Age Verification Page

[BijouWorld]

Okay, we broke down and created a separate age verification page, complete with an Exit link. The exit link goes to a non-profit our company currently supports for now. I'd love your thoughts... http://www.bijouworld.com

[proxak]

Hi Ken, thanks for posting a very timely subject, since I'm currently working on this myself.

Was there a decision to keep this page brief? Unlike what seems to be the standard of pages and pages of "rules." I also noticed the link to ICRA, but that you're not applying a label to this page or the index2.htm page that will work with the parental filter software built into some browsers, do you intend to eventually add the labels?

Other than my questions, I like the clean look-and-feel of the design for the age verification page.

Beauchamp "Beau" Woody

[Xstr8guy]

Say goodbye to any SE traffic that you used to get to your index page. You don't have any descriptive text at all. I can't believe that people still design pages like this.

[Bec]

Jim's right - build in some tables of text that utilize your site keywords that the SE engines can pick up on. Putting the warning into a graphic is one way to avoid that being spidered and used in SE results ... using an IFrame for a warning would also work. Change off the alt tags on your header image to describing the site and keywords, not the text about the warning.

I'd also trade where your enter and exit links sit - put enter on the right side, don't make the surfer work too hard to actually get to the goodies.

[BijouWorld]

Thanks for the feedback, guys. We'll add some more descriptive information on the page for the SE's.

As far as the briefness, our approach with design is more minimalist and avoiding the porn by the pound, in your face design.

[BijouWorld]

I've updated the page some...changing the ALT Tags, moving the Enter link to the right corner rather than the left, I increased the opacity of the Exit link a little to make the Enter link stand out more.

Also, I labeled us with ICRA, and added their label to our index and index2 pages (we'll deploy it across the website when we have an opportunity).

As far as any additional language, in our experience with obsinity charges, more won't really help us. It does, however, detract from what we're trying to provide our customers.

[Bec]

Ok, i'm not seeing the new alt text as actual physical text. What 's going to happen is this will get spidered and the SE result page is going to show the text about the parental controls to describe your site. Get the text you used as the alt tag ON to that page ... use some H1 and H2 tags to let the SE know those are important words/sentences for that site.

On the enter graphic - change the alt tag to read Enter BijouWorld - use your domain name as much as feasibly possible without appearing to be spamming it throughout that page. Brand Brand Brand!

[Xstr8guy]

Listen to Bec. That's my advice.

[BijouWorld]

Okay, I was just a little dense...now I'm following. I'll get the page loaded...I just try to avoid the "porno ghetto" look of bombarding a user with *obvious* keywords. So, I need to write some good copy for the page.

Now, I wanted to confirm...I'm using an H1 tag for the text under the image, but I'm using a style to make the text a little more inline with the design. Will the search engines catch this and downgrade the importance of the text?

[gaystoryman]

Okay, I was just a little dense...now I'm following. I'll get the page loaded...I just try to avoid the "porno ghetto" look of bombarding a user with *obvious* keywords. So, I need to write some good copy for the page.

Now, I wanted to confirm...I'm using an H1 tag for the text under the image, but I'm using a style to make the text a little more inline with the design. Will the search engines catch this and downgrade the importance of the text?

No they only look at style of text to determine if its an attempt at hiding it and making it for se views... its the tag designation that helps, plus if the words in the tag are further supported within the page that help boost its relevency.

:coffee:

[Bec]

The biggest thing is to make your text sound natural. Emphasize with h tags here and there, use of italics if it's appropriate will also be noted and weighed. Be sure the very last line at the bottom of your page repeats your domain name, with some sort of descriptive keyword sentence on it. You can also use bold, and different fonts for effect, just don't pick something that isn't common to most computers.

NEVER obscure text by trying to make it like a hair lighter or darker than your background for color ... the SE spiders can actually determine if you're "hiding" keyword lists that way. (think that's what Ian was referring to)

If normal H1 and H2 are too big - tell your page what size you want those to be font size wise. Links that are not pertinent to your site should always be in the smallest font you use. So if your main text is say 12 pixels ... make the links out to the parental controls to like 10 or 8 pixel.

When you name your page (title) - use 4-5 descriptive words and then a | mark and then your url


Example: Hardcore Twink Movies | Mydomain.com

Your meta tag description and keywords should change for every page - utilize those words that actually APPEAR on the page itself. If you only use 4 good keywords - then use 4-5 in the meta tag - you're penalized for keywords that aren't relevant to the page/site.

[chadknowslaw]

Listen to Bec. That's my advice.

I agree 100%.

One thing I noticed at first glance was that your 2257 link does not use the statutory language--it must read

"18 USC 2257 Record Keeping Requirements Compliance Statement"

You cannot use just any langauge, those are the words required.

It is just a minor detail, but it does need to be changed.

[Dzinerbear]

And at the very least, I would put a text link under the graphic: Enter our gay porn theatre, or something like that, and link it to your new index page. That'll help the search engines.

Michael