A Guide to SEO For Newbies

Search engines like Google and others similar, are critical to helping people connect with the web businesses they are searching for. There are companies out there that claim to get your page rankings so high that you’ll gladly pay high prices to make it happen. Not every website can or wants to go that route however.

Getting organic web traffic is usually one of the most desirable goals in web promotion. This definition means when someone types in a search engine a word or phrase, these are the websites the search pulls up. This is different than the paid ads you find to the right column, which can be a very expensive route to go. Here’s what search engine optimization comes down to:

1. Content is King. You need real content on your web site; this is content that has real meaning to real people, not just keyword stuffing. Search engines send out programs called web crawlers or web spiders that index web sites. The number one thing those web crawlers are looking for is content. They determine if a web site has content by tracking keyword phrases. This is why search engine optimization usually starts by picking keywords and writing content around them; a lot of web site marketing gurus advocate keyword stuffing well past the point of sanity and effectiveness. Anything more than about 2-4% of the words in an article and the web sites will filter it out it’s too obviously “gaming the system”.

2. Links back to your site from other’s sites provide validation. The more links particularly links that relate to your site’s content, the higher your page ranking will be. Methods to get link backs range from link exchanges with other websites in related topics, to writing articles about the topic you’re dealing with, to social bookmarking sites and such.

3. Updated, and expanding content. You can’t just put a page up and expect to keep the same page ranks. Your site needs to have new material, this is important not just for web spiders, but for human visitors as well. If they can expect to see something new and interesting at least three times a week, they’ll keep coming back and it takes an average of seven visits before someone decides to either post in a forum or buy something in a shopping cart.

4. Web structures that make sense. Your web site should have clearly structured navigational links, your landing page or front page should have links to everything else on the site.

5. Text means everything in web content. Search engine crawlers ignore Javascript, they disregard graphics, and until recently, they couldn’t read text in Flash animations. If the search engine spiders can’t read it, it doesn’t help your page rankings.

The real trick for long haul success to search optimization is to ensure your website is as easy to use as possible. Make it simple to navigate for visitors who want to read about your site and content that makes them come back.