Demystifying the Search Engine Optimization

10 October 2007
Basics of search engine optimization.

With web technology constantly changing, what you knew a year ago about search engines is probably not entirely true today. There is so much more to the process today than there was yesterday and the amount of information provided can be overwhelming and confusing to try and sort out. The process takes time and technical skills to prepare your site for search engine submission. Time schedules for getting registered can range anywhere between 1 week to 3 months, depending on the search engine.

In the past, basically all that was needed was an abundance of key words in the key word meta tag . (Meta tags are located in the head of the document and look like this: meta name="keywords" content="florist, flowers, roses, etc. etc.") Keywords acceptable included misspellings, plurals, singulars and just about anything you wanted to throw in the pot. However, today this is not true. The rules have changed and they begin with your choice of a domain name.

Search engines rely heavily on keywords to include you in their directories; however, the keywords must also be placed within the body of your page, page title, page description, domain name, and file name.

1) When thinking about your key words, think about what people search for. These could include phrases. Don't leave out phrases. (eg. "discount flowers", "flower specials", "hard to find flowers")

2) Your page title should be a short summary of your keywords you're using. A good page title would be "Discount Flowers Offering Daily Specials". Keep it simple, but remember to use your keywords.

3) Page description should be a bit lengthier than your page title. Your discount florist's description may be, "Discount florist providing daily flower specials, including roses, daffodils and those hard to find flowers”.

4) File name could be named "discount-florist.htm

5) Your text should be loaded with keywords that you intend to use in your Meta tag. A healthy keyword count is 5% of your total page text.

6) Pages filled with images may not be registered at all. Fill your page with relevant text. When a search engine spider and/or robot goes out in cyberspace looking for information, it helps to provide text, rather than code. One way to minimize your code is to use external CSS style files, as well as external Javascript files.

Popularity raises rankings. Write articles, submit them to other web sites, create a blogger and link it to your site, use free classified listings and/or check out Google Ad Words (http://www.google.com/ads/). With Google Ad Words, you get to choose how much you want to spend on clicks to your website. Just be careful when using this program. Check your account frequently. More times than not, Google Adwords have taken users financially down. One of their policies is to raise your credit line without your permission.

Designing a website is fun. However, in order to be effectively promoted on search engines, it will take a lot of hard work, knowledge to properly prepare your site and patience. If you are hiring a designer to do your site, make sure your designer is knowledgeable about search engine optimization. If you don't, you may be disappointed in the results your site appears in searches. For additional information, contact Cara through www.creativecommunicationsonline.com.