Many of the sites mentioned above accept articles on general topics whereas a few others accept articles only on specific topics like online marketing, SEO and business promotion.
Finding article sites that accept articles on specific topics To find more article websites that accept article submission on your specific domain all that you got to do is search in Google with the following search queries:
In the above search queries the term 'marketing' is your area of expertise or your domain that you can change. For instance: to find websites that accept articles on outsourcing, change the word +marketing to +outsourcing
Other than this you can also use Articles for reprint +marketing Reprint articles +marketing
Where marketing can be replaced by your area of expertise.]]>http://freshtravel.info/mainmessage.php?entry=entry090217-0217352009-02-17T00:00:00Z2009-02-17T00:00:00ZHow To Raise Page Rank One easy way of generating links in involves searching the internet to find relevant sites that are either vertically or horizontally related and asking them for a link exchange. Links brought in this manner are more effective and can help successfully increase the Page Rank. In addition to getting links from websites, getting links from quality directories is another way to increase your link popularity. You can also generate inbound links through article submission and press releases among others.
Some important factors to consider:
1. Try and get High PR Links Quality of back links secured is more important than the mere volume of back links. A link from a webpage having a PR7 will fetch a website more value than 200 back links from a PR3 page. In addition to this the relevancy of links is also taken into consideration by Google in its ranking algorithm. So it important to get back links from related websites (Websites should be related either horizontally or vertically). Getting too many links from unrelated websites is considered by Google as an attempt to unnaturally gather links and the website may be penalized.
2. Avoid Link backs to Link Farms Link Farms are very similar to webrings. Link farms are formed for the sheer purpose of exchanging links and improving the link popularity of participating websites. The downside is that link farms are considered by Google and other major search engines as 'bad neighborhoods'. This means that participating in link farms can get a website penalized to the extent that the site's listing may be removed. So make sure you stay out of link farms and do not link back to any of them from your website.
3. Carry Out Internal Link Text Optimization As mentioned above, page-ranks are specific to a web page and do not apply to the entire website. But this does not mean that a website having 100 odd pages has to secure links for all those 100 pages individually. The best part about Page Rank is that it is passed on from one page to another and this applies to internal pages as well. So in-case a website has a homepage rank of '6' chances are that the page rank will be passed on to the internal pages and all of them might get a PR of 3 to 4. The thing to note here is the linking structure of a website. Page rank can pass from one page to another only if the pages are interlinked. The best way to go about it is by including a Site Map or providing site wide links on a website.
4. Get Links from SEO friendly Directories One way links or links that are not reciprocated are generally given more value as they seem more like a naturally secured link. Links from good directories are hence an excellent means of increasing the page rank and to also get more crawls. OPD is a great directory to start with.
5. Get Links that are Placed Higher Generally in a link exchange campaign websites tend to place outbound links on specially created link pages. The fact to be noted here is that the Page Rank is passed based on the order of links and the number of links on that webpage. So the links on top of the link page will get more PR value in comparison to those at the bottom.
Outgoing links and Page Rank: The supposition that outgoing links can cause PR leakage may be true for all you know. But it would be safe to assume that even if outgoing links do leak PR, the leak is almost insignificant in comparison to the PR gained by a website from an incoming link. One thing that should be taken into consideration is the number of links on a webpage. Google emphasizes that no webpage should have more than 100 hyperlinks.
]]>http://freshtravel.info/mainmessage.php?entry=entry090217-0211152009-02-17T00:00:00Z2009-02-17T00:00:00ZContent OptimizationSearch bots love fresh content and there is no exception here. This is why content optimization plays a major role in any SEO campaign. Content optimization is not a solitary process and involves optimization of the webpage as a whole. This means content optimization can be defined as the optimization of the on-page content in correspondence with other factors like title tags, meta tags, alt tags, web page URL, domain name and internal links.
The process of content optimization 1. Keyword Research Keyword analysis plays a major role in optimizing content and is basically the first and more important step. In a narrow sense keyword research involves researching and finding keywords that people use in a day today context to search over the internet. Hence a keyword research should help a person locate all variations of keywords that people use for searching (a particular product/service/information).
There are many free as well as pay and use tools available over the internet that can help in effective keyword research. Some popular ones are overture and wordtracker. Wordtracker is a pay-and-use tool that offers real user search statistics from many meta search engines like MetaCrawler and DogPile.
2. Keyword Analysis The next step after a through keyword research is keyword analysis. Keyword analysis basically involves finding the right keywords from a bunch of available ones. This involves analyzing the most effective keywords that can generate traffic and at the same time are easy to optimize for. At the end of the day keyword analysis should give access to a set of keywords that are actually used by people and at the same time unique enough to generate highly targeted traffic. Keyword analysis is an extremely important step as wrong keywords can make your SEO efforts vain.
There are many tools available over the internet that help in effective keyword analysis. One very good tool in this regard is offered by Axandra
3. Using Keywords on a webpage When optimizing for content the webpage as a whole needs to be taken into consideration. This involves the on-page content along with title tags, Meta tags, alt tags and the page URL. For on page content optimization the first and foremost step is to find out the keywords that matter most. After this is estimated the keywords are spread out inside the content in the most natural manner. Search bots give more importance to keywords placed in the heading tags and within the first few lines.
A minimum of 200 words per page and proper spreading out of keywords is considered best from the optimization point of view. One must also ensure that the keywords are used naturally within the content. This is important from the usability point of view. To achieve this you can even break up the keywords without changing the order. For instance when using a difficult keyword like 'real estate Florida cheap' you can break it up without changing the word flow as follows;
'Finding real estate in Florida which is cheap requires proper research online.'
Important things to take into consideration for content optimization
Location of Keywords Location of keywords inside the content is very important. In basic search bots tend to give more importance to keywords that are placed within the heading tags and those that appear within the first few lines. Some search bots also give importance to keywords that appear at the end to the content. In addition search engines also place much importance to keywords that appear in bold and italics.
Checking keyword density It is important that keywords are used properly and not exceedingly which could lead to search engine spamming. Most bots today can easily identity pages that are filled with keywords and can even penalize them other than dropping their rankings. This is the reason why it becomes extremely important to manage the right density of keywords on a webpage. A particularly useful tool to analyze keywords is offered by keyworddensity.com
Increasing Keyword importance Keywords that appear in bold or italics are given more importance by search bots. In addition keywords that appear in the heading using heading tags like are given special importance. Search bots also give importance to keywords that appear in links and in the beginning of a webpage.
Ed Kundahl
]]>http://freshtravel.info/mainmessage.php?entry=entry090217-0209092009-02-17T00:00:00Z2009-02-17T00:00:00ZHow to Optimize Title TagsOptimizing the title tags plays an extremely important role in any search engine optimization campaign. In addition to search engine optimization, well written title tags also help you in increasing the usablity of a web page.
Importance of title tags Title tags play three very important roles: * First, title tags are very important from the search engine point of view. Search engines place a great deal of weight on these tags (and use these tags to gather information about an website) in comparison to other website features. * Second, many major search engines such as Google and Yahoo! display title tags of a web page as a heading in their SERPs (Search engine results page) followed by a breif description of the content were the keywords appear. * The third most important fuction of title tags is to help the user in finding out which page he is on. Almost all popular browsers including Microsoft Internet Explorer, display title tags on the top bar as well as the bottom. Firefox 1.0 uses title tags to describe 'tabs'.
Optimizing title tags to get search engine visibilty Title tags are most important when it comes to search engine optimization as all major search engines including Google place much importance on them. In fact, title tags are used by search engines to gather information about a web page. If the title tag does not match the content of the web page then the search engine may not give the page any ranking at all! As title tags and the web page content are two inseparable things, it becomes a necessity to understand what the webpage is all about before finalizing on the title tag text. Title tags should be specific to a single web page and not to the entire website.
