Search Engine Optimization or SEO is the process of improving the visibility of your website in major search engine's results. Most of us would like to be able to do this without having to pay a lot of money or any money, perhaps. However, I should be clear that many of the major search engines will list your website at the top of their list if you pay for it. The idea is to get your site to appear in the first page of a search engine’s results organically by implementing the techniques of SEO. Optimizing a website may involve editing its content to increase its relevancy with specific keywords. Many companies pay Web-Marketers to do this, however, you can do it yourself if you’re diligent and you devote some time to putting into use the techniques I am about to share with you.
Let’s start with some basics. When you put key words into a search engine you get several results, with the most relevant sites listed first. We do this every day. The relevancy of a web site is determined by algorithms involving the location and frequency of keywords within a web page. Web pages with search terms appearing in the title are assumed to be more relevant than others to the topic. Search engines also determine relevancy by the content within the first few sentences of your page. Search engines assume that the tagline or title of your site is relevant to your site’s content, therefore using that information as the keyword or key phrases to determine where your site will fall in the search results. So make sure that the title or tag line, or at the very least, the first few sentences of your page include the keywords that are most relevant to the content of your site.
Frequency is another factor in how search engines determine the relevancy of your site. A search engine analyzes how often the keywords appear in relation to other words in your page. Those with a higher frequency of use in a site are often deemed more relevant than other web sites. But be careful of word-stuffing. Some Web-Marketers try to fool a search engine’s indexing program by doing this. Word stuffing or Keyword stuffing is when you put keywords or phrases over and over within your website dozens of times to ensure that your site will appear at or near the top of the list of a search engine’s results. Sometimes they will even go so far as to imbed these keywords in white text on a white background which is invisible to the human eye, but are in fact visible to a search engine. This is also called spamdexing and it just may work against you. Search engines are wise to this technique. Therefore, they may automatically give your site a lower ranking in their search results if it appears that your site is guilty of spamdexing. I suggest using a more ethical way of getting a higher ranking in a search engine’s results, such as inserting appropriate keywords in the page’s meta tags. Meta tags are HTML codes that are inserted into the header on a web page after the title. This is the sentence or two that show in the results directly under the title or tagline in the search engine’s results.
Backlinks are another tool for optimizing traffic to your website. A backlink is a link attached to a key word or words on other websites or within your own site that will link a user back to your site or a specific page within your site. The keyword or key phrase that you are trying to optimize for should be either the same as your website’s title or tag, or relevant to the content of your site. When a search engine calculates the relevancy of a website to a keyword, they consider the number of inbound links to that site. But it’s not enough to merely get inbound links; it is the quality of that inbound link that affects your SEO. A search engine considers the content of the site to determine the quality of that inbound link. When inbound links to your site come from other sites that have content directly related to the content of your site, these inbound links are considered to be more relevant, which in turn improves your site's optimization within a search.
It’s partly common sense. Think about the way you use a search engine. If you are looking for a type of business rather than a particular website you may often narrow your search to a specific location. Secondary keywords are yet another building block and especially helpful when your website is part of a competitive market. Let’s use tanning salons as an example. When everyone else is optimizing for the most popular keywords, such as “tanning salon” you can use secondary keywords to boost your site’s location in a search engine’s results. Instead of using “tanning salon,” as your secondary key words, you might try “tanning salons in Northern California.” This may get fewer hits but considerably better traffic and due to the competitive nature of this particular subject matter, it may also move you up in the search results. Secondary keywords are can also be useful when the name of your site has little to no relevance to the content of the site. This is not recommended in Search Engine Marketing, but it happens. Again, let’s use tanning salons as our example; your website is promoting your tanning salon business in Northern California, but the name of your company, which is also the title or tagline, is Beautifully Bronze. Because you want your website to pop up in the first page of a search engine’s results you will want to utilize your secondary keywords in such a scenario.
These are some simple tips of Search Engine Optimization for the “do it yourselfer” or small business owner on a tight marketing budget. While Web-Marketers are the experts in their field it is absolutely possible to do it yourself if you understand how search engines work and have the time to devote to implementing these techniques.
Let’s start with some basics. When you put key words into a search engine you get several results, with the most relevant sites listed first. We do this every day. The relevancy of a web site is determined by algorithms involving the location and frequency of keywords within a web page. Web pages with search terms appearing in the title are assumed to be more relevant than others to the topic. Search engines also determine relevancy by the content within the first few sentences of your page. Search engines assume that the tagline or title of your site is relevant to your site’s content, therefore using that information as the keyword or key phrases to determine where your site will fall in the search results. So make sure that the title or tag line, or at the very least, the first few sentences of your page include the keywords that are most relevant to the content of your site.
Frequency is another factor in how search engines determine the relevancy of your site. A search engine analyzes how often the keywords appear in relation to other words in your page. Those with a higher frequency of use in a site are often deemed more relevant than other web sites. But be careful of word-stuffing. Some Web-Marketers try to fool a search engine’s indexing program by doing this. Word stuffing or Keyword stuffing is when you put keywords or phrases over and over within your website dozens of times to ensure that your site will appear at or near the top of the list of a search engine’s results. Sometimes they will even go so far as to imbed these keywords in white text on a white background which is invisible to the human eye, but are in fact visible to a search engine. This is also called spamdexing and it just may work against you. Search engines are wise to this technique. Therefore, they may automatically give your site a lower ranking in their search results if it appears that your site is guilty of spamdexing. I suggest using a more ethical way of getting a higher ranking in a search engine’s results, such as inserting appropriate keywords in the page’s meta tags. Meta tags are HTML codes that are inserted into the header on a web page after the title. This is the sentence or two that show in the results directly under the title or tagline in the search engine’s results.
Backlinks are another tool for optimizing traffic to your website. A backlink is a link attached to a key word or words on other websites or within your own site that will link a user back to your site or a specific page within your site. The keyword or key phrase that you are trying to optimize for should be either the same as your website’s title or tag, or relevant to the content of your site. When a search engine calculates the relevancy of a website to a keyword, they consider the number of inbound links to that site. But it’s not enough to merely get inbound links; it is the quality of that inbound link that affects your SEO. A search engine considers the content of the site to determine the quality of that inbound link. When inbound links to your site come from other sites that have content directly related to the content of your site, these inbound links are considered to be more relevant, which in turn improves your site's optimization within a search.
It’s partly common sense. Think about the way you use a search engine. If you are looking for a type of business rather than a particular website you may often narrow your search to a specific location. Secondary keywords are yet another building block and especially helpful when your website is part of a competitive market. Let’s use tanning salons as an example. When everyone else is optimizing for the most popular keywords, such as “tanning salon” you can use secondary keywords to boost your site’s location in a search engine’s results. Instead of using “tanning salon,” as your secondary key words, you might try “tanning salons in Northern California.” This may get fewer hits but considerably better traffic and due to the competitive nature of this particular subject matter, it may also move you up in the search results. Secondary keywords are can also be useful when the name of your site has little to no relevance to the content of the site. This is not recommended in Search Engine Marketing, but it happens. Again, let’s use tanning salons as our example; your website is promoting your tanning salon business in Northern California, but the name of your company, which is also the title or tagline, is Beautifully Bronze. Because you want your website to pop up in the first page of a search engine’s results you will want to utilize your secondary keywords in such a scenario.
These are some simple tips of Search Engine Optimization for the “do it yourselfer” or small business owner on a tight marketing budget. While Web-Marketers are the experts in their field it is absolutely possible to do it yourself if you understand how search engines work and have the time to devote to implementing these techniques.