Search Engine Optimation

By: Ben Norman

If you are trying to get your online business the attention it needs, you already know that search engine optimization is a lot more difficult than it looks! Using a search engine to get business to your site has been around as long as search engines have, but the methods for getting your site the relevant traffic it needs are getting more complex. Take a look at some search engine optimization advice and tips that might be able to help you get your web traffic where you need.

1. Be mindful of your keywords.

Keywords are what your prospective customers use to find your site. Think about someone who is looking for your services without being aware that your company exists. How are they searching, and what terms are they using?

2. Keep it relevant.

Search engines look for more than just keywords. They will also look for words that are related to the keywords in question, and they will look at the context that the keywords are used in. Resist the current trend of "stuffing" your website with keywords; search engines are sophisticated enough to discover instances of inflated content and your site rankings will suffer for it!

3. Be useful!

One of the best ways to get people to your site is to offer something useful and free. Industry-specific glossaries and things like mortgage or plan calculators fall under this topic. The more useful gadgets and resources that you put on your site the better.

4. Work with link building.

When a site links to you without you providing a reciprocal link, you can be said to be link building. Link building, aside from bringing you traffic in its own right, is one of the factors that search engines use to rank your site in its natural searches.

5. Establish yourself as an expert.

Chances are, you are already an expert in your specific field. Let everyone know this by spreading your know-how and putting your information up around the web in article and forums. These will give you excellent links back to your site. It is important to make a name for yourself in more ways than one, and establishing yourself as an expert in your field will go a long way towards getting you attention via more viral methods as well as through links.

6. Code well

Did you know that clumsy or awkward coding could cost you in terms of getting good search engine hits. make sure that your website validates through the W3C. This way you will be sure that the search engines wont have any problems crawling it.

7. Get a professional.

Search engine optimization is something that brings together a lot of factors that need to be balanced, and sometimes, it is difficult to make sure that they blend well. There are many professionals that can help you improve your ranking on search engine sites like Google, and if your business is reliant on the customers that it attracts online, this is definitely a resource that you want to take advantage of!

By: Adriana IORDAN

For a successful Search Engine Optimization strategy, take into consideration that search engines look at content and also at the structure of the markup. They emphasize the importance of text content, page titles, keywords rich text, meta descriptions and information architecture. A website where quality of content and code prevails will rank higher in the major search engines.

There are many Search Engine Optimization tactics, but try to find the best combination and don't sacrifice the usability and performance of your website. Here is some basic information about improving your source code from an SEO perspective:

-- Avoid classical 404 error pages

The 404 - File Not Found - page is presented to the user by the server as an error page. The user gets this message directly from the server of the website he is trying to visit. This error page is supposed to appear only when the server cannot find the requested location and is unsure of its status.

In the vast majority of cases, the 404 error emerges for pages that were moved or even deleted or the layout of the site or page information changed.

Many hosting companies offer a 404 redirect page. This means that when a user enters the URL of any page of your domain, and that page does not exist or can no longer be found, you can automatically redirect the user to a specified page - usually your home page or your sitemap.

Pay special attention when you decide to delete certain pages. Remember to redirect them to a main page of your site using the 301 (Moved Permanently) HTTP response code.

You can greatly improve the user friendliness of your website by creating a custom 404 page.

- Present a message of apology for the inconvenience;
- Try to ease the user's way back to your site. Introduce error messages and include evident links to the home page, sitemap, and contact page;
- Offer assistance and encourage the user to continue to search for the information he needs on your site. You could even include a search box right on the error page;
- Keep the same design for the error page as for the rest of the website.

See: www.avangate.com/4040404404

But remember that the best strategy for a 404 error page is to prevent it from coming up altogether, as many customers might be left with the impression that the whole website does not exist and not just the specific page they were trying to access.

-- Keep away from orphan pages

An orphan page is a page that is not linked to another one an thus cannot be found by spiders. To avoid having orphan pages on your website, check regularly that all your pages are linked to each other.