Title tags and web page content The onpage content of the webpage is also as important as the title tags and should be optmized properly. There are many factors that need to be taken care of while optmizing webpage content like keyword research, analyzing keyword density, keyword location, headings tags, anchor texts etc.
The one thing which should be common between the title tags and the content of a webpage is the keyword. The challenge here is to find that important keyword from the content. Here's where proper keyword analysis comes into the picture. Proper keyword research should help a person in identifying the most important keyword to be used in the title tags, heading tags, alt tag etc.,and secondary keywords (keywords which can be used additionally). In addition to using the primary keyword as the title, it also makes sense to keep the title as descriptive as possible. This can be done by adding one or two additional words to the keyword making it unique and descriptive. Using a descriptive title will improve the click-through rate in addition to making the webpage more usable. The best way to go about it is to use the same keyword or variation of the same keyword in the url, webpage content as well as the title tags of a webpage.
Mistakes to avoid while optimizing title tags 1. Loading the title tag with keywords This is a major mistake as using lots of keywords would dilute the effect of the title. A title tag can provide the maximum advantage only if it focuses on a specific keyword which is most important as far as the webpage is concerned. In addition to this, loading titles with keywords makes them look unprofessional and difficult to understand reducing the click through rate. Keyword repetition in title tags is another factor that needs to be avoided.
2. Using keywords in the title tags that do not appear in the content Search engines place much important to title tags and treat them as a word that describes the entire webpage. If the title tag uses a keyword that apperas nowhere within the content then the actual meaning of title gets lost. This is the reason why it becomes important to ensure that the title tag corresponds with the content of a webpage.
3. Using title tags that have no meaning or are not descriptive Title tags should be keyword specific, but at the same time they should also convey some meaning. In many cases using descriptive title tags have helped webmasters get better click-through rates even when their page was at the very bottom of the results.
Many users bookmark a page by adding it to their long list of websites on their favorites menu. Almost all broswers use the title of a webpage as the title of the bookmark. So in case of a descritive title the webpage will stand apart from the rest enabling easy sorting and access. In addition descriptive keywords also help the user in finding out which page contains what? For instance, if a person opens ten webpages in ten separate browser windows, then it is the title of these pages that helps him decide what each page is all about enabling easy browsing.
4. Using the same title tags for all pages on a website Title tags are webpage specific and need to be decided based on the webpage content. Hence as the all webpages cannot contain the same content all webpages should never display the same title. Titles make sense only if they are webpage specific. Webpage specific titles help in improving the web usability and also help from the search optimization point of view.
5. Not making use of proper capitalization Using all caps or all small letters in title tags is not advisable. A title tag appears at its best when it makes use of title caps. This means the first letter in each word begins with a captial letter following by small letters. For instance, 'Find Discount Hotels In Florida'
6. Not giving attention to the length of the title tags The length of the title is also very important, though many webmasters tend to ignore this, t. According to W3C the title of a webpage should ideally be less than 65 characters in length (Reference: http://www.w3.org/Provider/Style/TITLE.html). This also makes lots of sense as titles that contain more than 65 characters are generally truncated by search engines making them loose meaning.
]]>http://freshtravel.info/mainmessage.php?entry=entry090217-0208172009-02-17T00:00:00Z2009-02-17T00:00:00ZAnchor Text OptimizationAn anchor text as the name suggests is the name given to a text that carries a hyper link to a webpage. For instance take a look at the following sentence:
Get information on Search marketing here.
In the above sentence clicking on the text 'search marketing here' will take you to the index page of this website. This means the text 'search marketing here' carries a hyperlink to the index page and can be considered an anchor text.
What is anchor text optimization? Anchor text optimization is the process of optimizing anchor texts using keywords to get higher rankings for those keywords in SERPs. Basically any anchor text optimization campaign would involve using keywords to link to pages having related content. All major search engines place huge level of importance to anchor texts in comparison to mere links. When we place hyperlinks on keywords and use them to link with related pages the search bot considers this as additional value to the page. For instance, when the anchor text "search engine optimization" is used to link with a page containing information on search engine optimization, the search bot considers this as an additional indication that the web-page is relevant.
How to optimize for anchor text Anchor text optimization can be done internally as well as externally. Internal anchor text optimization involves linking to web pages within a website from other pages using related keywords as anchor texts. Similarly external anchor text optimization involves getting inbound links from websites, directories, forums and blogs using necessary keywords as anchor texts.
Internal Anchor Text Optimization Internal anchor text optimization refers to optimization within a website. For instance if a webpage has a hyperlink to another webpage then instead of using generic words as the link text (anchor text) one can make use of specific and related keywords. For instance, let's take an example of a website that offers information on search engine optimization especially regarding 'link exchange' and 'anchor text optimization'. Here the page that offers information on 'link exchange' can be linked from the homepage as Get link building information here instead of Get link exchange information here.
External Anchor Text optimization External anchor text optimization involves optimizing anchor text in the inbound links that a site gets. External anchor text optimization can be achieved by the following methods:
1. Link Exchange Exchanging links with related websites and making use of proper anchor text on inbound links is the best way to optimize anchor text. A link from a related site with an anchor text that is again related to the destination page is considered more important by all search engines.
2. Directory submissions Submitting your website in directories is a great way to get quality incoming links. Directories links are generally given more importance by search bots and are crawled more often. Some good directories in which you can consider submitting you site are yahoo! directory, Dmoz , LookSmart, Zeal, joint.com, business.com, allthebizz.com etc.
3. Participating in forums and blogs Participating in forums and blogs by leaving keyword rich links is also a great method of anchor text optimization. Although it is advised not to spam forums/blogs as that might create a bad impression for the website and of-course the links will be removed.
4. Article Submission If you have expertise in your field or area with some moderate writing skills, you can go in for article submission. There are many websites today that accept expert articles and to return the favor allow you to advertise your website/product/service. You can place the back-links using specific keywords that you wish to optimize. One major advantage of submitting articles is the fact that good articles get reprinted quickly leading to a good deal of exposure. Some good websites to which you can submit articles include site-reference.com, goarticles.com, workoninternet.com, amazines.com etc.
]]>http://freshtravel.info/mainmessage.php?entry=entry090217-0207192009-02-17T00:00:00Z2009-02-17T00:00:00ZHow to Optimize Title TagsOptimizing the title tags plays an extremely important role in any search engine optimization campaign. In addition to search engine optimization, well written title tags also help you in increasing the usablity of a web page.
Importance of title tags Title tags play three very important roles: * First, title tags are very important from the search engine point of view. Search engines place a great deal of weight on these tags (and use these tags to gather information about an website) in comparison to other website features. * Second, many major search engines such as Google and Yahoo! display title tags of a web page as a heading in their SERPs (Search engine results page) followed by a breif description of the content were the keywords appear. * The third most important fuction of title tags is to help the user in finding out which page he is on. Almost all popular browsers including Microsoft Internet Explorer, display title tags on the top bar as well as the bottom. Firefox 1.0 uses title tags to describe 'tabs'.
Optimizing title tags to get search engine visibilty Title tags are most important when it comes to search engine optimization as all major search engines including Google place much importance on them. In fact, title tags are used by search engines to gather information about a web page. If the title tag does not match the content of the web page then the search engine may not give the page any ranking at all! As title tags and the web page content are two inseparable things, it becomes a necessity to understand what the webpage is all about before finalizing on the title tag text. Title tags should be specific to a single web page and not to the entire website.
Title tags and web page content The onpage content of the webpage is also as important as the title tags and should be optmized properly. There are many factors that need to be taken care of while optmizing webpage content like keyword research, analyzing keyword density, keyword location, headings tags, anchor texts etc.
