You want to optimize your site for two basic reasons: to be appear on Page One of the search engines (when your customers search for what you provide). And to be taken seriously as a competitor.
You get "ranked" most high on the list of all results (Page One, hopefully the top 3 spots) because the search engines evaluated your site and consider you relevant to the keywords or phrases you've optimized your site for. You want to be taken seriously as a competitor, even if you get plenty of business from other marketing, because people do due diligence about you. An optimized site proves you are in the game and you deserve to win.
There are two basic worlds of SEO: on-site optimization and off-site. On-site SEO is what you do on your web pages to help the search engines find you, quickly evaluate you, and see that you are relevant to the keywords and phrases you want to be found for. Off-site optimization is what you can do on or about other sites to attract people to your website after you've prepared it with on-site optimization.
The major on-site elements (to be optimized with the most useful keywords and phrases) are: title tags, page names, content, headlines, image tags, and internal links. Every page should have a few links to content on other pages on your site. This shows that your site is lively. It's an interactive resource much used and appreciated by people for its valuable content and material. (Images themselves should be made internal links.)
The more your visitors stay and interact with your site, the more relevant you are in the eyes of the s-engines and the higher they rank you on their list of displayed results. Page One is the goal. The most relevant site wins. (Also important is the number of clicks - the amount of people who like your description on Page One and click to your site.)
The major off-site elements are back-links to your site from highly-ranked web-pages. Effective examples include press release and article sites that are well established and have a high ranking. A little research will lead you to the basic, classic, highly-ranked sites where you can submit press releases and articles with links to your site.
Also very helpful are back-links to you from your other sites where you create fresh content on a regular basis, for instance your blogs and social networking profiles. The s-engines love blogs for their fresh content. There's a great case to be made that a blog is the best format for your business if you want to be highly-ranked. Food for thought.
What about outbound links you might ask? You can omit them altogether as far as their usefulness to your ranking goes. Feel free to post them for all your generous and altruistic reasons. Just know they drain some ranking or "link juice" away from you.
Remember, Relevance is the Coin of the Realm, and Content is King.
When you search for something, you want a site that gives you what you want, right? Google and the other s-engines consider those sites relevant and they put them on Page One. If your content is great, and your site is well optimized both on and off, you, too, can earn the top spots. And that's where you want to be.
Because the vast majority of clicks happen on the top few results on Page One. Those sites are there for a reason. They are relevant and well-optimized. Take the time to make your site the best it can be. Give people what they want and they'll come back for more.
You get "ranked" most high on the list of all results (Page One, hopefully the top 3 spots) because the search engines evaluated your site and consider you relevant to the keywords or phrases you've optimized your site for. You want to be taken seriously as a competitor, even if you get plenty of business from other marketing, because people do due diligence about you. An optimized site proves you are in the game and you deserve to win.
There are two basic worlds of SEO: on-site optimization and off-site. On-site SEO is what you do on your web pages to help the search engines find you, quickly evaluate you, and see that you are relevant to the keywords and phrases you want to be found for. Off-site optimization is what you can do on or about other sites to attract people to your website after you've prepared it with on-site optimization.
The major on-site elements (to be optimized with the most useful keywords and phrases) are: title tags, page names, content, headlines, image tags, and internal links. Every page should have a few links to content on other pages on your site. This shows that your site is lively. It's an interactive resource much used and appreciated by people for its valuable content and material. (Images themselves should be made internal links.)
The more your visitors stay and interact with your site, the more relevant you are in the eyes of the s-engines and the higher they rank you on their list of displayed results. Page One is the goal. The most relevant site wins. (Also important is the number of clicks - the amount of people who like your description on Page One and click to your site.)
The major off-site elements are back-links to your site from highly-ranked web-pages. Effective examples include press release and article sites that are well established and have a high ranking. A little research will lead you to the basic, classic, highly-ranked sites where you can submit press releases and articles with links to your site.
Also very helpful are back-links to you from your other sites where you create fresh content on a regular basis, for instance your blogs and social networking profiles. The s-engines love blogs for their fresh content. There's a great case to be made that a blog is the best format for your business if you want to be highly-ranked. Food for thought.
What about outbound links you might ask? You can omit them altogether as far as their usefulness to your ranking goes. Feel free to post them for all your generous and altruistic reasons. Just know they drain some ranking or "link juice" away from you.
Remember, Relevance is the Coin of the Realm, and Content is King.
When you search for something, you want a site that gives you what you want, right? Google and the other s-engines consider those sites relevant and they put them on Page One. If your content is great, and your site is well optimized both on and off, you, too, can earn the top spots. And that's where you want to be.
Because the vast majority of clicks happen on the top few results on Page One. Those sites are there for a reason. They are relevant and well-optimized. Take the time to make your site the best it can be. Give people what they want and they'll come back for more.