SEO (Search Engine Optimisation)

Ok, so you've submitted your website to the necessary search engines, you type in your keywords, and...ok...it’s not on page 1...2...10....ah! there it is on page ...11 ??!! What's wrong?

 

What exactly IS Search Engine Optimization (SEO)? According to Webopedia.com, it’s "the process of increasing the amount of visitors to a Web site by ranking high in the search results of a search engine", in other words, getting a high Google/Yahoo/<every other search engine> placement.

 

Search engines use "spiders" to follow the links around the web, and get content from the web pages they find. Before you get creepy, crawly ideas in your mind, these "spiders" are different from our usual 8-legged friends. They are actually automated robots, and when they follow links they're "crawling" the web (also called "spidering"), hence, the name.

 

Usually, the first step in Search Engine Optimization (SEO) would be to submit your website to search engines. Many people view this as a very important step in SEO, some even going as far as paying huge amounts to companies that promise to submit their sites to "thousands" of search engines. Before you break the bank, many an experienced programmer has said that you do not need thousands of search engines, but simply the top 5. Submitting your website means filling out a form that is provided by the search engine. For Google, for example, you can submit your site at www.google.com/addurl.html, and once it’s registered, its automatically updated.

 

It used to be that this was the basic step in rocketing your site to the top of the Search Engine Results Pages (SERPS), and, if you don't have other websites that link to yours, this step may be necessary, but if you do have other web sites that link to yours, whether or not your submit your site, these guys will find you.

 

The second step many programmers take is to place keywords in the META tag. A META tag is simply a special HTML tag that is used to provide information about a website, but, it doesn't affect what is displayed. Many times, it contains what the page is about, who created the page, how often it is updated, and the keywords that represent the page's content (some programmers put every conceivable keyword that could possibly be ranked with).It was thought by many that this was also an necessary step for page rankings, but search engines have wisened up and now sometimes ignore the META tags and focus on the site's content, and many other factors. Many have been surprised that even if the keyword was not in their META tags, search engines still manage to find them because the site content was relevant to the words being searched.

 

Many programmers have focused on breaking the code of a search engine's algorithm, which is simply the "formula" a search engine uses to match the websites with the terms being used. Attempts at trying to figure out these algorithms is futile, first of all, because these are not simple formulas, but could contain hundreds of factors, and secondly, they are constantly changing.

 

Some focus on "tricks" such as using invisible text (e.g. putting pink text on a pink background), cloaking, which means showing one page to a search engine's spider and showing a different page to the real visitors, and keyword stuffing, which simply means, cramming every nook and cranny of your website with your keywords. These tricks could "work" for a while, but, on the other hand, could also warrant penalties from the search engines, resulting in either a lower ranking, or altogether being banned.

 

Some excellent ways, however, to get search engines and customers to notice you is to:

1. Have a catchy title that sounds like an advertisement. 2. Good page content (no paragraphs of pure keywords) 3. A quick loading page (if it takes forever, you won't get much repeat visitors) 4. A professional look 5. Being very clear about what it is you offer and what the visitor's next step should be (such as signing up for a newsletter) 6. Providing some pertinent information right on the first page (with no clicking on links required)

 

So, how do you achieve Search Engine Optimization? The key is still your website's content. Building a high quality site for your readers/customers is the best way to achieve SEO. Build it, and they will come. It sounds simplistic, but its true.

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