The one thing which should be common between the title tags and the content of a webpage is the keyword. The challenge here is to find that important keyword from the content. Here's where proper keyword analysis comes into the picture. Proper keyword research should help a person in identifying the most important keyword to be used in the title tags, heading tags, alt tag etc.,and secondary keywords (keywords which can be used additionally). In addition to using the primary keyword as the title, it also makes sense to keep the title as descriptive as possible. This can be done by adding one or two additional words to the keyword making it unique and descriptive. Using a descriptive title will improve the click-through rate in addition to making the webpage more usable. The best way to go about it is to use the same keyword or variation of the same keyword in the url, webpage content as well as the title tags of a webpage.
Mistakes to avoid while optimizing title tags 1. Loading the title tag with keywords This is a major mistake as using lots of keywords would dilute the effect of the title. A title tag can provide the maximum advantage only if it focuses on a specific keyword which is most important as far as the webpage is concerned. In addition to this, loading titles with keywords makes them look unprofessional and difficult to understand reducing the click through rate. Keyword repetition in title tags is another factor that needs to be avoided.
2. Using keywords in the title tags that do not appear in the content Search engines place much important to title tags and treat them as a word that describes the entire webpage. If the title tag uses a keyword that apperas nowhere within the content then the actual meaning of title gets lost. This is the reason why it becomes important to ensure that the title tag corresponds with the content of a webpage.
3. Using title tags that have no meaning or are not descriptive Title tags should be keyword specific, but at the same time they should also convey some meaning. In many cases using descriptive title tags have helped webmasters get better click-through rates even when their page was at the very bottom of the results.
Many users bookmark a page by adding it to their long list of websites on their favorites menu. Almost all broswers use the title of a webpage as the title of the bookmark. So in case of a descritive title the webpage will stand apart from the rest enabling easy sorting and access. In addition descriptive keywords also help the user in finding out which page contains what? For instance, if a person opens ten webpages in ten separate browser windows, then it is the title of these pages that helps him decide what each page is all about enabling easy browsing.
4. Using the same title tags for all pages on a website Title tags are webpage specific and need to be decided based on the webpage content. Hence as the all webpages cannot contain the same content all webpages should never display the same title. Titles make sense only if they are webpage specific. Webpage specific titles help in improving the web usability and also help from the search optimization point of view.
5. Not making use of proper capitalization Using all caps or all small letters in title tags is not advisable. A title tag appears at its best when it makes use of title caps. This means the first letter in each word begins with a captial letter following by small letters. For instance, 'Find Discount Hotels In Florida'
6. Not giving attention to the length of the title tags The length of the title is also very important, though many webmasters tend to ignore this, t. According to W3C the title of a webpage should ideally be less than 65 characters in length (Reference: http://www.w3.org/Provider/Style/TITLE.html). This also makes lots of sense as titles that contain more than 65 characters are generally truncated by search engines making them loose meaning.
]]>http://freshtravel.info/mainmessage.php?entry=entry090217-0206252009-02-17T00:00:00Z2009-02-17T00:00:00ZSearch Engine Optimization and Marketing Part 2Introduction to common problems There are a number of things that can impede a search engine from indexing your website correctly. The following section will address some of the most common problems.
Frames Frames have always been problematic for search engines when they are crawling for information. Some studies have indicated that users also have difficulty performing simple navigational tasks when they are confronted with a website using frames.
Jakob Nielsen, an acknowledged usability expert, addresses problems with frames in an important article titled: Why Frames Suck (Most of The Time) [http://www.useit.com/alertbox/9612.html/]. One of the peskiest problems with frames occurs when users want to bookmark the Web page. When users save a Web page from a frames website into their browser’s bookmarks they are directed to the website’s homepage whenever they use the bookmark.
Likewise, search engines cannot "bookmark" a deep page (using frames) of your website to reference it within a search listing. Search engines will try to browse through the site and look for individual pages they can refer to, but users that follow search results can then get trapped without navigation! So, search engines prefer to avoid ranking frames-based sites altogether.
Only if there are some compensating factors (like substantial popularity) will a frames site perfom well with the search engines. We recommend avoiding frames if you want good visibility in search engines. There is a work-around for frames but problems remain. A clever developer can use Javascript and re-fetch content pages when search engines index individual pages from a frames site. This solves part of the equation. Still, getting those pages indexed and ranking well is a bit of a problem.
Some search engines record content in an alternate container called NOFRAMES. NOFRAMES is meant for browsers that don't support frames technology. Text and links in NOFRAMES can help a search engine index a frameset document. However, a frameset document for every page of your site can be unwieldy.
The HTML code looks like this: <noframes>Place content here</noframes> Browsers – and search engines – not supporting frames, can display the content you place between the two NOFRAMES containers.
The suggested use of this space is to: • Fill the section with the same text that you have on the visible Web page. Use the raw text without images – but do not use any text that is not visible to the users. • Remember to add links in the NOFRAMES container too that can be followed by search engines. Use the same navigational links as you do on the page you show your visitors but remember to keep them as normal text-links.
Using these suggestions is not a guarantee that your Web pages will get indexed and rank well. Many search engines will not read the content nor follow links in the NOFRAMES-section.
Dynamic websites and Web pages Dynamic Web pages usually contain content (e.g., images, text, form fields, etc.) that can change/move without the Web page being reloaded. These pages are often produced on-the-fly by server-side programs.
A traditional static website is made up of a number of individual files usually ending with .html. For example, index.html, products.html etc. Each page is a unique file and usually has unique “static” content.
On the other hand, a dynamic website very often only has one or a few files –-called “templates.” The template dictates how to present the visible content but contains no content itself. All the content is stored in a database. To show a page on a dynamic website your template code knows what to load from the database. Technically, that is done by adding “parameters” to the url while browsing page to page.
If the template is called: pages.asp and you would want to load the content with ID #54 the URL could end up looking something like this: www.YourDomain.com/pages.asp?page_id=54
This seems fairly simple, but can get very complicated when many parameters are used to support the navigation of the underlying database. The same URL with a few more parameters may look like this:
This more complex URL (Web address) makes it difficult for search engines to crawl. There is simply no way for a search engine to ascertain which parameters identify a new page and which parameters are just a sort order of the content, a navigation setting or something else that does not justify indexing the page as a unique Web page.
There are other complicating factors related to having dynamic websites and websites built on content management systems indexed in search engines. This tutorial is unable to cover all of them.
There are a growing number of tools, techniques and services to help get dynamic websites indexed in the search engines. For further information on how to get your dynamic website indexed we recommend that you hire an experienced search engine optimization expert with expertise in these areas. Most often it takes a closer examination of your website to determine the best strategy.
Flash Search engines do not read Flash files; therefore, content and links that you place in any of these formats will not be accessible to search engines.
You can read more about Flash, Macromedia and Java Applets in the Links and Navigation section.
Java Applets and other client side applications. Search engines basically read regular text on a Web page. They do not read text or follow links in Java Applets or any other formats that require the user to have a program, run-time environment or plugin installed.
IP-delivery, agent-delivery and personalization It has become increasingly popular for websites to implement varying forms of personalization for their visitors. These websites gather numerous pieces of information about individuals which can influence the way they will serve Web pages to individual users.
A simple example is a server-side program that checks what browser people are using, and serve up a specially tailored version for that browser. The same kind of program can also be used to check if people have specific plug-ins installed so that they get a version of the website they can read.
A more advanced use would be to check what country the user is coming from to serve a local version of a Web page. Some portals, search engines and cross-national websites have employed these techniques. There are many legitimate reasons to do so including business strategies, marketing, and legal issues with products only allowed in certain countries.
Growing sophistication in personalization is evidenced by some of the larger e-commerce websites that track a variety of individual information, like purchase history, buying behaviors, useage patterns, etc.
Cloaking Similar techniques for tracking information about website visitors can be applied to the search engines that crawl a website. A Web server can detect a visit from a crawler and selectively serve different content. This technique is referred to as “cloaking”.