Search engines consider sites with orphan pages to be unprofessional, and not worthy of getting a high rank. This kind of website is under construction or is the result of a poor design process. If your pages aren't linked properly search engines won't index them and will consider them irrelevant for the search.

Pay attention to the fact that some search engines don't index correctly websites that use HTML frames. When spiders crawl through your internal pages, they index each individual page and display them as orphan pages in search results. Most frame designs include a content frame and

a navigation frame.

Visitors require both frames to navigate through the site. Create a JavaScript to check if the page is loading correctly, and load the frameset. In this way, users won't be able to open pages outside the frame. This is a very easy way of losing clients.

-- Use 301 redirect pages

To avoid displaying a 404 error page, set up a 301 redirect page. The code 301 means "moved permanently" and it's the easiest way to preserve your search engine rankings for that page.

There are two ways of generating proper 301 redirect pages. If your site is hosted on a Linux or Unix server create a .htaccess file to add the redirect to your server's web root.

The .htaccess file contains specific instructions for certain requests, including security, redirection issues and how to handle certain errors. If it is hosted on a Windows or IIS server then the 301 redirect can be set up in the Administrator's section of the server software or through the DNS (Domain Name Server) zone.

Make a habit of reviewing the log files which contain data sent by your server. Search engine spiders often make critical decisions based on what your server tells them through the server's headers.

Pay attention, an improper 301 redirect can cause you big problems, since your website might fail and users won't be able to visit your pages. Setting up a correct "301 redirect" assures that you'll stay high in search rankings.

-- Create a sitemap

A sitemap is a web page that lists all the pages on your website. They are intended both for users - to find easier the information they need , and for search engines to index pages.

Your sitemap link should be right on your home page. In this way spiders are sent directly to the place where all your content information is gathered. Sitemaps can improve SEO, however, be advised that they only take into consideration a limited number of links to those pages.

To make sure that spiders check your whole site and have more chances to get indexed, it would be a good idea to use a sitemap generator. You can use ROR sitemaps that are readable by all search engines.

ROR is a sitemap tool that uses XML feeds to describe your website. ROR sitemaps allow search engines to match text search with structured information, thus obtaining more relevance for your site. This kind of sitemap helps search engines to better understand your website content - products, services, images, articles, etc. By creating a file with product names, descriptions, prices, images, availability, affiliate programs, and any other relevant information customers can find you easier.

-- Don't overuse dynamic pages

Dynamic web pages include dynamic content - images, text, etc - which changes without the page being reloaded. Client-side languages like JavaScript and ActiveX are usually used to create these types of web pages.

Search engines don't rank well dynamic pages with many parameters. If you choose not to turn your dynamic URLs into static ones, at least put the most important parameters in your URLs first and try to limit dynamic parameters to no more than two.

Spiders can't read the text rendered as graphics. Any text that you want the spiders to read and index should be written out as text. At the very least, put any text that appears in graphics into the images' ALT attribute.

A slightly better alternative is to write your text in Flash, but remember to have a "Skip this intro..." link that takes visitors (and spiders) to the text-rich content of your site. Don't neglect this

information if you want to optimize your search engine strategy.

-- Put .CSS and JavaScript into external files

For a search engine, improperly formatted code will have a negative impact on your rankings. Since search engines read only a certain amount of information on a web page, you should try to increase the text content to HTML tag ratio.

If you have too much HTML code, the text content won't be seen entirely. For reducing HTML code, utilize hand coding using external .css files and Javascript.

-- Make sure you have well formatted [X]HTML

Try to fix as many of the HTML errors as possible. Although the search engines don't rank better websites that have standard compliant code they tend to "read" them easier. Use the W3 HTML Validator to check the validity of your code.

For a successful Search Engine Optimization strategy, take into account all of the aspects presented here. It takes time, effort and patience to achieve a higher rank in the main search engines. The idea is to have a long term strategy that makes your website stay on top for an extended period of time.

By: Scott Lindsay

Search Engine Optimization (SEO) strategies can be likened to the janitorial staff of a large company. Why the janitorial staff? Well, no other individuals in the building are as well acquainted with every nook and cranny of the business as the janitorial staff.

