MonsterCommerce’s SEO Catalog
Years ago ASP carts were notorious for having long garbled URLs and bloated code. Both no-no’s when it comes to SEO (Search Engine Optimization). Some for the more forward thinking shopping cart solutions added a mod_rewrite to their product that translated the ASP garbled URLs and code into clean easy to read html. The result was unmistakable. The stores using these solutions rankings improved once the product pages were re-indexed by the major search engines.
MonsterCommerce took a different approach. They allowed their clients the ability to generate a separate copy of their product catalog in html. MonsterCommerce called the feature the SEO catalog. The only problem is that the SEO catalog doesn’t rewrite/convert the asp page into html; rather it makes a copy of them in html. This is a dangerous thing to do in terms of SEO as the search engines frown upon duplicate content. A few merchants reported in our forum that they were penalized for using SEO catalog when some of their pages started to be deemed supplemental by Google. Not good.
In terms of SEO, MonsterCommerce can’t compare to Volusion, 3dCart or the other solutions that utilize a mod_rewrite. I have experience with all three solutions and can compare apples to apples. MonsterCommerce might be a great solution to learn the ropes of e-commerce but until they offer a REAL SEO solution, it will fall further and further behind Volusion and 3DCart with each passing day.
So be wary of shopping cart solutions that promise great SEO results out of the box. Do your homework and find out if these claims can be substantiated.
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I am a costumer of MonsterCommerce and I was reading about SEO Catalog. Still is not clear for me is this is good or bad for my site. I have the free monthly service anable.
I was wondering how can I know if this hurts or helps my site. This is a new site and I have no to much experience with this.
The site is my site: www.galpicos.com
I would appreciate if somebody could give me a answer in plane English how to find out if this service is the right choice or not.
Thank you so much
Manuel
MonsterCommerce clients have posted horror stories about it in our forums.
I've used it in the past and was happy when it was first released. Finally a tool to make my MonsterCommerce store more SE friendly! But the luster wore off quickly – much like Monster's entire solution.
Now I use a mod_rewrite to make my ASP urls search engine friendly. Both 3dCart and Volusion offer this feature. A merchant would be much better served going this route rather than the MC SEO Catalog. Why risk the duplicate content issues and supplemental indexing that could follow? It's a no brainer. MonsterCommerce clients have posted horror stories about in our forums.
I've used it in the past and was happy when it was first release. Finally a tool to make my MonsterCommerce store more SE friendly! But the luster wore off quickly - like Monster's entire solution.
Now I use a mod_rewrite to make my ASP urls search engine friendly. Both 3dCart and Volusion offer this feature. A merchant would be much better served going this route rather than the MC SEO Catalog. Why risk the duplicate content issues and supplemental indexing that could follow? It's a no brainer.
It works for some people, and it doesn't work for others. That said, I wouldn't touch it with a 12-foot pole.