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Search Engines [SEO]

Search Engine Optimization

De-Mystification

While there’s a lot of mystique surrounding search engine optimization, the concept is really not mysterious or difficult to understand. SEO is the process of making various types of changes to your site so that it ranks higher in search engines when specific words or phrases are searched for.

Before we outline some strategies, ask yourself these questions:

  • Is your website complete? Do all the pages have complete content? Has the first revision of the design been completed?
  • Have you made your first sale?
  • Have you had others review your website for feedback?
  • Have you set up and tested your e-mail marketing system?

If you answered no to those questions, stop worrying about the search engines.

Obtaining list subscribers, processing a sale [or two] and informing people are your top priorities. Once you’re there, then you can re-think page titles and research Google keywords to use on your site.

You can always resubmit your website to Google to crawl for changes.

Ok, now that that is out of the way, continue reading to learn what to keep in mind while building your site.

Basic SEO Strategies

Some simple ways to improve your SEO are as follows:  

Use relative keywords throughout your site’s every nook and cranny, especially the words used for links, the text describing images, the titles of pages, posts and paragraph headers inside pages and posts. The keywords that you use on your site should be search terms. What words would someone type in the search bar when looking for information in a topic?

If you need helping figuring out what people are typing, use Google’s Keyword Tool.

Your paragraph headers are crucial places to use keywords. The text you use “Heading 1” for or <h1> in the code.

heading 1Also make sure to update your website often with useful knowledgeable information to keep the clients that you have gained.

Fresh content keeps your readers coming back. Return stops on your site are just as important as the very first visit!

Creating “obvious” URLS or Permalinks with keywords is another great way to make sure that your website is being seen by search engines.

After it’s all said and done, don’t stress about SEO, about terms you don’t know or about percentages. If you’re starting out, put your best foot forward, title things appropriately and move on!

SEO is just one method to gaining traffic. If you have ferocious fans who share your content to every living soul, it won’t matter what robots see on your site. Chip away at SEO, clean up a few headlines on your site and move on.