Search Engine Optimization (SEO) Tip #1
Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is the process of placing keywords within a website so that search engines can use those keywords to index the website. Because of the competition for rankings with popular keywords, SEO has become an essential requirement for a successful website.
The first step in SEO is to determine which keywords should be targeted on each page that will be optimized. When we have narrowed the keyword list to four or five phrases per page, then we’ll begin implementing those phrases within the code of each page.
Implementation starts with the meta tags. It is very important that the meta tags for keywords, page title, and page description are applicable to their specific page, so the search engines know how that page should be indexed. The meta tags should only list keywords that are related to the primary subject of the content on that page. You won’t see most of the meta tags in the usual course of web browsing, but you can see them if you click on the “view page source” option from your browsers view menu.
After the meta tags we’ll add the selected keywords into the image alternate text wherever there are images on the page. Because most search engines don’t read images very well, the alternate (or alt) text placed with an image tells the search engine about the content of the image. The alt text is visible while browsing only if you mouse over an image without clicking on it. We are seeing a big increase in traffic coming from image searches within Google and other search engines and alt tags are partially responsible for those numbers.
The next post will talk more about the text headings on each page, the content of the text itself, and the importance of anchor text links within the text linking your pages internally. Each of these plays a part in a well optimized website.
It takes time to do SEO the right way on each page, but it will make a big difference long term in your search engine rankings and resulting traffic.
Most of the SEO changes we make will not be noticeable to the average visitor; SEO is primarily seen by the search engines as they index the source code of a website. I am convinced and our tracking reports prove that SEO is one of the best long-term investments for a successful website.