Thursday, January 31, 2008

Tips on SEO Techniques

Keyword Research

Research the best keywords for your website - The first and most important step in SEO techniques. But this is a common that Optimizers do while choosing the keywords they want to optimize their website for. The best way to do this is to do some research. Use some of the tools available out there to find which keywords are the best for your particular website. These include tools like Google AdWords Keyword Tool, Keyword Overture Tool, WordTracker, etc.

This is not always best to optimize for the most searched keywords. Sometimes it can be too generic. Suppose you have a site on Financial Planning that helps you to find financial planners. Then the keyword “financial planners” is too generic to be of any real use. But in addition to this it might also not be targeted enough. Again, “financial planners” can mean so many things to so many people. Therefore you should opt for some different, more targeted keywords like "find a financial planner".


Keyword in Title Tag

Insert your keyword in your title tag. You should use different and unique titles on each page of your website. The idea is that you should try to be creative and include your keyword when it makes sense. Don’t go overboard and stuff it in everywhere, Google will notice and most likely reduce your search ranking. Just do it where it makes sense.


Meta Tags (Meta Description, Meta Keywords)

Meta tags still have importance in SEO techniques. Search Engines use your Meta description tags in their search engine result page (SERP) and often users refer to your Meta tags before clicking on the links to your site in the SERP. Hence, you should optimize your Meta description properly (means your targeted keywords should be there in the description and clearly specifies what your site is all about).

Even there are some Search engines that still refer to your Meta keywords tag. So, don’t think they have no value. Although not as much as before, they are valuable especially if you don’t stuff them with irrelevant keywords.


Use Headers to emphasize your Keywords

Headers in the sections of your page content often highlight what the chapters are about. Hence, use Header tags to your advantage to separate out sections when it makes sense. And if possible, use your keyword in the section title, but don’t overdo, only use if it makes sense.


Addition of Alt Text

There are many websites have images but no alternative text for the images. Search Engines can’t parse your images. That's why they look at your alternative text for clues. So add alternative text. Put a comment stating what the image is about. Even you can include your keyword in the alt tags.


Keywords in the Content

Use your keyword in your content. If you don’t use, then how the search engines know about that keyword. And of course, use them when it is required. Many times, you will find posts in the forums and blogs on Keyword Density like what should be the keyword density in a page. From my personal experience I can say there is no fixed keyword density. You can use a keyword in your page as many times you want but should be meaningful and sound good.


Keywords in the Anchor Text

Google also uses the anchor text of a link to determine what a website is about and use it heavily as one of the ranking factors. The idea is that if a lot of websites are linking to yours with similar anchor text, then most likely that’s what you’re about. Anchor text is the textual part of the link that tells the people where they will be moving. But, don't use same anchor text in all your links, because search Engine may consider it as a spam.


Highlight the Keywords

It’s a known fact that most website visitors scan text. They look for bold text, italicized text. Basically whatever text that stands out. Google’s also figured this out and will give more weight to your text that’s highlighted in some way, such as bolded text. Hence use these techniques to make your text scannable, but use it to your advantage for SEO purposes when appropriate. If you have scannable text, check to see if it makes sense to add your keywords too.


Use of Keywords in the Filenames

Google also looks at the filenames to see what your WebPages are about. Hence, use keywords for the file names.


Internal Navigation Structure

Every page should be reachable within 2 links. Google will only look at your site within a limited depth. A good rule of thumb is to keep all your content within 1 to 2 links of your main page. In other words, you should be able to reach any page you want Google to index within 1 to 2 links from your main page. Anything beyond that is not likely to be indexed.


Competitors Analysis

Look at what your competitors are doing. Like which keywords they are targeting, list those sites that are linking to your competitors and what is the specialties in their sites. Once you know, use this knowledge to your advantage. Improve your own website.


