This blog entry specifically written for merchants who use osCommerce SEO links with their e-shops. In many cases someone does the integration work of the SEO-G module for osCommerce without following up with support. Neither he provides extensions or upgrades for the module.
If you are using SEO-G and you are in a need of support please use the contact us form. We will be happy to assist you by either deploying one of the recent SEO-G version or upgrade your current one to the latest fully featured SEO component. In addition we provide long term support as SEO-G is one of the modules we created from scratch.
The original versions of SEO-G were designed by Asymmetric Software for two main reasons.
- To promote the merchant online store with search engines
- To promote the osCommerce package as a whole for online stores.
Many online stores we analyzed who do deployed the earlier versions of SEO-G use the stock osCommerce code for the content. This includes the information pages. We have specific extensions that target the general content page and can better expose links and meta-tags to search engines.
It is very easy to identify the SEO-G by locating the root.php file on the catalog folder of an e-shop. All versions old and recent include a root file that is responsible for decoding incoming SEO URLs into the original osCommerce scripts and parameters.
The typical SEO-G link is
http://example.com/product.html
Plain and simple with no identifiers or other strange characters appended to the products, categories and manufacturers URLs in a site. In addition in the back-end administration there is a section for SEO-G that shows the scripts associated with the module, includes configuration controls and link editing and URL restructuring.
In contrast the stock osCommerce links can be seen by the osCommerce demo strore here:
http://demo.oscommerce.com
The conversion from the PHP based links into continuous and meaningful names is a task an SEO module is responsible of. With SEO-G the system is architected so normal links show 100% static content and at the same time are totally transparent to search engines.
Typically an SEO component binds into the .htaccess file routing the traffic to the main web application indirectly. The indirect mechanism varies among different SEO components. SEO-G uses the .htaccess to route links of pre-configured extension into the root.php file. This in turn scans the database for the original osCommerce parameters that constitute the SEO URL. If the incoming link can be decoded, the system patches the PHP global arrays to use the osCommerce parameters thus preparing the common script variables to keep the site functional.
Other SEO components drive the traffic directly into independent osCommerce scripts like product_info.php and index.php using identifiers as part of the URLs to assist decoding. We decided against this practice as extending the link length detriments the link importance because it adds irrelevant identifiers to the URL.
The stock osCommerce SEO uses a basic translation to convert just the PHP separators into a continues folder like URL. It does not convert the stock parameters in anyway, thus does not improve exposure of the site's content.
Today hundreds of stores utilize SEO-G addon with osCommerce. The experience we have for a totally new store deploying a combination of SEO-G and META-G is that just weeks later merchants start receiving orders. When they place some effort with adding and improving the overall content their enterprises flourish.
SEO-G is also designed for personal sites or sites where a business exposure needed and just generic information pages are used. The simplified osCommerce package is available by us and called the I-Metrics CMS. The I-Metrics layer is the e-commerce version that includes the SEO-G and META-G components.
The Asymmetric Software site also used the SEO-G and META-G versions along with the original MS2.2 osCommerce engine. The I-Metrics layer is deployed at the top of the standard osCommerce simplifying the use of the stock components and enhances the SEO aspects of our online store. |
