Search engine optimization (SEO) can be the most effective way of increasing website traffic. Most internet users, when searching for information about a product or service, use search engines to find that information and very few of those people ever get beyond the third page of results. Therefore, if a website does not appear on one of those pages, the chance of being found through the search engines is lost.
What is Search Engine Optimization?
SEO is the art and science of improving a website's ranking in the search engines for a predefined set of keywords. The search engine optimization (SEO) industry is changing daily. More and more search engines are relying on link popularity and other factors to determine ranking. In addition, keyword usage in page text, titles and, to a lesser extent, Meta tags, in concert with strategic page layout design and quality link management, are all essential factors in your quest for successful search engine optimization.
How is Keyword Research Important to a Websites SEO?
Every site approaches SEO in a different way. Some target keywords which are highly competitive, returning millions of results in the search engine listings. Others are less competitive. The first step in any search engine optimization project will be to analyze the chosen keywords. Don't choose words that have too broad a meaning, as you will encounter too much competition for those keywords and keyword phrases. Try to be as detailed and targeted as possible when choosing which keywords you want to use in your SEO campaign.
How Should a Website Creator Maximize It's Profit and Ranking on a Search Engine?
To maximize any site's chances of being found in the search engines, it is necessary to understand a little about how search engines rank web pages. Each of the major search engines has its own, slightly different method, or algorithm, for deciding where each page should rank within its index in response to a particular search term being entered.
Most rely on some variation of keyword relevancy ranking. When a search term is entered, the search engine first looks for pages which contain the exact search term in its titles, page text and, to a lesser extent, keyword and description Meta tags. Pages on which these particular search terms appear most often are ranked more highly than others since the search engine considers these pages to be more relevant to the search query.
Pages which carry the search terms in their page titles are also ranked more highly than those which do not. Conversely, page enhancements such as frames and JavaScript, can have an adverse effect on search engine rankings. JavaScript’s which appear high in the underlying HTML code of a page can push keyword laden text toward the bottom, rendering it all but inaccessible to search engines.
Final Tips for those Looking to Improve SEO
In the end, the practice of writing targeted, relevant content which uses, but does not overuse, specific keywords is the best way to make sure webpages rank highly within the search engine results. Avoid so-called "Black Hat" methods of search engine optimization, such as hiding repetitive keywords at the bottom of WebPages as these methods can get the pages downgraded or banned altogether from the search engine's indices.
Sources
- Basics of SEO accessed September 17, 2010
- Google on SEO accessed September 17, 2010
Kathleen Odenthal - Kathleen Odenthal began her writing career in 2010 with Demand Media Studios, writing as a contributor for eHow. After that, she branched ...