There may be some legitimate reasons to use cloaking. However, in most cases search engines do not like the use of cloaking and it is considered a spamming tactic. We recommend that you do not use cloaking unless you have a very good reason to do so, that you fully master the necessary techniques and that you understand the possible consequences.
Cookies A cookie is a small text file that a web server can save in a users’ browser for later retrieval when that same user has a subsequent visit. It can be used to store log-in information or other preferences to make it easier or better for users to use a particular website.
Cookies are safe to use in the sense that they cannot be read or shared across different users or websites. If a cookie is set on a browser then the website that wrote it is the only website that can read it. Also, other users of a website cannot get to the information in my cookie – it can’t be transferred or shared. Important to note is that Spiders do not accept cookies. Therefore, if your website uses cookies you have to make sure that all of the Web pages that you want to have indexed can be accessed without accepting the cookie.
Tip: You can turn off cookies in your own browser to test if your website can be accessed without them. Refer to your manual or help files of the browser you are using. This information can usually be found in “advanced options”.
Submit and index pages Introduction Search engines do not always include all Web pages from a website. Usually they will only include a sample of your pages – the ones they determine to be most valuable.
Some of your Web pages will be more important to have indexed than others. A product information page is far more important to have indexed than a contact form, as it is more likely someone will search for your products than your contact form texts.
Search engines do not always find the right pages to index by themselves. Sometimes they need a little help and guidance. In this section you will learn how to submit your Web pages to search engines to get them indexed.
Introduction to submission Most search engines advertise a free feature to submit your website by adding your URL. Submitting a website to the search engines is not guarantee that it will be included in the Index. Unfortunately, a significant volume of undesirable websites are submitted in this fashion. Therefore, the search engines will generally evaluate a candidate website, before including it in their Index.
How to submit to search engines Most search engines have a form you must fill out to submit your website. You will usually find the link in the bottom of the front page labeled “Add URL”. Generally you should only submit your front page as the search engines will follow links from that page to the rest of your website.
However, if you have important sections of your website that are not directly accessible through the regular navigation you can also submit them. If you have a site map (a page with links to all the Web pages on your website) you can submit that too, to help the search engine spiders find all of your content.
TIP: The easiest way to get your website into the search engines is by having it included in the major directories, such as Yahoo and ODP. Many directories are used to provide input to the search engines. Most search engines will consider a website that is included in the major directories to be of higher value.
Do not over-submit You should never submit a Web page to a search engine if it is already indexed. Some questionable SEOs will recommend that you resubmit your Web pages on a regular basis to keep your rankings. This is simply not true and can cause undesirable results.
You can buy software or services that make it easy for you to submit all of your Web pages to hundreds of search engines as often as you like. BUYER BEWARE, do not use such programs or services!
The reality is that there are only a handful of major search engines and directories that serve the vast majority of all search users – either directly through their own search portals or through distribution of their indexes to other portals.
Paid Inclusion (PFI) programs Some of the search engines (e.g. Yahoo) and their Partners offer a commericial service to submit your Web pages. This is a time-tested service that offers some measureable benefits. You can pick exactly the pages from your website you want to have indexed, including deep, dynamic pages. As long as you have the direct address (URL) to the page, you can have it included through a Paid inclusion program. Generally, these programs offer some ancillary benefits, like regular refreshes, performance reporting, etc. The Yahoo Search Submit Basic program is such a service.
Excluding pages from getting indexed Introduction to exclusion of Web pages There are instances when you may not want a website crawled and indexed by the Search engines. This can be accomplished with one of the following methods: • Robots.txt • META robots code
Robots.txt Robots.txt is a file that provides instructions for all robots that attempt to crawl your website. It is placed in the root directory of your Web server. The file uses a simple syntax to exclude specific types of user agents from parts of your website. You can either exclude specific search engine spiders or all spiders. To exclude all search engine spiders as well as all other robotic user agents from all directories on your web server, the robots.txt file should contain the following:
User-agent: * Disallow: / Note: This would disallow everything including your home page!
TIP: We recommend that you validate your robots.txt file before uploading it. There is no way to predict how a search engine will interpret a robots.txt file with errors.
META robots META robots is a container that you can place in the HEAD container of your HTML documents. You can use the META robots container if you don’t have access to your web server’s root directory or if you want to exclude single pages on your website. You can read more about how to use the META robots code at http://www.searchtools.com/robots/robots-meta.html
FAQ Can I pay the search engines to improve my rankings? No, major search engines like Yahoo do not sell improvement of rankings. Some of the search engines have inclusion programs in which you pay to get included in the index but you are not guaranteed a specific ranking.
Furthermore, you can buy sponsor links and keyword targeted banner ads in most major search engines and this way get a premium position for your favorite keywords. However, don’t confuse this with the regular search results as such listings are clearly labeled as ads – separated from the free search results.
Why do my Web pages not rank well? Unfortunately there is not one simple answer to that question. The first place to start would be with a question: “For what keywords?”
Maybe you have been unrealistic about the keywords you are targeting. Maybe the competition for the keywords you are trying to rank well for is just too high. You should probably not expect to rank as number one for “Microsoft”, just because your online bookstore has a used book about Windows XP on stock, just as you should not expect to get top rankings for broad competitive terms such as “Travel” and “Mortgage”.
Be realistic about your goals! If that’s not the problem then maybe you need to optimize your website further. This tutorial can serve as a good starting point for the basic things to learn. If and when you want to learn more we recommend that you visit us often as we will be posting more information on a regular basis and recommending other good sites for specific topic information.
I have paid for inclusion, why do I not rank better? For those search engines that offer this type of program you are guaranteed a fast inclusion and refresh in their index. However, you are not guaranteed top rankings for your keywords. That alone is determined by the search engine’s relevancy algorithms.
How deep do search engines browse my website? There is nothing to keep search engines from reading and indexing content on your website – even in very deep directory structures. There are no set rules on how deep search engines go. In some cases – with some websites - they might go deeper than in others.
Generally a good internal link-structure will help you get as many pages as possible indexed. If you have valuable pages buried deep down in sub-directories it might be worth linking directly to them from other pages higher in the directory structure, to “point out” to the search engines (as well as human visitors) how good these pages are.
However, we recommend that you do not put your most important content in deep sub-directories. You should place your most important pages in the root, or in a directory directly below the root, as in the example below.
What do the search engines consider spam? There are unfortunately not any agreed standards on this topic. However, there are a few basic rules that you should follow to stay out of trouble. Do not … • repeat keywords over and over just to get better rankings • target Web pages to keywords that are unrelated to the exact Web page • use hidden text or links on your Web pages • submit Web pages that are already indexed • participate in link-exchange programs to boost Link popularity • link to criminal, illegal or very offensive websites We recommend that you look at the search engines ‘Help’ pages for more information. Many of them have published guidelines on the web for what they consider to be spam.
TIP: If you are ever in doubt that what you are about to do is spam, don’t do it! Instead, study and investigate the technique or method further. Do not always blindly trust what people tell you in public forums – use your own judgment and common sense. If something sounds too good to be true it probably is. Easy tricks never work in the long run.
Can search engines index my dynamic website? Most search engines will have difficulties interpreting a dynamic website. Dynamic websites generally have a much more complex structure, which can easily make the search engine spiders get lost or confused trying to read and browse through such websites. When a spider becomes confused it messes up the index, so most search engines tend to stay away from dynamic websites.
However, if you are using Pay For Inclusion or Trusted Feeds you will be able to tell the search engine exactly what URLs you want indexed and thereby making it safe for the search engines to spider those Web pages.
There are also a number of other solutions you can implement to improve the search engine friendliness of your dynamic website. It is however beyond the scope of this tutorial to get into the details of these methods …
You can learn more about dynamic websites in the Optimization section of this tutorial.
