Friday, September 14, 2012<\/p>\n
\n Government sites, from city to state to federal agencies, are extremely important to Google \n That’s why I’ve spoken at the \n \n Most locations in Google Maps have a Google+ Local listing—businesses, offices, parks, \n If you work for a government agency and want to claim a listing, we recommend using a shared \n \n If you run into any issues, use the \n \n What if you’re moving just part of the site? This question came up too—for example, a city \n In that case, many of the same steps apply: verify both sites in Webmaster Tools, use \n \n Google’s generation of page titles and descriptions (or “snippets”) is completely automated and \n Question 5: How do I get into the YouTube government partner program?<\/b> \n Did I say I had even better news? YouTube has added a lot of functionality useful for governments \n I hope this FAQ has been helpful, but I’m sure I haven’t covered everything government webmasters
\n Search. For one thing, governments have a lot of content—and government websites are often
\n the canonical source of information that’s important to citizens. Around
\n 20 percent<\/a>
\n of Google searches are for local information, and local governments are experts in their
\n communities.\n<\/p>\n
\n National Association of Government Webmasters<\/a>
\n (NAGW) national conference for the past few years. It’s always interesting speaking to webmasters
\n about search, but the people running government websites have particular concerns and questions.
\n Since some questions come up frequently I thought I’d share this FAQ for government websites.\n<\/p>\n
\n Question 1: How do I fix an incorrect phone number or address in search results or Google Maps?
\n <\/b>
\n Although managing their agency’s site is plenty of work, government webmasters are often called
\n upon to fix problems found elsewhere on the web too. By far the most common question I’ve taken is
\n about fixing addresses and phone numbers in search results. In this case, government site owners
\n really can do it themselves, by
\n claiming their Google+ Local listing<\/a>.
\n Incorrect or missing phone numbers, addresses, and other information can be fixed by claiming the
\n listing.\n<\/p>\n
\n landmarks, etc. I like to use the
\n San Francisco Main Library<\/a>
\n as an example: it has contact info, detailed information like the hours they’re open, user reviews
\n and fun extras like photos. When we think users are searching for libraries in San Francisco, we
\n may display a map and a listing so they can find the library as quickly as possible.\n<\/p>\n
\n Google Account with an email address at your .gov domain if possible. Usually, ownership of the
\n page is confirmed via a phone call or post card.\n<\/p>\n
\n Question 2: I’ve claimed the listing for our office, but I have 43 different city parks to claim
\n in Google Maps, and none of them have phones or mailboxes. How do I claim them?
\n <\/b>
\n Use the bulk uploader! If you have 10 or more listings \/ addresses to claim at the same time, you
\n can upload a
\n specially-formatted spreadsheet<\/a>.
\n Go to
\n www.google.com\/places\/<\/a>,
\n click the “Get started now” button, and then look for the “bulk upload” link.\n<\/p>\n
\n Verification Troubleshooter<\/a>.\n<\/p>\n
\n Question 3: We’re moving from a .gov domain to a new .com domain. How should we move the site?
\n <\/b>
\n We have a
\n Help Center article<\/a>
\n with more details, but the basic process involves the following steps:\n<\/p>\n\n
301<\/code> redirect<\/a> on
\n all pages to tell search engines your site has moved permanently.\n <\/li>\n\n
\n experience.\n <\/li>\n
\n redirect to a new page with similar content.\n <\/li>\n
\n cross-domain canonical links<\/a>.\n <\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
\n Fetch as Google<\/a>
\n feature in Webmaster Tools.\n <\/li>\n
\n Change of Address<\/a>
\n tool in Webmaster Tools to notify Google of your site’s move.\n <\/li>\n
\n Links to Your Site<\/a>
\n in Webmaster Tools and inform the important sites that link to your content about your new location.\n <\/li>\n
\n URL structure, or navigational updates.\n <\/li>\n
\n new site, and submit a Sitemap listing the URLs on your new site.\n <\/li>\n
\n in place for as long as possible—at least 180 days.\n <\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
\n might move its “Tourism and Visitor Info” section to its own domain.\n<\/p>\n
\n 301<\/code> redirects, clean up old links, etc. In this case you don’t need to use the
\n Change of Address form in Webmaster Tools since only part of your site is moving. If for some
\n reason you’ll have some of the same content on both sites, you may want to include a
\n cross-domain canonical link<\/a>
\n pointing to the preferred domain.\n<\/p>\n
\n Question 4: We’ve done a ton of work to create unique titles and descriptions for pages.
\n How do we get Google to pick them up?
\n <\/b>
\n First off, that’s great!
\n Better titles and descriptions<\/a>
\n help users decide to click through to get the information they need on your page. The government
\n webmasters I’ve spoken with care a lot about the content and organization of their sites, and work
\n hard to provide informative text for users.\n<\/p>\n
\n takes into account both the content of a page as well as references to it that appear on the web.
\n Changes are picked up as we recrawl your site. But you can do two things to let us know about
\n URLs that have changed:\n<\/p>\n\n
\n so we know about all of the pages on your site.\n <\/li>\n
\n choose to
\n submit it to the index<\/a>.\n <\/li>\n\n
\n section of your site, you might want to submit the main page or an index page for that section
\n to let us know about a broad collection of URLs.\n <\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/ul>\n
\n For this question, I have bad news, good news, and then even better news. On the one hand, the
\n government partner program has been discontinued. But don’t worry, because most of the features
\n of the program are now available to your regular YouTube account. For example, you can now
\n upload videos longer than 10 minutes<\/a>.\n<\/p>\n
\n in the past year:\n<\/p>\n\n
\n broadcast live streaming video<\/a>
\n to YouTube via Hangouts On Air (requires a Google+ account).\n <\/li>\n
\n link your YouTube account with your Webmaster Tools account<\/a>,
\n making it the “official channel” for your site.\n <\/li>\n
\n get better and better<\/a>,
\n supporting
\n more languages<\/a>.\n <\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
\n want to know. I highly recommend our
\n Webmaster Academy<\/a>,
\n where you can learn all about making your site search-engine friendly. If you have a specific
\n question, please you can add a question in the comments or visit our really helpful
\n Webmaster Central Forum<\/a>.\n<\/p>\n