Search Engine Optimisation is an ever changing discipline. It works to maximise a website's ratings on the 'natural' search lists on major Search Engines. The natural listings form the main body of a Search Engine's pages. These do not include the paid listings. On the major Search Engines, you'll see a box at the top, and a column down the right hand side. These are the paid adverts. Naturally listed adverts have been taken directly from the index. They show sites listed in the order of importance and relevance - according to their algorithm.
Of course, we would like to be as high as possible on page one. If we're the 7th listing on page 9 then we're hardly going to get prospects beating our door down! It's impossible to know about all the SE's rank determining factors. It isn't something they publicise to the rest of us!
Because of this, much technical expertise has developed around the subject. On the one side you have SE's like Google deliberately filing technology patents in many different areas. This makes determining their ratings methods more complex. Then to challenge that on the other hand is a growing SEO (optimisation) sector. Optimisation specialists test, quantify and evaluate a myriad of indicators that affect a site's ratings.
There are two sides to SEO: 'On-Page' factors & 'Off-Page' factors. In addition there are geographic and demographic factors, but SEO cannot control these. (Off-Page optimisation is examined in an additional feature.)
SEO 'On-Page'
On-Page SEO is all about changes you can make directly to a site to make it more Search Engine 'friendly'. It involves 'correctly' configuring your website. For example: Internal-linking, using H1 & H2 header tags, seeding keywords at the correct density (and in appropriate places,) and to some lesser degree, using meta-tags.
If all that is complete double-dutch to you, then don't worry - you're not alone! It's very easy to control on-page factors. But to be quite honest, they have the least relevance to your ranking these days. In truth, many argue its relevance has disappeared altogether! In the past it was easy to affect Search Engines with on-page SEO. That hasn't been possible for a long time though.
The only time that 'on-page' becomes important is when you have taken care of 'off-page' and have a lot of inbound 'back-links'. At that stage, Internal Linking and some On Page manipulation can be beneficial.
A Bit of Advice... A phrase that shows vast numbers of results should not be your first SEO target. For example, on Google's Search Engine you'll see 70 million listings in the UK for the term Car Insurance. It's not rocket science to realise that competing in this area wouldn't be productive.
However... If I typed in "Southampton Car Insurance", then there are only around 300,000 results. (If car insurance in Southampton was my business!) So a much more realistic target.
I've a much better chance in the rankings having added the word 'Southampton'. In reality, getting ranked for car insurance would cost a fortune! I'd actually be head to head with the really big boys. So not a great idea - especially, in fact, when there are much better ways to go about it.
In fact, what we really need are terms that more specifically reflect our product or service. They're known as long tail searches, because they'll have several keywords. Phrases can be as many as seven words, depending on your competition. Most are about 3 - 4 keywords.
We prefer to begin optimisation strategies with phrases that bring in less than five hundred thousand results. Sometimes we'll consider higher counts if the top results are not benefitting from optimisation. Over time we'll gain ground on the larger search terms. This will happen automatically through building back links. We can go for some of those after several months if we've SEO'd well. It's a much more targeted strategy. Frankly, we're only interested in the customers who are looking specifically for what we offer. There's much more chance these people will buy!
Your home page isn't the only place for back-links. Spread them liberally around your website. This technique is referred to as Deep Linking. For example, build links to the pages that group products. They often have links to several other sub-pages about individual products. Don't just create back-links to your home-page. The SE's are becoming increasingly interested in how a site's individual pages are listed.
Of course, we would like to be as high as possible on page one. If we're the 7th listing on page 9 then we're hardly going to get prospects beating our door down! It's impossible to know about all the SE's rank determining factors. It isn't something they publicise to the rest of us!
Because of this, much technical expertise has developed around the subject. On the one side you have SE's like Google deliberately filing technology patents in many different areas. This makes determining their ratings methods more complex. Then to challenge that on the other hand is a growing SEO (optimisation) sector. Optimisation specialists test, quantify and evaluate a myriad of indicators that affect a site's ratings.
There are two sides to SEO: 'On-Page' factors & 'Off-Page' factors. In addition there are geographic and demographic factors, but SEO cannot control these. (Off-Page optimisation is examined in an additional feature.)
SEO 'On-Page'
On-Page SEO is all about changes you can make directly to a site to make it more Search Engine 'friendly'. It involves 'correctly' configuring your website. For example: Internal-linking, using H1 & H2 header tags, seeding keywords at the correct density (and in appropriate places,) and to some lesser degree, using meta-tags.
If all that is complete double-dutch to you, then don't worry - you're not alone! It's very easy to control on-page factors. But to be quite honest, they have the least relevance to your ranking these days. In truth, many argue its relevance has disappeared altogether! In the past it was easy to affect Search Engines with on-page SEO. That hasn't been possible for a long time though.
The only time that 'on-page' becomes important is when you have taken care of 'off-page' and have a lot of inbound 'back-links'. At that stage, Internal Linking and some On Page manipulation can be beneficial.
A Bit of Advice... A phrase that shows vast numbers of results should not be your first SEO target. For example, on Google's Search Engine you'll see 70 million listings in the UK for the term Car Insurance. It's not rocket science to realise that competing in this area wouldn't be productive.
However... If I typed in "Southampton Car Insurance", then there are only around 300,000 results. (If car insurance in Southampton was my business!) So a much more realistic target.
I've a much better chance in the rankings having added the word 'Southampton'. In reality, getting ranked for car insurance would cost a fortune! I'd actually be head to head with the really big boys. So not a great idea - especially, in fact, when there are much better ways to go about it.
In fact, what we really need are terms that more specifically reflect our product or service. They're known as long tail searches, because they'll have several keywords. Phrases can be as many as seven words, depending on your competition. Most are about 3 - 4 keywords.
We prefer to begin optimisation strategies with phrases that bring in less than five hundred thousand results. Sometimes we'll consider higher counts if the top results are not benefitting from optimisation. Over time we'll gain ground on the larger search terms. This will happen automatically through building back links. We can go for some of those after several months if we've SEO'd well. It's a much more targeted strategy. Frankly, we're only interested in the customers who are looking specifically for what we offer. There's much more chance these people will buy!
Your home page isn't the only place for back-links. Spread them liberally around your website. This technique is referred to as Deep Linking. For example, build links to the pages that group products. They often have links to several other sub-pages about individual products. Don't just create back-links to your home-page. The SE's are becoming increasingly interested in how a site's individual pages are listed.
About the Author:
(C) Jason Kendall. Look at EvolveSEM.co.uk for in-depth business tips on SEM Experts.
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