Can you tell me how the search engine algorithms work? No, the algorithms are well kept secrets of the search engines. However, there are a lot of similarities in the way they work that we recommend you study further if you want to improve your rankings.
The number of daily visitors from search engines has dropped – why? Search engines are constantly adding new pages to their indexes and changing the algorithms to improve search results. That is part of the job of maintaining a good search engine. If the number of visitors you receive has dropped the reason could be that you do not have as good rankings as you did before or that less of your Web pages are included in the search engine indexes.
If there have been a lot of new Web pages added within your category it will be harder for you to rank well. In that case you may have to optimize your Web pages further to keep decent rankings for your most relevant keywords.
But the drop in visitors can also be due to changes in search trends. If you have a website that sells Christmas decoration you will most likely (hopefully) get a lot of search visitors in December. But you should not get surprised, or blame your rankings, if you experience a dramatic decrease in traffic by mid January and February.
Searches for ski-tours, summer vacations, camping, boating, swim suites and fur coats all have their own season. People search for what they need – when they need it.
Help! My site got dumped – what do I do? First, make sure that your website is actually not in the index any more, what search engines it has been dropped from and how many pages were lost – if not all. It may be that your website was not excluded at all, but your rankings just changed a bit. If that is the case you will have to analyze why that is and make the necessary changes to your website or search engine optimization strategy.
If some, or all, of your pages have been excluded from a search engine there can be several reasons for that. Most commonly it is because your web server was down the last time the search engine spider was trying to browse your website. If that is the case then you should not worry – the next time the spider is out it will most likely pick up your site again and re-index your Web pages.
It is not very often that a website gets banned by search engines. Compared to the billions of Web pages that do get indexed, it’s only a small fraction of sites that search engines chose choose to permanently exclude from their indexes. These include extreme adult sites, hate, violence, racism - sites that most of us can agree search engines should not link to. In some cases search engines also ban websites that have been taking radical steps to manipulate their rankings.
If you have been optimizing your website to the limit and suspect you have been banned for crossing the line then you should contact the search engine for verification. In some cases you can get back in if you make the necessary changes to the website and promise not to mess up again.
Conclusion SEO and SEM in general are not for the faint of heart. It is a process that takes knowledge and continued education-however, there are fundamental things that site owners can do or ask their webmaster to do.
Long term commitment, consistency and persistence with a touch of patience will get you to where you want to be.
We recommend using the correct tools for the job-Google and Yahoo are putting more emphasis on the structure of the url and other onsite and offsite factors relating to your shopping cart software or content management software. You need to use the latest search engine friendly shopping cart and website content management software that has these features already built in. You want to be better than your competitors, better optimized, using the best tools available to increase your return on investment. Successful online businesses start their online Holiday marketing and software implementation plans in March. A good solid search engine marketing plan should start as early in the year as possible.
If you need any help with your search engine optimization, search engine marketing or pay per click plan, or would like to upgrade to one of the best shopping cart software and website content management software platforms available, please contact one of our Internet Marketing Specialist at our toll free number, 866.864.2836, or email us and we will contact you at your convenience.
Ed Kundahl
]]>http://freshtravel.info/mainmessage.php?entry=entry090217-0205232009-02-17T00:00:00Z2009-02-17T00:00:00ZSearch Engine Optimization and Marketing Part 1Article on Search Engines and Directories Search engines and directories can be one of the most effective ways of attracting interested visitors to your website. Learning this process can be a challenge because of the misinformation that has been perpetuated over time. Search engine and directory systems are constantly changing. Optimization techniques that worked five and ten years ago may no longer be valid. This document has been created by search marketing experts with the most current information available and is a proven approach to effectively promote your website through search engines and directories.
Search engines and directories can be one of the most effective ways of attracting interested visitors to your website. Learning this process can be a challenge because of the misinformation that has been perpetuated over time. Search engine and directory systems are constantly changing. Optimization techniques that worked five and ten years ago are no longer valid. This series of Featured Articles have been created by search engine marketing experts with the most current information available and is a proven approach to effectively promote your website through search engines and directories.
Introduction to search engines
Search Engines, Directories and PPC Engines
Search Engines are usually categorized in the following groups: 1. Search engines (crawler-based) 2. Directories 3. PPC engines (pay-per-click)
Search engines like Yahoo use sophisticated computer programs – called “spiders” – to browse the Web, analyze Web pages and programmatically index the content into large searchable databases. Search engines provide a database of website pages that are ranked by popularity and relevance for particular keywords or phrases and are displayed as a list ordered by popularity and relevance. This ranking structure is based on mathematical equations that use many factors to determine Web page popularity and relevance. By understanding these factors you can maximize the traffic and success of your website.
Directories are human powered hierarchical structures of links to websites. The most popular directories are: Yahoo! [http://dir.yahoo.com/], ODP [http://dmoz.org/]
PPC engines are special purpose search engines that offer an auction-style advertising program. Advertisers bid on keywords (or key phrases) for which their Web pages will be found during a search. The term Pay-Per-Click (PPC) refers to the cost of delivering one visitor to your website, known as a “click-through”. Typically, the highest bidder gets the top result, the next highest the second listing and so on. In this article we will be focusing on the natural-crawl Search engines and how to optimize your website, to gain visibility in these search engines and attract more relevant, interested visitors.
Four steps toward search marketing success This tutorial will guide you through four step process for effective search engine optimization: 1. Optimize your website 2. Ensure your pages are indexed 3. Build popularity 4. Monitor and analyze results
Formulate a long term strategy Search engine optimization (SEO) is a journey and requires a longer term view versus a quick fix to your search marketing needs.
There are many campaign strategies that can be utilized to increase the number of targeted visitors your website. Some popular tactics include:
• optimize your website for ranking in the natural listings of search engines by increasing your websites’ relevance through the development of unique, high-quality content; • optimize your website by increasing your websites’ popularity by establishing quality in-links (links to your website); • pay for inclusion in natural listings using paid inclusion programs; • leverage search listings that can be purchased through auctions within search engines supporting PPC programs; and • subscribe to free and paid directories with powerful advertising copy.
This tutorial will focus specifically on search engine optimization (SEO). However, you are encouraged to investigate other viable methods of getting qualified targeted visitors from search engines.
In developing your strategy, you should focus on the methods which are most likely to generate the best results given the budget you have set in terms of money, time and resources. Each method will vary on the quality of visitors. There is not a way to predict the exact solution that is best for your business. It is strongly recommended that you test each method carefully before using your entire budget (on potentially the wrong choice). Take it step by step and see what works on a limited budget before increasing your spend to its maximum.
When optimizing your site for the search engines, it is important to remember that the search engine itself will never buy anything you are selling. Creating a site that is focused on usability and accessibility will greatly increase the chances of your visitors converting to customers. Creating a navigational structure that allows a user to find exactly what they are looking for from any page of the site will ensure a positive user experience. Help visitors make choices by prompting them to perform the action you are hoping for with calls-to-action and benefit statements. Calls-to-action is text or hypertext (links) that guides a visitor to “click here” or “buy x” or “learn about x” and help them understand what choice they should make.
By stating the benefit of the choice the likelihood that they will click through to the appropriate page is even higher. An example of a benefit is “free shipping” or “30 day guarantee.” This whole process is called the path to “conversion” and should be measured and valued to the highest regard. A path to conversion is the path a visitor follows from the moment they enter the website until they perform the action desired by the website owner, known as “converts.”
A general suggestion is to focus primarily on building a usable and professional site while always heeding the optimization suggestions in this tutorial. You will find that many of the features that characterize a usable website (i.e. well thought out navigation) are also key to optimizing your site for the engines.
Be realistic about how much work you are able to do in-house and how much of it you need to outsource. Also, be sure to select methods that match your goals and are within your budget.
