Information
for those who want to do it themselves
There
is a lot of information on this page and it'll
take a bit of time to read and digest. But if
you want to undertake search engine positioning
on your own, we think this basic information is
important. Throughout this page there are links
to information and resources for those who wish
to continue their reading. We hope you find this
information useful and informative.
Where
To Start
Sometimes
being #1 in the top search engine is useless -
either because it brings you no traffic or because
it brings lots of the wrong traffic. One
of the most important things you can do is choose
the right keywords. For the purposes of illustration,
let's suppose your Web site is about a certain
kind of widgets. You specialize in left-handed
ones, and you are a wholesaler.
Your
first instinct is to want to be #1 for "widgets".
But most people are right-handed, and the average
consumer only wants one or two, and you are not
a retailer. Besides, there are lots of different
kinds of widgets, and they may not be looking
for the type you sell. So your best bet is NOT
to focus your efforts completely on the keyword
"widgets", even though it will bring
lots of traffic. It won't be the right traffic,
and it won't convert to sales. You could easily
get the #1 spot for "wholesalers of left-handed
widgets in South Carolina", but nobody searches
for that, so it won't bring any traffic.
The
best thing for business will be to position your
website for a variety of phrases, such as "left-handed
widgets" and "wholesale widgets".
Find relevant phrases for lots of your pages.
There are probably plenty of variants that people
use in their searches, such as "widget wholesalers"
or "widgets for lefties". How can you
find out? Try a service like WordTracker.
You'll need to spend some time learning how to
use it, but this excellent service can give you
a very good idea of what people are searching
for in your area of business. There is a pared
down free version and a subscription full version.
There
is also a very valuable free low tech tool that
you must take advantage of. Ask everyone you know,
especially people who are NOT directly involved
in your business, what they would type into a
search engine if they were looking for your product.
Their answers, along with your own knowledge and
intuition, can be very enlightening. Ask your
staff what people ask about on the phone or in
emails. What words do they use?
Prepare
Your Site
Think
of every page on your site as a potential entry
page, and optimize as many pages as possible.
As long as you have good, clear navigation it
doesn't matter if people arrive somewhere other
than your home page. What matters is that they
arrive as close as possible to the information
they are looking for. If they search for "wholesale
widget prices" send them right to your pricing
page.
With
each page, start at the top of your html. (If
you don't know where that is, you're going to
need some help from the person who built your
Web site!) Most experts will tell you that one
of the most important html tags on your site is
the <title> tag, and we agree. Use your
keyword phrase in your title tag - after all,
if you've chosen the right keywords, it will be
what that page is about. Don't use the same title
tag on every site page.
Where
else in the head section should you use the phrase?
In the meta description and keyword tags. By the
way, that keyword tag is far less important than
it used to be, so don't bother stuffing it with
every conceivable word. Lots of the major search
engines don't even consider the keyword tag anymore,
because it is so often abused by irrelevant keyword
stuffing. Some engines do though, so just put
your phrase in there with a few variants, and
leave it at that.
Another
critical place to use your keyword phrase is in
the body text - that's the text that is visible
on the page, that people will be reading. Again,
if you have chosen the right keyword phrase for
a given page, it should be easy to use that phrase
in your text. Use it at least a couple of times,
especially high in the text. Here we could get
into optimum percentages of keywords to other
words, and the concepts of keyword prominence
and density. But this changes all the time, and
it's part of the ongoing learning discussed later.
You'll
also want to consider using your keywords in links
between your pages (anchor tags), alternate image
information (alt) tags and heading tags. (<H1>
tags don't have to be huge - you can control the
look with CSS, but make sure that the words inside
the tag still look like and function as a heading
for the page. Don't use style sheets to hide text.
)
Submitting
to Search Engines
Very
few search engines accept submissions these days.
You can still submit to some of the important
ones, but once you are in their index, STOP SUBMITTING.
There is no need to submit monthly or quarterly.
ONLY submit your site again if it has disappeared
from the search engine database or if you have
made significant changes to your content.
Take
the few minutes necessary to submit by hand. Auto
submissions will in all likelihood be ignored,
and lots of search engines are putting measures
in place to block these submissions. They'll ask
you to type in letters you see on an image, or
some other little test to prove you're human.
There's a reason for this - search engines are
overwhelmed with automated submission programs
and they don't like it.
Some
links for HAND submissions:
http://addurl.altavista.com/addurl/new
http://addurl.alltheweb.com/add_url
http://www.google.com/addurl.html
http://submitit.bcentral.com/msnsubmit.htm
Tip:
If your site can't be found in the first few pages
for your keyword search, it doesn't mean your
site has been dropped from the database. If you
are in the search engine index but not placing
for your keyword phrase, you need to do some work
on that page - not resubmit it. To see what site
pages are listed, try the following:
Go
to http://www.google.com
and type the following into the search bar: allinurl:yourdomain.com.
This will bring back a list of all the pages that
Google knows about within your domain. The
same search at http://www.altavista.com
would look like this: domain:www.yourdomain.com.
Check the 'advanced search' features at other
search engines to see if they can return this
type of result.
Links
The
very best way to get your site found by search
engines is to make sure there are links to your
site from other websites. Perhaps your customers
or suppliers would be willing to provide a link
to your site. How about local business organizations
or industry specific groups to which you belong.
The
Importance of Directories
Getting
listed in local, regional, national and global
directories is a must.
Search engines do as their name suggests - they
search. It's an automated process that involves
following links on Web sites and keeping track
of the content they find. Directories can be trusted
sources of links for search engines. Most directories
require that you look through the directory and
choose an appropriate category, and from there
submit your site. Follow their guidelines for
submissions. Directory editors are very busy,
and many are volunteers. Please don't waste their
time.
Some
links for global directories:
http://www.dmoz.org/
- Free, but it takes a loooooooong time to
get listed.
http://www.jayde.com/
- Free, focuses on B2B (business to business)
listings.
http://www.goguides.org/
- Not free, but very reasonable.
http://www.joeant.com/
- Not free, but very reasonable.
And don't forget those regional, local and industry-specific
directories. Take the time to find them.
The
Don'ts of Search Engine Positioning
Don't
hide text. (The most common ways to do this are
making the text the same color as your background,
or making it so tiny it is practically invisible
to the human eye.) If you think it is difficult
for search engines to program filters for this,
you are wrong.
Don't
hide links. An image with 1px by 1px dimensions
that is a link is a dead giveaway. Lots of sites
use 1x1 gifs for tracking or other purposes, but
not as a link.
Don't
hide anything. What search engines "see"
and what people see should be pretty much the
same. If you use html tags such as <noframes>
or <noscript>, which contain information
that may not be visible, make sure they accurately
convey what is in the frame or script to those
who have incompatible browsers or who choose to
turn some features off. The worst use of a <noframes>
tag is "This site uses frames and your browser
doesn't support them." Why not say, "This
site is about left-handed widgets, and we are
a leading wholesaler. Since your browser does
not support frames, we'd like to provide the following
information and contact details...etc." Much
more useful. Might even lead to a sale.
Ongoing
Learning
What works this month may not work next month,
so keep on top of the latest news. Search engine
rankings are a moving target. You'll have to keep
monitoring and adjusting and building inbound
links. That's why professionals recommend an ongoing
maintenance plan. There are lots of forums dedicated
to this topic - here are links to a couple of
them:
http://www.webmasterworld.com/forum5/
http://www.jimworld.com/apps/webmaster.forums/
Good Luck!
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