash in question 14. The forward slash infront of the Disallow command tells crawlers you DON'T want any of your site indexed. But remember, not all crawlers obey the robots.txt file, which is why question 7 recommends authentication to prevent indexing, as it's a lot more secure than the robots.txt file, even from Google.
27: Google guarantees indexing for the following types of sites? - None of the above
As big as Google is, as valid as your HTML might be, it is important to remember that Google does not guarantee to index anything. However, it is likely they want to, so make sure you can be found. Submit your URL, use Google Webmaster tools and get links to your site.
37: Your site has 200 pages, but Google only found 5 pages from your site. What could be the cause of this? - Even when a site is crawlable and indexable, it can take Google time to fully explore it
With so many billions of web pages online, Google will unlikely crawl and index your entire web site right away. It may scan your pages quickly, which could show up in your server logs, but not index them for a long time, if at all.
Firstly, redirects are mentioned more than once, so for those who may be unaware of what these are, a redirect is a method that allows a particular web address to point to somewhere else.
A 301 Redirect is a response that can tell a search engine like Google that the address it is looking for has permanently changed to a different address. Knowing this, Google can stop looking at the old address, and pass any PageRank it may have to the new page.
4: Your homepage has 287 errors in the W3C validator. What is the maximum number of URLs that Google could index from your site? - All.
While web standards and valid HTML & CSS are recommended by Google, and indeed many other people, Google does not make it a requirement for any web page to be valid HTML. Google knows that there are many sites out there that aren't valid, but still have great content. Just because your site isn't valid, doesn't mean Google won't index it.
That being said, I would still recommend you take the time to find these errors and correct them, as invalid code might not be indexable, but don't worry about Google deliberately not indexing you because of any validation problems.
5: You bought multiple domain names and want them to all show the same website. What should you do with them? - Use a 301 redirect.
It's not an alien concept for people to obtain more than one domain name for their desired web site, because they want to protect the brand name, or cover possible spelling mistakes, and have them all access the same site. Previously, site owners who have multiple domain names would use a concept known as mapping, where by each domain name would seem to be its own web site, but would load the same web pages.
Rather than doing this, Google recommend picking your preferred domain name, and having a 301 redirect from all the others to point to your main domain name, so that Google knowns they are not separate web sites. If Google thought they were separate, and different people were linking to different domain names, Google wouldn't be able to give your site such a boost in its index.
8: Your site changed all URLs from .php to .asp, what do you need to do? - 301 redirect the old URLs to the new ones
For the same reason as above, if your old links and new links have people linking to them, Google won't necessarily known they are one in the same page. Use a 301 redirect from your old web addresses to the new addresses so Google knows anybody who still links to the old address is destined for the new addresses.
7: You need to prevent Google from indexing any content in the new folder /private-files/. What's the best way to do this? - Use server-side authentication (username/password) for this folder
You may think using the Disallow command within the robots.txt file would be the best answer, but Google recommends using authentication because it's much stronger against other crawlers too. If something is private, it should be password protected. After all, it's not just Google that might try to get to this private folder.
11: Which of the following is NOT against Google's Webmaster Guidelines? - Running tests on a site that result in some users seeing one version of a page and other users seeing another version
This might sound confusing to some people, because the answer could sound like clocking, where Google is provided with one page design / layout, and users are shown another, but this isn't what Google is trying to say here.
Some people might know of this process as A/B Testing, where slightly different content or designs are shown to a different group of people, either randomly or categorized in some way. The reactions to these differences are monitored and compared to see if one design type or hyperlink text works better than others.
The BBC recently used A/B testing to see which link button generated more interest, and found one was a stronger winner than the previous under-performing button, and as a result changed the link text they were currently using.
Freeola might use this to test the selling of their Domain Name service, with different banner designs or link text to a few people, and seeing which generated the most results, before deciding on a permanent design.
13: What does it mean when a robots.txt file contains "User-agent: *" and "Disallow:"? - Allow all search engines to crawl your site
14: What does it mean when a robots.txt file contains "User-agent: *" and "Disallow: /"? - Don't allow any search engines to crawl your site
At a first glance, both questions 13 and 14 may appear to be the same. The only difference is the addition of a forward slash in question 14. The forward slash infront of the Disallow command tells crawlers you DON'T want any of your site indexed. But remember, not all crawlers obey the robots.txt file, which is why question 7 recommends authentication to prevent indexing, as it's a lot more secure than the robots.txt file, even from Google.
27: Google guarantees indexing for the following types of sites? - None of the above
As big as Google is, as valid as your HTML might be, it is important to remember that Google does not guarantee to index anything. However, it is likely they want to, so make sure you can be found. Submit your URL, use Google Webmaster tools and get links to your site.
37: Your site has 200 pages, but Google only found 5 pages from your site. What could be the cause of this? - Even when a site is crawlable and indexable, it can take Google time to fully explore it
With so many billions of web pages online, Google will unlikely crawl and index your entire web site right away. It may scan your pages quickly, which could show up in your server logs, but not index them for a long time, if at all.
And the Google Webmaster Quiz answers are up - I thought I'd saved my answers somewhere, but can't find them. Never mind.
robots.txt appears in a lot of the answers it seems.... ;)
But I had to enjoy Question 3. They should have had another answer..... e) Phone up your web host and complain
:D
But I had to enjoy Question 3. They should have had another answer..... e) Phone up your web host and complain
:D
Google have created the Google Webmaster Quiz, for anybody who may want to give it a go!