Search Engine Optimization (SEO), part two

Ways to Get Good Rankings...

As I mentioned, the folks who program the search engines are looking to award the best rankings for the best content. This gives them happy customers. They develop (and re-develop) ways to rate content.

Here we go...

1. Content

Create pages with lots of content. Search engines give higher ranking to pages with a great deal of text.

Give each page a unique keyword and key phrase optimization focus.

Add new content often.

Content in bulleted and numbered lists, with underlined or highlighted font or in headings is considered important by search engines. (And should be used often rich with keywords and key phrases.)

Study the content on sites that rank highly in searches for the keywords and key phrases you are interested in using.

First and foremost, write for your site visitors and potential customers not the search engines.

2. Keywords and key phrases

Search engines look at the frequency and placement of words on individual Web pages to rank their relevance. The more often a word is used, the more significance it is given for that page.

(So, if you use the word “pomegranate” often on a Web page the search engines will increase that page’s ranking for searches having to do with pomegranates.)

Keyword and key phrase value decreases the further down the page it appears.

Be realistic about your choice of keywords and key phrases.

Page titles and descriptions in the page’s Meta tags should contain your keywords and key phrases.

Put keywords and key phrases in the words you use for your links.

URLs should contain keywords and key phrases. For instance, a page with an article on basket weaving could have the address www.aspetuckmedia.com/basket_weaving.htm.

3. Titles and Meta tags

Each page should have its own title and description Meta tags with keywords and key phrases relevant to that specific page.

4. Links

The more links that lead to your site the better you will rank.

Being linked to by sites that rank well in the search engines for a particular keyword or key phrase will increase your ranking for that same keyword or key phrase. So, do a search for keywords/key phrases you are interested in using and try to get a link to your site from the top results.

You ideally want links from other sites to all the pages on your site, not just the home page.

5. Other helpful tips for optimizing your site for search engines

The longer your site has been in existence the better you will rank. Similarly, your ranking will improve when you are linked to by sites that have been around for a long time.

Search engines are looking for text. Having a Flash show on your home page will keep spiders out. Having a graphics-rich site (including pages that include much of the content in the graphics) will keep it from being well-ranked.

Site IDs and cookies are bad for page rankings. They keep the pages from having a consistent Web address to index.

Similarly, DHTML (Dynamic html that uses a database to pull up content) often use characters that spiders have a hard time reading and indexing.

Get Clicked.

You want people to want to click on your link when it comes up in a search.

When the results come up in searches there is a brief description just below the name of the Web site or Web page. The search engines generate that text from a combination of the words in the description Meta tag and the content at the very top of the page.

When people search the Internet they are looking for content they can trust. The way your information first comes up in a search can influence if they give you a shot or not.

So, know what your potential customers are looking for and give it to them (and then some) from the very first moment your site comes up in a search.

There are no guarantees with SEO. But there are constructive things you can do to get indexed and decent rankings. Be smart and be realistic and - first and foremost - write for your potential customers. ... Construct a Web site that works for you!

Go to Search Engine Optimization (SEO), Part One: An Overview

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