pdf and google

[kapara]

hi

i build a site with a lot of articles in pdf.

the articles are full of very important and informative information.
the author insists on using pdf.

how do i tell google about the pdf's and about their content?

someone advised me to put the pdf in an iframe within an html page, and add a div of 1 pixel with the text (or at least extract of the page? or even only keywords?)
this means there will be links to html pages that include most of the data, and the surfer will see pdf.

can it work?

does google allow it?

is there a better or simpler way?

thanks

[Webnauts]

Upon creation of the PDF files you should add their title, description and keywords.

[Dubbya]

WebNauts is correct (what else is new?)

Here's a great article on the how to SEO Your PDF's

.02

[kapara]

Originally Posted by Webnauts

Upon creation of the PDF files you should add their title, description and keywords.

2 things:
first, thank you for your reply.

second, how do i do that?

when transforming word document to pdf (using acrobat or 995), it doesnt have this option (or i just dont see it)

thanks again

lenny

[pchauhan]

Hi all

Nice topic to discuss

i found a great article i think it will help you to optimize your PDF files

Optimize PDF Files - tips on pdf optimization to compress file size & optimizing pdf files - Acrobat 8 review

[incrediblehelp]

PubCon had a session on this:

Alternative Discovery and SEO - Feeds, PDF's, and Blog SEO

[fathom]

Originally Posted by kapara

2 things:
first, thank you for your reply.

second, how do i do that?

when transforming word document to pdf (using acrobat or 995), it doesnt have this option (or i just dont see it)

thanks again

lenny

In Word select from File > Properties > and fill in Title, Subject, Author, etc. and save... then generate the PDF.

Google actually converts is cache version to a html version so the only thing you need to do is link to the pdf naturally from the website nav bars or on inline text.

[pablowerk]

When I get a new pdf to put on our website, I always open it up, select some text, copy it, and paste it into notepad. If I can read the text in notepad.... Google can read the content directly from the pdf.

I've never had any trouble getting Google to index our English and German pdf's. Still haven't figured out how to create pdf's in Russian to be able to be read by Google though.

[jcisar]

In my opinion, Webnauts and Fathom have it down.
Create descriptive metadata inside the document using what I'm assuming to be Acrobat Professional. Acrobat has a form field for this. Link to this document with descriptive text and keep it relevant because Google assigns whatever linking text you are using to that PDF document.

[Clarrie]

Originally Posted by kapara

hi

i build a site with a lot of articles in pdf.

the articles are full of very important and informative information.
the author insists on using pdf.

how do i tell google about the pdf's and about their content?

someone advised me to put the pdf in an iframe within an html page, and add a div of 1 pixel with the text (or at least extract of the page? or even only keywords?)
this means there will be links to html pages that include most of the data, and the surfer will see pdf.

can it work?

does google allow it?

is there a better or simpler way?

thanks

Interesting thread. We also work with a client with a similar problem (in their case legal documents). We never really tried to optimise the PDFs because it didn't seem that Google ranked them as highly as HTML.

Our solution was to create html pages containing an abstract with the core information, and a link to the full pdf document. This was also to make it easier for site users as well as the search engines.

As these abstract pages are quite specific in content, they do seem to rank well for the relevant terms, but the more comprehensive PDFs were rarely found (except in MSN).

However, we have noticed a trend recently in Google for the PDFs to rank much higher, sometimes above the abstracts, so I suspect (not verified) that Google have relatively recently changed how they treat and rank PDFs, which for us makes the optimisation of PDFs more important.

[spiderbait]

I would strongly suggest that you ensure all of your PDFs have at least one obvious clickable link to bring visitors to the site's homepage.

Since Google will index your PDFs naturally, it's likely that people may land on the PDFs from the SERPS and you want them to be able to find their way to your homepage.

[mtuba4u]

Welll there are two seperate issues that need to be addressed

the first is the actual PDF document needs to be created using the correct software, which allows you to add all the same things that you wouild add to a HTML page.

Title
decription
key words
author
publisher
accreditations
source
coverage
rights

you will also need to include all other special meta tag tricks that you may use in the original PDF file using any trade secrets which you may have.... there are a few that help....

The second thing is that you do need to create an HTM document with a good well balanced abstract of the document much like a synopsis or review.

This HTML page needs to have a very similar if not identical set of meta tags as the original PDF document and link to it. the next step is to ensure that other pages on you site also refer to the original PDF document and the html page with the abstract.

Frontpage uses catagories, and placing the page concerned in a catagory and having a page that lists catagories is also helpful.

I am not sure how you may do this in a new PHP or ASP site, but I am sure the experts in these fields will give advise.

You do need to do both options above, and your key word research is critical. you will need to spend time with the author and get to understand the target market of the document concerned, as this will dictate the key words and key word phrases that your expected viewers will use to locate the document in question.

Only once your keyword reseach has been done will you have the words that should be used to create your page titles and page descriptions for both the HTML abstract and the original HTML document.

This may seem time consuming, but the results will speak for them selves.

Often discussing key words with the original content supplier or the Author of the document concerned brings conflict and misunderstanding between the SEO team and the Author. How best to solve this is the real issue, as if you do not have a good working relationship with the autor, discovering the target market and key words selection process can be rather cumbersome and you will miss out on the small important issues.

hope this helps.

mtuba4u

[Clint1]

Originally Posted by spiderbait

I would strongly suggest that you ensure all of your PDFs have at least one obvious clickable link to bring visitors to the site's homepage.

That's a good idea and what I do.

Since Google will index your PDFs naturally, it's likely that people may land on the PDFs from the SERPS and you want them to be able to find their way to your homepage.

G won't index the PDF's unless other site owners have the need to link to them.

kapara, there's a free tool and I think it's called "PDF Info" or "PDF Info changer" that will change the title, description and keywords of any existing PDF file, and it really works. I also have an old version of Acrobat that allows you to add clickable links to any PDF file. Doing these things will "help" them get indexed but don't expect it in G unless others link to them (or maybe if you link to them all from your homepage if it's a high PR). Of course the other SE's will index them with no problem.

As for "telling google" about them, just submit the URL's to G.

[mattk@nexsens.com]

Putting a link to your website is especially essential if you think anyone would download the PDF and place it on their website... Are their any automated programs that will go through a list of PDF documents and add the title and description to them? We have a /pdf/ folder with hundreds of documents, and going through a few random ones noticed that they have all blank properties content.

IE: http://www.fondriest.com/pdf/nexsens_isic_spec.pdf

Our graphical artist who made the files left them as the indesign file name.

[WDC]

Originally Posted by kapara

hi

i build a site with a lot of articles in pdf.

the articles are full of very important and informative information.
the author insists on using pdf.

how do i tell google about the pdf's and about their content?

someone advised me to put the pdf in an iframe within an html page, and add a div of 1 pixel with the text (or at least extract of the page? or even only keywords?)
this means there will be links to html pages that include most of the data, and the surfer will see pdf.

can it work?

does google allow it?

is there a better or simpler way?

thanks

May be this post is of soem help to you

Search Engine Optimisation - SEO Company Services - SEO Expert: Search Engine optimisation of PDF files