Search Engine Optimization - The Basics

Internet marketing is rough. You are up against millions of other internet businesses. It is a constant education and re-education to keep up with the Joneses all over the world. They are all doing everything they can to make their site better than yours, and only the best will wind up at the top of the heap.

You see the letters SEO around a lot these days and also SEM. SEM simply means "Search Engine Marketing", and SEO means "Search Engine Optimization". You do SEO to your site so you can do SEM more effectively. Search engine optimization is what the words imply when applied to your web site. They are the things that can be done to make search engines aware of your website and give it as high a ranking as possible.

WHY IS SEO IMPORTANT?

Well, we can probably agree without even knowing why that it may be in the best interests of an internet business to approach a search engine with the most effectively designed and organized website. While it is somewhat self evident that a well designed and effective website may be a good sales tool when dealing with humans, it might not be so evident why you have to be so concerned when dealing with a search engine.

Let's start with the fact that while we are trying to display our internet business to human eyes, it is the spiders of the search engines which must first be appeased. After all, according to whose figures you believe, up to 85% of all websites visited are found through search engines and directories. When you consider all the people looking around the internet for all kinds of "stuff" you can begin to grasp the power search engines have in the online marketplace.

Add into the mix the fact that for any given search term, there are thousands, millions, or even billions of possible sites that may meet the query terms provided by the human searcher and you begin to grasp the vast competition going on at any given time for any given subject.

Out of those potentially billions of pages which may be presented to the searcher by the search engine, only about ten or so will fit on a page. Therefore, if you are not on the first page, it's almost as if you are not there at all. I don't need to explain this to you if you have ever used a search engine, How many times have YOU bothered going on to page two, and especially page three?

Another aspect of searcher versus search engine is something that anyone who has been on the internet for a week has discovered. You have to be especially specific when doing searches or you could wind up with some really worthless results.

As you can see, it becomes imperative that your page get listed in the first ten results returned by the search engine.

HOW DOES A SEARCH ENGINE DECIDE WHICH PAGES COME FIRST?

Actually, each search engine has its own method of assigning value to each website it visits and chooses to include in its listings. These determining factors are included in the instructions given the spiders which visit the sites and the software controlling the listings on the search engine site. There are often humans as well who can override the decisions of the software judges. This is what can make SEO a little difficult. What is top priority for one search engine may not figure in as strongly for another. Of course, everyone is trying to figure out how to second guess Google, but don't forget, there are other search engines also providing traffic to a great many sites as well.

If you have figured out by now that I have danced around the question, you are right. You see, not much is actually known about the exact science by which search engines, particularly Google, select and rank the pages they show in response to a searcher's query. However, a lot can be deduced by looking at some of the sites that DO make it to the top of the list.

HERE'S THE BASICS OF SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION (SEO)

1. Choose the niche target of your website. Don't just put up a site for travel. Make it a site for travel to Ireland. Better yet, make it a site for discounted travel to Ireland. Even better, make it for discounted family travel packages to Ireland. Each narrowing of the target reduces the competition.

2. Choose a domain name that relates to your target words. In the example above, I might want traveltoireland.com. Unfortunately, someone beat us to that site, so now we have to play with some ideas. Maybe we can still get traveltoireland.net. Unfortunately, someone beat us to that one too. Don't give up hope. There are traveltoireland.biz, traveltoireland.us, and traveltoireland.ws to look at. In fact, I just took a look and all three of those are available. If they weren't, maybe we could have used irelandtravel.com or familytraveltoireland.com although that is getting a bit long...particularly if we want to put it on a business card or on a magnetic sign on our car.

3. Pick a title for your website that includes the basic idea and the words, keywords, that you hope people will search on. Don't just stick up the words, however. Make it a headline. It will be the first thing the search engine and the human learn about your site. Make it a headline that will catch both their eyes...er...sensory apparatus. "Travel to Ireland on a dollar a day!"

4. Create a description that includes and expands the information and keywords stated in the title. Some search engines will display the first few words on a site, but some will display the description Meta tag. "Travel to Ireland does not have to be expensive. Learn how you can visit the Emerald Isle for as little as a dollar a day."

5. List five to ten keywords related to your subject. Make these words that will appear logically in the content of the site. "travel, Ireland, travel to Ireland"

6. Provide logical, relevant, valuable content throughout the site. Make sure your keywords appear at intervals, but do not overuse them. Also make sure they appear in the first few lines of your site. "Welcome to our site where you will learn how to travel to Ireland without breaking the bank."

These are just the first steps towards search engine optimization. There is more to learn, such as putting a statement with your keywords in headline form near the top of the page. You can find other high-ranking sites with content relative to yours who might be able to provide a link to your site, but don't hope for it at first. They usually want to link to sites as powerful as they are.

The major key to search engine optimization still seems to be quality content provided in a consistent, rational package. Even some fairly simple sites rank well because they can provide the goods. However, a ton of broken links and a lot of coding errors coupled with horrible site navigation can make it difficult for the search engine to find its way around, much less recommend the site to its users.

Above all, do not stop with this small article. There are many sites offering information and even courses on search engine optimization. There are companies that specialize in search engine optimization for a fee. To get started, read some of the articles posted at sites such as EzineArticles.com on the subject. I just checked, and they have over 8,000 articles which mention the subject. Of course, some of those might not have anything to do with search engine optimization, but we knew that. That's just the way search engines are!
 
 
About the Author
Donovan Baldwin is a Dallas area writer and network marketing professional. Get a domain name that suits your internet business needs at http://www.donovanbaldwin.com/domain/get_name.html.

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