Search engine optimization (SEO) is one of the challenging aspects of managing a website. For many businesses, it’s easier to hire someone to manage SEO and not have to think about it at all, while others prefer to keep everything in-house by using this seo video or similar ones to gain as much as knowledge as they can about it and use their knowledge by themselves to minimize company expenses. You may be surprised to know that there are plenty of no-cost, easy thing you can do to improve your search rankings, without the assistance of an expensive search agency. As major search engines consistently change and improve their ranking algorithms it is actually getting easier for your website to rank well, assuming you’re playing by the rules.
When Larry Page and Sergey Brin met at Stanford University in 1995 they developed a search site called BackRub, which was later renamed Google. Since it was launched Google has ranked websites according to their relevance to the search term. The primary method for gaining relevance in the eyes of Google has been the almighty link.
Why links don’t matter… as much
Links have long been one of the best ways to improve your search rankings. In fact, an entire line of SEO products and services have been developed to service that one need. For example, you can buy software that will automatically search for sites to link to your site; then send them an automated email asking for a link back. In other words, you’re asking the webmaster for that site to setup a link to your site. Usually, this is in exchange for a reciprocal link on your own site. Furthermore, there are countless services that will do nothing but search for sites to link back to yours. You can also buy software to spam forums and community sites with postings that contain a link. I am sure you have all seen an interesting blog post or conversation in a forum with one user that posted: “interesting blog post, buy your generic drugs from this site”.
In the past decade the search engines have started getting smart to these less-than-reputable search optimization methods (aka Blackhat SEO). No one knows for sure how important links are in the current search algorithms, but what is certain is that quantity is far less important than quality. If my site has 1,000 link-backs from random websites that have no relevance to my site, that will carry very little weight in Google’s ranking algorithm. However, if you have only a few links from very high quality sites in your industry, that will help significantly. The automated software, spambots, and overseas link building service are essentially useless for effective and reputable search optimization.
So what does work?
Update Your Site Frequently: Keeping your site updated with fresh, relevant content is a great way to keep the search engines coming back to index more of your site. The best way to do this is to include a blog on your site and/or Twitter/Facebook feeds. Updating a daily or weekly blog adds fresh, original content to your site and lends relevance in your industry. For example, if you write an interesting blog post about something in your industry, other site may link to it. These sites would likely be industry-relevant sites, hence lending more credibility to your own site. I could dedicate an entire blog posting to the benefits of blogging for your business, but you get the point. For small businesses it is essential to dominate your local search engine results page. Check out www.calescence.com/services/local-seo/ for full website optimization necessary for local search terms.
Use Headlines and Sub Headlines: One of the first things a competent SEO agency or consultant will tell you is that they need to reorganize the content on your website. The way Google and other search engines determine the subject of the content on your site is through your headline tags. For example, if there is a paragraph about the best way to use your widgets, make sure there is a bold headline above it that says “The best way to use our widgets”. Google can actually determine the subject of your site by reading these headline tags and evaluating if the copy that follows is relevant. To learn more about formatting text check out this article.
Limit the Flash: Though Flash technology has fallen in and out of favor amongst web designers, it is still very prevalent on the web. One thing remains true; search engines hate Flash. Why? Well, they can’t read it. If you have a fancy Flash element on your website the search engine has no way to determine what the Flash is about. Surprisingly, many businesses still create their entire website in Flash. Yes, it looks pretty but it will have a difficult time ranking well in search engines. Furthermore, the hundreds of millions of iPhone users out there will not be able to see your site due to the iPhone/Flash restriction. Instead of your website, the user will see a little blue Lego-like icon with a question mark on it. Not very effective.
I hope this brief overview of good SEO practices was helpful. To read more, check out this artifcle on pleasing Google.
