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Posted by: mdsource Jun 24 2009, 05:51 PM

I have been noticing that many sites, are using Tabbed Content. Most recently I have seen them being used for the various attributes people are now able to apply to their product detail pages.

I like the look and the many options it opens up for us to add content on our pages without making the person viewing the page scroll down to infinity...!

My question is about how these pages are seen and indexed by search engines. If I were to take the exact content on each product page and break it up within tabs on our pages would that have any effect on our rankings?

For example, we list on many of our products the description for each item, the features, any technical info about it etc. Currently all of this is listed in one column that continues as far down the web page as is required. Below that is the related products images/link. I want to divide each separate subject about the product;description, features, specs, into different tabs.

We currently rank highly for many of our products and I wouldn't want to risk that if by tabbing the content we would lose our placement.

Has anyone had any experience with before and after results?

Thanks

AJB

Posted by: christianbooksbibles Jun 25 2009, 01:33 PM

I just did this, but I really don't think it will hurt SEO rankings. (see an example http://www.christianbooksbibles.com/theliferecoverybiblenltpersonaimitationleather9781414324838.aspx

The long description still is there, it is just some extra code that pulls up different ns script. So it shouldn't make any difference.

Now, I don't think if it helps, but I definitely don't think it hurts.

Posted by: mdsource Jun 25 2009, 08:31 PM

Thanks CBB,

I went to your page and checked the page source. Everything within each tab is listed in the source code. I was concerned that the content would be pulled from a separate file only when each tab was selected.

That helps a lot!

Posted by: cnmor Jun 26 2009, 04:20 PM

An easy way of seeing what a SE sees is to hit CTRL ALT C on the page in your browser and then paste (CTRL ALT V) into any text editor (notepad). I did it with CBB page and it shows the info from all his tabs.

Thanks for asking the question. I might consider trying tabs someday.

Posted by: Nuriel Jun 30 2009, 03:17 PM

christianbooksbibles,

I like your tabs, the only thing I would question is if the related items shhould be hidden in a tab? I like the amazon approach:

Customers who bought this also bought;

just my 2 cents

Nuriel

Posted by: beckyg75 Jul 1 2009, 11:30 AM

christianbooksbibles--

agreed, love the tabbed content, and i don't think it will affect your seo for reasons stated above.

my only comment would be for the user--the 'tabs' appear disjointed from the actual content, so the user may think they are going off to a different page when clicking the button to see new content. a minor issue, but the presence of tabs indicates to a user that they aren't going anywhere--which is why they're used so much to keep content manageable.

i also prefer related products visible, as it is a visual enticement to increase average order value. putting a click between the user and those 'optional' products may not be a good idea, as they are there to entice the user to spend more.

Posted by: christianbooksbibles Jul 1 2009, 12:05 PM

Thanks for the input Becky. I completely get what you are saying about how they look like links to another page, as well as the related products in the same column, but there are so many issues with the actual backend stuff it takes to create them in bulk, that we don't even use it except on a limited basis...

HOWEVER,

Consider this a feature request....for us to be able to style how to related products are displayed. For example, if for the <ns> function for displaying the related products had some javascript vertical slider stying, it would be able to customize that entire section based on which product template it had associated with it...anyways

What would you suggest to make them feel like they were tabs rather than links to another page? One thing that I was thinking, is that you could make the top links a part of that same background color as the contents, and still make it stand out, it would be perfect). Or just create an image that appears telling users to click for more information.

Any help with css is appreciated as I am not gifted in that area.

Posted by: mdsource Jul 8 2009, 08:53 PM

Posted by: smckenzie Jul 10 2009, 01:54 PM

we've just setup tabs using the dreamweaver spry widgets - an example can be seen http://www.thesunglassmanonline.com/gatorz-sunglasses/magnum.aspx