Try to get External Links with your Keyword in the Anchor Text

On-page SEO techniques are not the only thing you do to increase your search engine rankings. Google has realized that the more people link to you with a specific anchor text, the more likely it’s what you’re about. Again, the links are considered as a vote of support to your site by the other sites and the basis of this the PageRank of your site is determined. And we all know PageRank has to do a lot for ranking in Google.


All the above seo techniques I discussed are really helpful for getting rank in the SERP. Using these SEO techniques in your site in an ethical manner will help you in achieving your goal.

Monday, January 14, 2008

SEO Techniques: On-page Optimization Tips

SEO Techniques is broadly divided into two categories.
1. On-page optimization
2. Off-page optimization

The on-page optimization is very important to make your site search engine friendly. The on-page SEO techniques maximize your site's exposure to the search engine and have a significant impact on your ranking in the SERP. The followings are some of the On-page optimization tips that can help you build a search engine friendly website.

1. Keyword in the Title
You should add your main keywords in the title tag. This is important to have these keywords in the title because to give the search engine spiders an idea that your web page is related to the topic of that keyword.

2. Keyword in the Meta Description
It is also very important to put these keywords within the meta description tag, this will add more relevance to your web page about the topic.

3. Headings
You may also add the primary keyword in the headings especially. You should also stick the main keyword at the top of your page.

4. Anchor Text used in Inner links
You should make the inner links with the anchor texts of the optimized keywords of every web page. Search engine consider it as one of the ranking factor and can really helpful for you to achieve top ranking in the SERP.

5. Bold keyword
You may bold the main keyword at least one time with in the web page.

6. Keyword Density
Distribute the main keyword through the page. Distribute your main keyword through the page as many times possible. Of course, don't forget about relevancy. Try to put the keywords in the content but it should meaningful and sounds good.

7. Alt Tag
Use Alt image text for the images in your page and put your keywords in these Alt tags.

8. Sitemap
You should have a sitemap for your site and the link to the sitemap should (recommended) present anywhere in the Home Page of your site. If possible have an XML sitemap for your site and submit it in Google. It allows Google to crawl your site more frequently and can put an impact on your ranking.

9. Internal Navigation Structure
Make your internal navigation structure user friendly. Use Breadcrumb in your site.

Remember search engine like sites that are made for human visitors, not for spiders. So, try to build a site that can make your visitors to visit your site again and again.

Thursday, January 10, 2008

Important SEO Techniques

Search engine optimization is a technique that is used to achieve high rankings on the Search Engine Result Page (SERP) in order to maximize your site's traffic. People might regard optimization as a big problem and waste of money. But optimization is the only thing which helps your website or your business to reach your potential customer. Hence, it is important to identify what SEO Techniques need to be performed. In this post you'll find a brief idea of few most important techniques of SEO.

Proper Title & Meta Tags
A title tag is an HTML code that appear in the top bar of your Web browser. It shows the words which describe your web page. Search engines use your title tag to explore your website. These are the words which appear in the clickable link on the SERP. Users decide whether your site will be relevant or not through these title tags. Your website can attain good search page ranking if it features searched keywords in the Title tag. Similarly, The meta description tag describes your site's content. It is important because some search engines use it as a site's summary on their results pages. The meta description tag should contain multiple keywords organized in a logical sentence. Place the keywords at the beginning of your description and close to each other to achieve the best possible rankings.

Site Submission
Submit your website in as many free directories and search engines as possible. Search engines are your medium to travel to your visitors hence pay special attention towards these engines. Make sure your site is well indexed in major search engine. It's not necessary that you will be featured in the first pages of search engines but if you focus on other factors then later you can be in the first page.

Reciprocal Links
Don't rely on one way link building. I am not saying one-way link will not be helpful, but practically it is really difficult to get one way links unless you have such content in your site. If you are getting some good sites that are relevant to your site, then there is no harm to exchange link with them. But, make sure your link should be exchanged properly and your links are visible.

Anchor Text
Anchor text is the actual text part of a link and used by search engines as an important ranking factor.But putting same anchor text in every page may result in making you a spammer in search engine's eye. Have different anchor text and make sure you don't repeat this text inadvertently.