Optimizing your website Introduction to search engine optimization Every search engine has a proprietary method of determining the ranking of documents in search results. The ranking is the resulting ordered list that appears when a user enters a word or phrase and submits. These words and phrases are referred to as “keywords” and “key phrases.” An algorithm is (in this case) a complex set of computer-based rules meant to understand which Web pages on the internet are most relevant to a particular user, based on a given query. For obvious reasons, search engines do not publicly reveal the detailed logic behind their algorithms.
There are a lot of similarities in the way the search engine algorithms function, even between competitors. This article will give you an introduction to the most fundamental parts, which should be enough to get you started on the right track.
We will take you through the three most important elements of search engine optimization:
• Iinks and navigation; • text and HTML elements (including Meta Data); and • popularity measurement.
Introduction to search engine spiders Search engine web spiders (also known as web crawlers or web robots) are special purpose computer applications used to gather up-to-date information from the web. Think of a search engine spider as a simple browser (e.g. Firefox), powered by a computer program. It traverses the Internet like a human would do with a browser – just many times faster and fully automated. The web spiders follow navigational links and gather all of the readable information it encounters to be referenced in the Search engine Index. It is critical to understand that the web spiders have some limitations in what they can process. They readily process textual data and can only process some graphical data (images, gif, jpeg, mpeg, etc.) on a limited basis.
Common text elements that are used by the spiders include, page titles, meta data, alt tags, as well as the on-page content.
TIP: It is possible to monitor the activity of the search engine spiders on your website. Most HTTP server access logs include the IP and User-Agent for all requests. You can use this information to determine whether a particular spider has accessed your site and understand what pages the spider accessed and in what order.
Keep your website online It is imperative that your site is accessible 24 hours day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year.
To ensure that their Indexes are up-to-date, search engines visit billions of Web pages each month to capture new information. The search spiders usually only have time to request each Web page once. If your web server is not accessible at the time the search engine spider visits your website, your page(s) will not be included in the database and/or updates to your website will not be captured and subsequently will not be indexed.
If this happens to you, do not panic! Most search engine web spiders crawl the web on a regular basis. If some of your Web pages have been dropped because your server was down, they will probably get back into the index the next time the search engine visits your website.
TIP: There are several online services and software packages available that can monitor your website and report any downtime. If your site experiences drop-outs in search engines it might be a good idea to use one of these services to make sure your web server does not have too many prolonged drop-outs.
Validate HTML HTML code is the most fundamental part of every Web page on the Internet. When displaying your Web page with a browser, you typically do not see the actual HTML code but only the final result – how the Web page appears. Most of the popular web browsers have a feature that will display the actual HTML source that is “behind” the visible Web page.
Most browsers are good at interpreting HTML code, even code that may contain syntax errors. Even with fatal syntax errors some browsers will still show a nice looking page. However, you never know how a search engine spider will interpret the same errors. It may or may not index a Web page with syntax errors. It may just skip the part that uses a wrong syntax or it may skip the entire page. There is no way to predict what the web spider will do when it encounters HTML that it doesn’t understand.
Although, you may want a site that is visually attractive, please keep in mind that search engines spiders are unable to see. Spiders will not appreciate fancy graphics or the use of some techniques, like Frames. Spiders do not translate the HTML code into a visual presentation like browsers do – they simple process and store textual content from the raw HTML code.
If search engines cannot decode your website, follow its links and process the text, you will not get rankings. It’s not enough to verify your Web pages by looking at them in your browser – the HTML syntax needs to be correct. Therefore, it is very important to validate your HTML with an HTML validator.
TIP: There are many commercial products available to do HTML editing and validation. Use them religiously! If you do not have access to any of these validators we strongly recommend you to use the public domain HTML validator at http://validator.w3.org/
Stay away from “alternative-HTML”
Some search engine optimization “experts” will advise you to use non-standard HTML to try and squeeze in extra keywords in hidden places in your HTML-code.
Do not do that! Search engines will penalize websites that use hidden keywords either by de-ranking the websites or removing it completely from their index. Always stick to valid HTML.
Introduction to links and navigation In this section we will look at the most important aspects of search engine friendly navigation and how to build links that will be followed by search engines spiders.
By having a good navigation structure you will make it easier for the search engines to browse your website as well as making it easier for human visitors too.
If it is easy for users to navigate your site they are more likely to become customers. If it is easy for search engines to follow your links it is more likely that they will index many of your website pages.
The more of your website pages that are indexed by the search engines, the more likely it is that one of your Web pages will be found in a search that can lead to a targeted visit to your website.
Use hypertext that can be followed by search engines Search engine spiders will not follow every kind of link that web developers use. In fact, the only kind of hypertext link that you can be certain all search engine spiders can follow is standard hypertext links.
In HTML code, a standard hypertext link is written like this: <a href=”http://www.domain.com”>Link Text</a>
The link will look like this on a Web page: Link Text
All other forms of links can be problematic for some search engines.
TIP: If you are using a what-you-see-is-what-you-get (WYSIWYG) editor, or content management system, it will usually output the correct HTML code for you when you insert a text link. You can verify that it is a valid text link by highlighting the link text in your browser. If you can highlight it letter by letter like most other text on a Web page then the HTML code should be safe.
Image maps or navigation buttons Sometimes designers want to use graphics for navigational links. There are basically two ways of creating such graphical links: • Navigation buttons • Image maps
Navigation buttons are single images that each link to a specific Web page. Most search engines spiders will readily follow this type of link. However, if you want to be absolutely sure that all search engines can properly interpret the images meaning, then utilize the “alt tag” as an added measure.
Image maps can have different areas of one image linking to different Web pages. That is a very common way to build top- or side-navigation bars or country maps to click on. The Image maps which are hypertext based are also good for visitors who do not use a graphic capable browser, or are surfing with graphics turned off to save bandwidth, or they simply do not understand that you want them to click on the image. Individuals who are disabled or blind can use hypertext based links to understand the website by using a reader to “speak” the text on the page as well as to navigate the web. Image maps add complexity that may confuse the search engine spiders.
Flash, Macromedia and Java Applets Flash and Java Applets both require the user to have a special program installed on their computer to be able to open and play the files. Most new browsers come with the necessary programs installed to play the most common file types. However, search engines usually do not open such files.
It is recommended that you build your navigation links without Flash or Java. If you choose to build your Web pages using these techniques, you should only serve the high-tech version of your website to users that have the right plug-ins installed and have a low-tech version ready for all others. The low-tech version should include regular text-based links. This will work well with the search engines as well as the users that do not have these plug-ins installed. Javascript can be used to help browsers detect if a plugin is needed to display these parts of the site.
Javascript and DHTML Javascript is widely used to perform simple client side operations (such as adding an item to a shopping cart). The script is loaded into the users’ browser along with the HTML and can then be executed without having to contact the server again. This works well, especially, if you utilize shopping carts and dynamic navigation schemes. However, be aware, search engine spiders do not read Javascript!
It is very important that your main navigation is NOT purely Javascript, alone. If you choose to use Javascript for your main navigation be sure that the same links are also available as standard text links, in a sitemap or urllist.txt file.
Non-HTML formats (PDF, MS Word etc) Even though some search engines have begun to read and index non-HTML file formats such as Microsoft Word, Microsoft Excel and Adobe Portable Document Format (PDF) files, none of the search engines will follow links within these formats. If you want search engines to follow links on your website they should always be placed in your regular Web pages – the HTML documents.
It highly recommended that you NOT place important content in these types of formats alone. It will not be found by the search engines. The content should be accessible in HTML format too – as a regular Web page. Some search engines will index non-HTML formats; however, many will encounter more errors indexing them, and in most cases it is easier to have ordinary HTML-pages rank well.
TIP: Sitemaps and other protocols can be created to help search engines easily navigate your website. A sitemap is a file consisting of hypertext-based links for each of your websites’ pages. A URLlist.txt file is similar in nature but comprised solely of URL’s list, one per line. Introduction to Text Content and the Meta data If you want good rankings in search engines, then you need quality content. Content is King! The more quality content you have the higher your chance of being found.
