Just make sure all redesigned pages have the same name/url.

You can change meta tags, sometimes you lose, sometimes you win.

Lastly, if a portion of a keyword phrase that is used in the title tag is used more than once (ie. napkin band, napkin ring) is this something that is looked down upon? I read an article that stressed keywords should NOT be duplicated because it would indicate SPAM to the SE? Is this an example of that? Please advise.

Big G results often show several top ten pages with titles designed this way, but it leaves you succeptable to a drop if they ever tweak the algorithm to punish repetitive titles. It also may be that the repetitiveness is'nt what helps them to top ten but other factors so that it is no benefit at all only risk.

I avoid repeating words in title tags, but that doesn't mean I never do it.

But - if you are doing a redesign - I dislike these 'lists of terms' in the title tags that you see so often.
I often get good click through from SERPs with lower positions because, I believe, my titles are in sentences.
I think one of Brett's 101-articles also mentioned that the SEs were (or would be) parsing title strings for English in preference to junk lists of words.

"Just make sure all redesigned pages have the same name/url.

You can change meta tags, sometimes you lose, sometimes you win."

So switching from standard directory structure URLS to a dynamic site can cause a problem then?

Any way to avoid? Url rewrites, etc.?

So switching from standard directory structure URLS to a dynamic site can cause a problem then?

Dynamic pages can be awkaward for SE spiders to find. BUT if you create a sitemap, then Google will spider the dynamic URLs. Check the Google guidelines for webmasters.

Matt

Just my point of view,
If your websites doing well in the serps. LEAVE IT ALONE.

With Google hitting sites you've got to be very very VERY sure that your changes won't kill off your site.

Unless you can take several months of not being ranked, or have the money to pay your way out through Adwords. Then leave it.

I'd be tempted to set up another site/business. Using totally different setup so as to avoid duplicate issues. Take a few products new images etc and see how it goes.

I only say this as since we changed url in May this year we have made less than our worst month of 2005 2004 or 2003.

Or
Yeh go ahead.
It could work.

I went and had to update my product DB and i used to get some traffic as a new site with my old DB. Now i am back to trickle traffic until the SE's pick it up again. I was going nuts, i never knew that i would lose the small traffic i had built up by changing my DB....

-Karim0028