Site Map
A site map is a textually organized model of a Web site's content that allows the users to navigate through the site to find the information they are looking for, just as a traditional geographical map helps people find places they are looking for in the real world. Site map is the most important step towards achieving a well optimized site. Site map enables search engines to know about your website. A well crafted site map helps your users to navigate easily within your website. I would suggest you to have both html (for Human and Yahoo) and xml (for Google) sitemap for your site.

Link Farm
Link farms are the link building farms which guarantee you to give thousands of links instantly. Try not to depend solely on link farms exchange links directly with the websites. This gives you the idea about the site and whether the particular link exchange will work for you or not.

Unique and Fresh Content
The information about a site is its content. Content is the king and hence it should be given a royal treatment. Your content should be distinct and relevant. Unique content increases your chances to attain a top PR in major search engines. Because, both human visitors or search engine spiders will come to you only when they find you different from the other websites.

Friday, January 4, 2008

The Role Of Inbound Links in SERP

The quality of your inbound links is a key factor that search engines will use to rank your pages. But the number of links you have is not that important. Having a few high quality links is much better than having a bunch of links that are low in quality. Inbound links can be defined as the links in other websites which point back to your site, sending traffic to it. There are a number of strategies you can use to get high quality inbound links. Remember, the quality, not the quantity, is the most important factor you will want to take into consideration. Again, the Anchor text used in the links is also another factor that can affect your ranking in SERP (Search Engine Result Page). Hence, it would be ideal if you can get inbound links (with proper keywords/key phrases as the anchor text) from sites which have many relevant inbound links themselves. This would help increase your page rank which may lead to increased web traffic. Here are some of the best seo techniques to getting inbound links:

Quality Content
This is the best way to generate back links. There is nothing better than a good site providing quality content. If you have valuable content, other webmasters will borrow them for their own sites. Your content will of course contain a link to your site for copyright purposes. That’s one backlink for you. Other webmasters may also simply post your link in their website to provide their visitors more information resources.


Forum Posting
This means becoming actively involved in forums. Contribute your thoughts, get to know the people on the forum, interact with them. With every post, tag your signature with a link to your site. Make sure though that you write only worthy posts.


Article Submission
If you’re an expert on your website’s contents, spend some time preparing and submitting well-written, thoughtful articles for submission to other websites. Every article you write is one back link; if your article is good enough, it will be copied and posted by other sites and thereby give you additional back links.


Directory Submissions
There are an increasing number of free web directories. Get on the net and visit each and every web directory you can find, and submit your website and URL to them. Of course, you should make sure to submit only under your keywords or niche category.


Reciprocal Link Exchanges
As the name implies, these are web-based services where you can ‘exchange’ links with other website owners or web masters in a ‘You place my link and I place your link’ approach. There are two things to keep in mind with link exchanges, however. One, make sure you are exchanging links with relevant sites. Second, never do mass mailings to webmasters – most will only ignore you. It is better to make contact individually (especially those whose pages are relevant to yours) and suggest a link exchange.


Link Baiting
This happens when you post something controversial on your site or post something interesting with the aim of getting people to blog it, and provide links to your page. While some people consider it as spam or ‘black hat SEO’, ignore them, choose to link to your site; you don’t force them to do so.


Provide a “Link to Me” Code
Make things easy and convenient for people who want to link to you. “Link to Me” is an HTML code that people simply copy and paste on their websites and blogs to link to you. But don’t use all text – use some graphics, come up with icons or buttons to include in your code. People who look for filler content may just be willing to make use of your sleek, glossy and alluring banner or button on their sites because it’s free and available.


Consider RSS Feeds
RSS feeds allow you to network your content, or allow other sites to display your content on their sites, with a back link to the original article or page.


Buy Text Links
If you have the resources, why not simply buy text links? The option is available if you do not want to go through the hassle of the other methods discussed above; on the other hand, this is a worthwhile option if your actual intent is to make money and sell text links to others.