One important element of HTML, the TITLE container, is given special ranking privilege. The text written in the TITLE container of a page appears in its search results (as the link), as bookmarks, taskbar buttons and ultimately in the browser window pane above the FILE menu when viewing the page.
Text in other HTML containers is not as easily seen. Usually, Meta data can only be found by viewing page source code. Meta data is not typically very helpful for ranking in major search engines, but are useful nonetheless and should be added. The two important containers to have for each page are the Meta Keywords and Meta Description.
ALT attributes of your images are hidden from view until you move your mouse to hover the cursor over images. The text will appear in a box if you hover for just a second or two. Be careful to use text in ALT attributes of images that depict the associated image. Using text that is misleading is particularly troublesome because the visually impaired have few other options to know what's going on.
Introduction to keyword research Before you start optimizing your website you need to know what keywords your target audience is using to find your products and/or services. Keywords are the words and phrases that people might use to find your products, brands, services or information, via search engines.
For example, if your business is in the travel industry, text such as: “travel”, “vacation”, and “holiday” would be considered important keywords. This is just a small sample; deep research into the topic of “travel” would probably show more than 100,000 different keywords people use when they search for travel information. Your success in this area will depend on your ability to get into the minds of your target audience, to best predict their search behaviors.
You may find out that the majority of searches for “travel” come from people using combinations of “travel” and a certain city, country or region. Or you may verify that people use “travel” more than “vacation.”
All research and insight should be used to help tailor your Web pages and the way you write your text, titles and META data. If most people in your target audience use the term “travel” to describe your product, then so should you.
TIP: Your most important keywords will often include some of the following: • Your company name if it is important for branding purposes • All product and brand names that are featured on your website • Countries, regions or cities you have an association with – often in combination with the one of the words above • Relevant generic terms for your business, brands or services (e.g. car, house or boat) • Combinations of 2 and 3 keywords – most people search for multi-word phrases rather than single words
Adding keywords to your website Once you have collected the keywords that will help bring targeted traffic to your website, it is time to incorporate these keywords into your Web pages. The question you should be asking yourself is whether or not, adding all these keywords will dramatically change the tone and feel of my site's text? If so, you may want to compromise some to fit the best keywords from the list. You are very fortunate if most of the keywords fit perfectly, or can otherwise easily fit your website.
Some people confuse adding keywords to a Web page with simply adding Meta Keywords. Meta Keywords is Meta data as described above in Text Content and Meta data. Meta Keywords are mainly useful for you and only have a modest impact on rankings in major search engines. They are still good to publish, and you will want a unique list for each page. Use mainly words found on corresponding pages.
Adding keywords to your Web page really means changing the page text. Each element of HTML carries its own level of importance for rankings, and each search engine weighs these factors a little differently. In the next section, we will examine each element of HTML as well as its relative importance for ranking in all major search engines.
When adding keywords to your website, consider your target audience. This is especially important if you are fully rewriting pages to incorporate new keywords. Write text that has a natural style, not overtly dense with a keyword or two packed into every possible spot on the page. Also consider readability and write text that is easily comprehended by those you are trying to reach.
Focus on a few keywords for each Web page In most cases a Web page will only rank well for a few keywords – the ones that the search engines determine to be the most relevant for that page. You cannot expect to rank well for the thousands of keywords if you only optimize your front page. Instead, you have to optimize each of the Web pages on your website that have content people are looking for – the keywords you have developed through your research.
Important places to use your keywords Search engines weigh keywords according to their placement on a Web page. There are some placements that are more important than others – places where you should always remember to use the most important keywords for each Web page. Included are:
• Page titles The title of your Web page is the single most important place to have your keywords. Keep titles concise (65 characters or less), well-written and use natural language. • Headlines Headlines can be important elements on your Web pages. The text found in headlines usually identify a particular theme or section of content. The headlines can be formatted using the HTML elements <H1> to <H6> to be readily recognized by search engines. • Body copy Many people lose sight that the Body copy is the most obvious place a search engine looks for relevant content. You have to use the keywords in the main viewable text on your Web page. This is what the users will actually see, whether processed by humans or machines. Generally speaking, if keywords are incorporated in the Body copy then they should appear on the viewable page. • Links The words on your Web page that are links to other Web pages are weighed heavily. Keep this in mind when building hypertext links from one page to another. • META data META keywords should contain words that appear on the Web page. As a general rule, if it is on the page then the words can be included in the META data. However, the page will not rank well on their use alone. You can read more about META data in the next section. Generally, the search engines will give weight to keywords that are used consistently across all of the areas described (e.g. titles, headlines, body copy, etc.). • ALT text The ALT attribute is also called “alternate text” and is used to describe images. You can see the text when you hover your mouse over an image on a Web page (that is, if they have added the ALT attribute). Some search engines recognize the text in ALT attributes but the weight (importance) given varies from engine to engine.
Key point: Remember to only use keywords that are relevant to each of your Web pages.
Introduction to page titles The page title is the single most important piece of information on your page, when it comes to achieving good rankings in search engines. The words you use in your page title carry much more weight than anything else on your page. Use this limited space wisely.
Page titles are written this way in HTML code: <title>Page title goes here</title> The page title is placed inside the Head tag at the top of the HTML page: <head> <title>Page title goes here</title> </head>
TIP: You should limit your page titles to 50-65 characters as most search engines do not consider more than this amount of characters.
How to write good page titles First of all you should make sure that all your Web pages have unique titles that are highly relevant to the Web page. Go through each of your Web pages and write a title that makes use of the most important keywords.
Keep in mind that the page title is what the users will see as the first line of search results and will become the text link to your Web page. The title text should compel searchers to click on the link and visit your site!
The goal is to make titles that both make people click and that make use of your primary keywords for each page. If you want a page to rank well on “dental services Boston” make sure to use those exact words in the title. For example, a title such as “Dental Services in Boston – open 24 hours a day”, would be appropriate and work well for you (that is, if you do in fact supply 24 hour services).
TIP: Find the right balance between the use of your keywords and writing catchy titles. If you can’t afford a consumer panel, it is suggested that you write a few candidate titles for each page. Do not think too much about each of them – just write them down on a piece of paper. When you have a few good candidates, you can compare them side by side. Usually the best choice becomes obvious. Consider combining some elements from multiple candidate titles, to form a hybrid. Again, always keep in mind that our audience is both the search engine and a potential visitor.
Introduction to META data META data containers are used to help classify or describe data on your page. META data, which means “data about data” – simply means “data about your page.”
META data can help search engines better understand and present links to your website. It is highly recommended that you populate the META data on all your Web pages.
META data containers that are important to use.
You only need to focus on the META description and the META keywords.
They are written this way in HTML code: <META NAME=”DESCRIPTION” CONTENT=”Put your description here ….”> <META NAME=”KEYWORDS” CONTENT=”Put your keywords here ….”> The META data are placed inside the header tag at the top of the HTML code just below the page title: <head> <title>Page title here</title> <META NAME=”DESCRIPTION” CONTENT=”Put your description here ….”> <META NAME=”KEYWORDS” CONTENT=”Put your keywords here ….”> </head>
Adding META data to your Web pages Adding META data to your Web pages will depend on how you maintain your website. You should refer to the manual of the editor or content management system you are using for detailed instructions.
In most cases there will be a simple box somewhere with two fields to fill out: The META description and the META keywords, or just “description” and “keywords.” Your program will usually insert the necessary HTML code in the right place for you.
If you are coding your Web pages by hand or in a simple HTML editor, make sure you do not make any syntax errors. If the META data containers have not been coded correctly search engines will not be able to process them.
