31 March 2009
Jargon Busting from JUMP. In this article we look at the basics of Search Engine Optimisation (SEO). How do you optimise a website? How do you get to the first page? We try and answer these questions and give you a behind the code analysis.

A BRIEF HISTORY

Webmasters and content providers began optimising sites for search engines in the mid-90's, as the first search engines were cataloging the earliest versions of the World Wide Web. Initially, this was a relatively straightforward method of submitting a page, or URL, to the various engines which would send a 'spider' to "crawl" that page, extract any links to other pages, and return all of the information found on the page to be indexed. Site owners slowly started to realise the value of having their sites ranked highly and visible in search engine results.



GOOGLE WAS BORN

Google was founded in 1998 by Larry Page and Sergey Brin, who graduated from Standford University. The concept created was a search engine that relied on a mathematical algorithm to rate the prominence of web pages. The number calculated by the algorithm is also known as PageRank and if you have Google's Toolbar installed in Internet Explorer, this is visible for every web page. Other factors have been considered since and these include a web pages keyword frequency, meta tags, headings and the overall site structure. Nowadays, search engines use a wide range of undisclosed factors in their ranking algorithms, with Google stating that they use 200 different signals to rank web pages.

Google Search Engine

Download Google's Toolbar



WHAT DOES THIS MEAN TO A WEBSITE

Well as Web Developers we must design and build each of our websites to include all of the above features to help our clients gain the best search engine ranking possible. Simply building a website is by no means the end of the project. It must then be optimised to gain the greatest ranking and search engine position. You might even look at this exercise as advertising your website. If you are higher up a search result in Google, it is much more likely that someone will see you. Think about when you search for something on a search engine, you put in the words you want to search for and most of the time you will have hundreds of pages of results. Then think which ones do you normally click on...it's normally the first few isn't it. So to be on the first page, and within the first 10 results is the best possible place to be to get traffic to your website.



THE ANOTOMY OF GOOD SEO

The perfect webpage is one that is coded well, but is also relevant. Below is the inner workings of a webpage that has been optimised for search engines.

Page URL

The URL of the webpage is the full line of text found within your browsers navigation bar.

Page Title

A webpage's title is found at the very top of the browser and is normally followed by the type of browser you are using i.e. 'Google - Windows Internet Explorer'

Page Description

This is found deep within the code of a website and is setup by the webmaster/developer. This description is different on every webpage, and lists exactly what the individual page content is about. It must be short and concise as this is displayed underneath the resulting Page Title (from above), in the search results.

Page Keywords

Once again found within the Meta tags of a webpages content, keywords are a list of words relating to the page they are on. Similar to a pages description, they give a greater clue as to what the page content is about and therefore helps a search engine index this page, in the right place.

Page Content

Very often not considered is the actual content within a page. The major search engines expect a keyword or key phrase on each webpage. But not only that, they want these to make up a good percentage of a webpage and this is known as Keyword Density. An example of this is if your webpage has 200 words and your keyword or phrase appears 10 times throughout, you have a keyword density of 5 per cent. This must be cleverly balanced as to have too many in one webpage can be considered spamming, however too less will mean the search engine won't identify it as a keyword for that page. This attribute is best learnt over time, but is vitally important in helping your search engines ranking.



9 out of 10 users find websites through Search Engines such as Google, Yahoo and MSN.

Almost half of products sold online are found through Search Engines.

Over £2 Billion is spent on SEO/PPC annually in the UK.



WHAT ELSE CAN I DO?

The above shows you the very basics of what you need to do on each and every one of your webpages within your website. With the basics sorted out, your organic search engine optimisation should be well on its way. But what else can you do to help improve your overall attractiveness? Here are a few things you can try:

Google Adwords

Google offer a service in which you can advertise your company or products in a more prominent space in their search results. The basic method used is to create a list of keywords, similar to the ones found in your Page Keywords (from above), which relate to your business. When people search on Google, and have typed in one or more of the chosen keywords, your advert may appear next to the search results. As Google put it: "Now you're advertising to an audience that's already interested in you". So whats the catch you ask? Well, Google charge you for this service of course! Google charges you each time a person clicks on one of your 'adverts' and this is determined by the popularity of the actual word. A word or phrase that is more popular, for example if you worked in the plumbing sector it might be the phrase 'emergency plumbing', would cost more than a phrase like 'Bob's Plumbing', because it will be much more popular.

Google Adwords

Web Directories

A web directory is a directory that specialises in linking to other web sites and categorising those links. A web directory is not like a search engine, and instead it lists web sites by category and sub-category. This categorisation will normally be based on the whole web site, rather than keywords or phrases, and sites are often limited to inclusion in only a few categories. Web directories can be a good addition to your SEO; however I would not suggest placing your site on every directory out there as this could have a negative effect on your rankings. Choose a select few and make sure the quality is high. Examples of these directories include:

Open Directory Project

World Wide Web Virtual Library

AlexBid



Clever networking using the web

Finally, the web changed forever when 'Social Networking' became the next best thing. Unlike Google Adwords or huge Web Directories, which are classed as Passive optimisation, networking on the web is classed as Pro-Active optimisation. The reason being is that your company blog must be constantly updated, edited and audited. Examples of this include 'blogging' using sites like:

Blogger.com

Wordpess.com

To make up your own mind and figure out whether it is a good thing for yourself or your company, have a read of the following article on whether it is right or not:

Does your company belong in the blogosphere? By Katherine Heires



FINALLY...

Whether you like it or not, SEO is a necessary evil and the tangible benefits certainly outweigh the time and expertise needed to perfect it. Having a presence on the web is now only the beginning of the process for getting your company online. Using SEO is a way of advertising your company online and you then have the choice whether you want to add alternate methods to gain better results.

View JUMP's SEO page or Contact Us to discuss your needs now.