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SEO: Optimize Your Web Pages
Published: Sunday, March 28, 2004
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Search Engine Optimization, widely known in the web world as SEO, has gained a lot
of attention in the last few years. SEO techniques are applied to web pages so that they
are ranked higher by the search engines (like Google, Yahoo, AOL etc.) for targeted key word searches.
This article
will provide some tips on how to optimize your web pages for a better search engine ranking.
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Provide navigational links to all your web pages
In order for any search engine to index all the pages of your site, it should be able to find them.
An efficient navigation system is very important in this regard as explained in
this article. Avoid using images, JavaScript or flash
navigation links, because search engines look for HTML link tags for indexing.
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Content is king
Search engines index the content of a website, and the more content you have, the better.
Add relevant content to your website. If your website sells digital cameras, you can
add reviews on the digital cameras that you carry. This will also attract potential buyer
to your website. Usually buyers do research first before they buy online.
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Use keywords in text
In order to target keywords in searches, use the same keywords in the text.
For example, an article on design layout will use the keywords design and layout instead
of using architecture and templates. However, using the keywords repeatedly does not help
either.
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Use synonymous phrases in title, meta tags and headers
Include related words and phrases in page titles, text, and header meta tags. This will
expand the range of keywords that the web page might be listed under. For example,
this page has a title of "Search Engine Optimization - Tips & Tricks", while the article
header is "SEO: Optimize Your Web Pages". This page has been targeted for anyone searching
for either of these words. Search engines value the page title, meta tags and page headers
(within HTML <H1> tags) more than any text in the page.
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Order of keywords in title and content
The order in which the keywords occur in your web page matters in the search
rankings. For example, one of WebsiteGear pages is ranked #1 on Google for the keyword "favicon create",
whereas the same page is ranked #21 when the search keywords are switched to "create favicon".
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Use descriptive links using key words
When linking to web pages within your website, use descriptive words in that link to
describe that page. Advanced search engines use these words as the keywords defining
the content of the page.
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Use key words in file names
Use the keywords that best describe the content of the web page to name the page.
Use underscore '_' between keywords. For example this page is named as seo_tips.asp.
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Submit your site to search engines and directories
Submitting to search engines is not new to webmasters. However, follow all the rules
and regulations of such submissions to each search engine. Your site may be rejected
if it detects spam submissions of your website.
Submit to relevant categories in popular manually edited internet directories like
DMOZ.org, Yahoo.com and Zeal.com. These directories are used by most of the
successful search engines like Google, Yahoo, AltaVista and LookSmart.
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Conclusion
Plan ahead for optimizing your website pages and choose the keywords correctly. Add value to
your website so that visitors find it helpful and link to it from their webpages. Allow
some time before expecting results in the searches. If it is not satisfactory, update
your web pages again.
If you have to hire an external SEO company, search on the top search engines
for keywords such as
"search engine optimizers". Select one from the top 20 in the search results. If
they cannot optimize their site within the top 20, probably they
would fail in optimizing yours too. Read this Google article to
know more about SEO consulting firms.
No one can guarantee the #1 position in a search
engine for your web pages. Even Google is ranked #4 when searched on Google for the
keywords "Search Engine". However, rankings can be increased by tuning your web pages.
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