Writing good META descriptions The META description is used by some search engines to present a summary of the Web page along with the title and link to the page.
Many search engines use the META description, but not on a consistent basis. Some search engines use text from your Web pages and some use a combination. It is best to make sure you have valid META descriptions on all your Web pages so the search engines that do use them have something useful.
TIP: You should limit your META descriptions to 150-200 characters as most search engines do not use more than this amount of characters.
Writing good META keywords META keywords are very often misused and misunderstood. Some webmasters put hundreds of keywords in this container hoping they will get good rankings for everything listed. This is completely unrealistic. Some webmasters add keywords that have absolutely no relevance to the actual Web page or website. In reality, these practices are more likely to harm your placement in the search engines than help it.
This has caused the search engines to not rely heavily on the META keywords as a determination of what a Web page is about. However, some Web search engines and site search engines do use the META keywords, so we recommend that you craft relevant keywords for all your Web pages.
Just as with META descriptions and titles you have to write a unique set of keywords for each Web page. You should not copy the same set of keywords for all your Web pages.
Do not add keywords that are not 100% directly related to each Web page. In fact, we recommend that you only use keywords that are found in the visual text of your Web pages to have the greatest effect.
It is often discussed whether or not to use commas to demarcate keywords. Some search engines remove the commas before reading the keywords and some search engines may use the comma. To find the exact keyword and keyword phrase matches we recommend using commas, but you should be aware that you should not have too many instances of a single word. Avoid going beyond 3 instances unless absolutely necessary. You will never get penalized for either using or not using commas. Some people use commas because it makes it easier to read in the raw code. This can be helpful if you want to edit the keywords at a later date.
TIP: The limit for the META keywords container is 1000 characters; however, you should never add that many keywords. Include the 3 to 5 most important keywords for each Web page – no more! The more keywords that you use (beyond the 3 to 5) the more diminished their value.
Will META keywords give me top rankings? You will not achieve top rankings on keywords if you only use them in your META data. META keywords are not magic bullets.
In those search engines that use them, it gives you a better chance of ranking with relevant visitors when you have unique, optimized and relevant META keywords for all your pages. Remember, for the best results use only those words that appear in the main body of the page in the META keywords.
Introduction to Popularity When a search engine tries to determine which pages on the Web are the most relevant to a given search query they must consider more variables than just the content on each Web page. The search engines try to incorporate a measure of “popularity”. To this end, most search engines today analyze both link structures and click-streams on the Web to determine the most appropririate Web pages to include in the SERPS.
Getting high quality, relevant websites to link to your website is not something you do overnight. It takes time and effort. By implementing a sound strategy to improve your Link popularity, you can gain a long-term advantage but it is not a quick solution to better rankings. It is like building a good reputation, a trusted brand – it takes time. But once you have accomplished this goal, the ranking benefits are significant.
Getting the right and relevant websites to link to you will not only build your Link popularity, as measured by search engines, it will lead to qualified visitors directly from the referring websites.
Tip: The following list is a quick guide for where to look for relevant links: • All the major and local directories, such as Yahoo or ODP • All trade, business or industry related directories • Suppliers, happy customers, relevant sister companies, and partners • Related but not competing sites
Link popularity Link popularity considers the number of links between Web pages on the Internet. There are two kinds of links to focus on: inbound links (also known as in links) and outbound links - links to your website and links from your website.
Links can be thought of as a form of endorsement. When you link to a website you are endorsing that site and recommending it to your visitors. Likewise, when an external website links to your website they are recommending your site to their visitor. This form of website endorsement adds to the Link popularity score of the website. The higher the number of quality links from other popular websites, the more relevant the destination site is considered. Some search engines consider this the single most important factor in determining relevance.
TIP: Not all links count the same! For example, links from recognized authorities in your industry count more than links from a small private website on a free host. Do not use free submission software or services to submit to hundreds of thousands of free directories and search engines just to gain more inbound links. Links from most of these places won’t do you any good and there is even a risk that some of the links you get this way will harm your rankings.
Do not participate in organized exchanging of unrelated links between websites, to boost your Link popularity factor. Most search engines consider that to be harmful to relevance. Instead, focus on getting inbound links from major directories and important related websites within your industry as they are the only ones that really count.
Internal link popularity Links to and from external websites are important, but not the only consideration when developing your Link popularity strategy. The link structure within your own website has an important role in determining the value of each of your Web pages.
Your Web pages that are most often linked to will gain the most popularity. If one of your Web pages has 500 internal pages pointing to it and another only has only 10, then the first Web page is more likely to be more valuable to users as there are more pages “voting” for that page.
TIP: Typically, a website has a navigation bar of some kind that points to the 5-8 most important sections of the website. This navigation bar will be on all Web pages on the website and therefore boost internal Link popularity on those sections. Make sure to include links to the Web pages you most want to rank well in your cross-site navigation and make sure that the pages the navigation links to have good content. The pages you link to in the navigation bar will be easier to rank well in search engines. For large sites, a dynamic navigation can be a great solution. One that changes based on the page you are currently viewing and offers related areas to further navigate. ]]>http://freshtravel.info/mainmessage.php?entry=entry090217-0204322009-02-17T00:00:00Z2009-02-17T00:00:00ZImportance of Google Page RankPage Rank plays a major role in Google's ranking algorithm, but is not the only factor that decides which pages will rank higher. There are many other factors (other than page rank) that Google takes into consideration to find the relevancy of a page to a search query. This is clearly reflected in the fact that Google also lists pages having a lower PageRank above pages that have a higher PageRank in the SERPs.
The other (other than PageRank) factors that Google takes into consideration to rank web pages are as follows:
* Web Page Title * Anchor texts * Heading Tags * Title/Meta/ALT Tags * Domain names * File names * Directory names * Keyword density * Relevancy of back links/inbound links
As Google keeps changing its algorithm on a regular basis it is impossible to say which of the above factors will be given more importance and which will be not. Though at present it is clear that Page Rank does play a major role in deciding how a webpage will rank. A good Page Rank with necessary optimization of the above mentioned factors could guarantee a higher placement for any web page. ]]>http://freshtravel.info/mainmessage.php?entry=entry090217-0152522009-02-17T00:00:00Z2009-02-17T00:00:00ZGoogle PR
Realistically you are looking to achieve five to eight which is really good. With that said here are some techniques you can use to help increase your Google Page Rank and appear higher on those Google search listings.
Google looks favorably upon websites when other websites link back to them. The more links you have pointing to your site the better and the higher PR those sites have that is even better yet. In other words a website that has a PR of 5 that points back to your website has a higher value than a website with a PR of 1. Although there is nothing wrong with a website that has a PR of 1 pointing back to you, it just means you will need more of them.
There are two types of links that can refer back to your website, they are reciprocal links and one way links. Reciprocal links are links in which a website places a link on their website that points back to yours and in return you put a link to their website on yours. This process is also called a link exchange. You can spend many hours surfing the net and contacting websites individually or you can look up websites that are specifically designed to handle link exchanges. Doing a Google search on the words "Link Exchange" will yield you plenty of results. There are also plenty of free options out there.
One way links are exactly what the term implies. A website has a link pointing back to your website and you are not obligated to return the favor. The best way to do this is through article marketing. That is the process of where you will write an article and post it to various article directories and include a link to your website in a resource box. Then bloggers pick up your articles and post them on their blogs which includes your link. Google looks favorably upon one way links.
Finally, you can partake in discussions related to what your website is about on various social networking sites and message boards. In the discussion areas they allow you to have a signature line. In your signature line you can post a link back to your website. The more active you are in those discussions with relevant information the more often your link will appear.
There are the three ways I recommend to help increase your Google Page Rank. They are all free which is very helpful and regardless of what you read you can not go from a zero to a nine in a couple of months. The Google algorithm does not allow for it. Be prepared to work at it and in no time you can climb up that Google PR ladder.