 |
 |
|
Strategies For Search Engine Optimization
A web site does not stop with ownership. Work has to be done such as
getting it optimized for search engines. Your web site has to be made
search engine friendly, that is to say, it must meet certain
expectations of the "crawlers" or "spiders" of search engines. The index
that these crawlers have created will be used in ascertaining the status
of your web site in terms of relevancy to the requests of users.
Good strategies for search engine optimization that should be fully
implemented include the following:
(1) Credible domain name
Acquire a domain name that is not too long or difficult to remember. It
should relate to the content of your web site. Within the domain name,
there should preferably be keywords that a crawler will understand.
Abbreviations, dashes, underscores, numerals and other meaningless
characters should all be avoided. Always opt for a .com name if
possible, simply because it is a more common term that customers think
of.
(2) Titles should be rich in keywords
The titles for all of your pages should be keyword-rich. They should be
easily understood by visitors, and more importantly should contain
keywords that will relate to whatever your customers may want to search
for. In search engine optimization, search engines often use the
[TITLE]; element as the text for their link to your site. Emphasis is
placed by search engines in this area of optimization because it enables
them to determine the relevance of your page to a visitor's search. The
titles for your pages should preferably be less than 50 characters
including spaces. This enables you to select a title that is precise,
and one that will not be truncated in search results for reason of
length. For immediate impact, include your call to action, so that
attention of visitors can be captured.
(3) Include META elements
Description and keyword properties should be included in your headers'
META elements. META name="description" content="[brief description of
your site]" is often used by search engines to find out what your site
is all about. It will be beneficial to put yourself in the shoes of your
customers. You can think about how they will go about searching for
information, and you can subsequently choose appropriate terms that will
capture traffic to your site. A great research tool to use is
Wordtracker.
(4) Quality of content
It is imperative to provide good and rich content on your web site. The
content should always be keyword-rich, as this facilitates good
classification of your pages by the search engines. It must be
interesting and entertaining. Quality is the keyword as far as content
is concerned. This is one strategy for search engine optimization that
should be given heavy consideration. Content should therefore be fresh
and should never be a duplicate. Search engines now include in their
search algorithm ways to effect measurement of freshness of content on
all sites. Do note that spiders cannot read images, so remember to use <
ALT > tags for images if you need to use them to increase your site
traffic.
(5) Links leveraging
Web sites that get incoming links do get a higher ranking. If these
incoming links originate from a site with higher ranking and which
perform well for key phrases that are related to your content, these are
good links of quality that will push up the ranking of your site. They
will greatly benefit your site. It will be to your advantage to request
them to link back to your site. Everything on your site must be properly
linked; all links must be functioning, because this will enable all of
your content to be indexed. This shows a good strategy for search engine
optimization in operation.
(6) Site registration
Your site must be registered with major search engines such as Google,
Yahoo!, and Open Directory Project (DMOZ.org) once it is sufficiently
optimized. Instructions given by each search engine are different from
one another, so it is important to follow instructions closely, to avoid
having your site improperly indexed. For best results, do it right -
straight from the beginning.
(7) Play it smart
Ensure that your site can be easily indexed by search engines. Your
pages must be crawler-friendly. Avoid the application of spamming
strategies such as irrelevant metadata and hidden text. Better be safe
than sorry. Play it smart when you are in your zest aiming for higher
search-engine rankings. Avoid strategies that offer the easy way out for
getting good ranking.
(8) Virtue of patience
Patience pays. It may take some time to reach Google No 1 spot. The time
spent on search engine optimization for your web site will definitely
not be lost just because the top spot is not reached yet. There are
still numerous other ways of capturing traffic besides performing a
little more tweaking of your site.
In conclusion, your web site must be optimized for search
engines, as this will help you secure a better search result, better
site ranking, and not forgetting increase in site traffic. For your
desired results, you will need to apply the strategies for search engine
optimization listed above.
|
