Improving the volume or quality of traffic to a web site from search engines.

Wednesday, November 24, 2010

SEO in a Nutshell in 4 Steps



Even today search engine optimization is often made out to be this ominous entity that's extremely difficult to understand and implement. In reality, SEO comes down to just a few fundamental factors:
  1. Great content
  2. Link building
  3. On-page optimization
  4. Gain reviews from customers
Each of these elements is what helps drive a website to higher rankings within search engines. A continuous campaign to improve rankings by implementing each of these as every aspect of a website is what can truly give websites higher rankings over their competitors.
In this article, you will learn what search engine optimization is in an SEO nutshell.

I. Great Content
Content is what drives the web.
When producing content, every aspect should be rewarding to the reader through valuable information, enticing media, and satisfies the urge to share great information with another. But, alas, great content is much harder to create than simply wiping together a short article, adding in SEO keywords, and sending it out across the net.
To create great content, topics should be researched and crafted to convey a single message without distracting the reader from the main topic. Content should be crafted which can easily be shared with one another as an essential resource for questions and problems others have.
In a nutshell: create content specifically tailored to the topic of each website, include keywords for rank and placement service purposes, and include a call-to-action for readers to share this article with one another.

II. Link building
Search engines, such as Google, place a high value on websites that are being linked to. Part of the reason why link building is so important is the inherent purpose of search engines - to provide the best possible results to its users.
Websites that aren't being linked to tell search engines people don't find the content as worthwhile as, say, a website that has hundreds of backlinks. These backlinks from various sources point out that the website contains information that was both relevant and helpful.
Link building is an essential part of any SEO campaign and not entirely difficult to conduct. Using social bookmarking sites, web2.0 platforms, blogging, guest writing, and various other methods, backlinks can be built in a relatively short amount of time.
The more popular and higher rank other websites are which point back to a website, the higher rankings the website will gain.
In a nutshell: create backlinks daily through a variety of methods that allow adding in a link.

III. On-page optimization
On-page optimization is the crafting of each web page (HTML/CSS) to include the correct hierarchy so search engines can easily understand and index within search results.
The main factors for on-page optimization are:
  • Title tag
  • Heading tags
  • Interlinking
  • Keywords
  • Page load speed
  • Body content
There are many more minute factors that play an overall role with on-page optimization but the previously mentioned are those which have the greatest impact.
In a nutshell: When creating each page and adding content, use keywords within each tag (not overdoing it), create highly focused content, and link to sub-pages through keyword links.

IV. In conclusion
In a nutshell, there aren't many factors to search engine optimization that need to be discussed to ends length. When great content, backlinks, and on-page optimization are formed the website will begin to rank well for whichever keywords it chooses to pursue.
Search engine optimization is an ongoing campaign that should include these items every day. Within due time, websites will rank well when using each of these elements - in a nutshell.