Not only is the janitor acquainted with the business, he or she is also the keeper of the keys. These individuals hold in trust the means to access every portion of the business. They can lock or unlock every room in the building and they know more about the physical structure of the building than virtually anyone else on staff. Sometimes the best answers come from the janitorial staff.

SEO strategies provide a similar function for online business. SEO has the ability to unlock the doors and explore the possibilities of marketing via the most powerful and free marketing tool available – search engines. SEO is the key to all areas of website marketing, and when it comes to marketing there are a lot of doors to unlock.

When you do not work to maximize your marketing potential through SEO strategies it may be like the owners of a brick and mortar store deciding they don’t need janitorial services. It won’t be long before your business is cluttered up with overstock inventory, accumulated clutter and dust, which translates to very few customers. SEO eventually unlocks the doors to higher traffic counts and improves sales conversion rates.

Perhaps the analogy of a janitor may seem a little obscure, but I used it because just like janitors the potential in SEO is often overlooked and undervalued.

Both a janitor and SEO strategies are important to a company’s ability to perform well and manage the day-to-day functions of the business.

SEO is a long-term strategy that provides compound interest. Every month it has the potential of bringing more and more business to your website. It may start slowly, but if you maximize SEO strategies the result will be improved overall site performance and increased sales.

While many online businesses are utilizing alternative forms of advertising they are often lulled into believing this strategy will stand alone, but the truth is when you rely on Pay Per Click (PPC) advertising you are simply running a financial faucet. As soon as you turn off the faucet to conserve finances the traffic goes away.

The approach of SEO is more like an artesian well that has a steady and refreshing supply of fresh water that can be replied upon.

So let’s recap.

SEO is like…

A janitor – It provides keys that unlocks every area of your online business.
A bank – It supplies compound interest with greater site visitation and sales conversions.
An artesian well – It provides refreshing consistency when other forms of advertising cannot and will not.

Hopefully by taking a few abstract examples and making them applicable to SEO strategies you can capture and more fully appreciate the idea that this marketing strategy is not only good, but also good for you, your business, and your customers.

SEO may not be that difficult, but it certainly is not easy either. If you want to rank well in the search engines there are some rules that you need to adhere to. When it comes to ranking well in serps the common perception is that MSN is the easiest followed by Yahoo and then Google. The thought is that Google places too much value on older pages. That means that even if your website has a lot of relevant content it may not rank in the top ten for your main keyword.

All right, let’s get to the point. The first thing you need to work on is links. You need links and lots of them coming from sites that are relevant to the content on yours. For some search engines relevancy does not matter as much as others, but for Google is matters big time.

Now where are these links going to come from? That is the question. They can come from quality web directories, article directories or from other sites that relate to your niche. You gain the relevancy in directories by submitting to the most relevant category to your website. With directories you should be careful of any site that has more than 20 outgoing links listed per page, displays excessive ad-sense or banner ads. Plus some other more advanced items to look for in SEO enhancements, unique on-site content and additional features.

You can also receive back links by writing and publishing relevant articles on article directories. Make sure that you include keywords that you are targeting within the article itself. When writing the article keep it on point and have fun with it to make it something people want to read. You can use examples to make your points and bring more credibility. Most of all include the link back to your website within the author resource box. Without that the whole process is kind of pointless. Once the article is written search for some article directories and start submitting.

Reciprocal linking is not recommended as Google frowns on this activity. Excessive reciprocal linking could result in punishment in the search engines or even banning. If you take part in this activity do so with moderation and extreme care. Three way linking was developed to get around being able to detect the link exchanges, but Google claims to be able to find those kinds of reciprocal linking activities also. Frankly with the minimal reward of reciprocal linking the risk is too great.

Good optimization for search engines will take time. It does not happen overnight so prepare for a consistent hard approach to it. There is a certain amount of enjoyment in achieving goals and modifying strategies as the search engine algorithms change. Keep in mind that if you focus on Google the rankings in the other search engines should also follow.

SEO does not have to be expensive, but it will take an investment of some part from you. Either money or time, if you choose to go low budget be prepared to invest your time.