SEO Basics - 8 Key Strategies For Online Business Success

Written by Leah West


Continued from page 1

5. Relevant Content Make sure that you provide only relevant information to what your actually offering or selling. If you have a bunch of unrelated info on a wide range of topics thanrepparttar search engines will have a harder time pinpointing exactly what it is your site is about. So if your selling golf stuff stick to golf content, don't throw in articles or links about scuba diving.

6. PageRank This is still a relatively new term and applies to an algorithm that google's search engine uses. Other search engines use similar strategies to google's PageRank also.

Basically PageRank is used to define how popular your website is. The more relevant inbound links you have coming into your websiterepparttar 127733 higher your PageRank will be. Google also has a toolbar that you can download for free that will show you a site's PageRank. The best way to go about getting inbound links is to find related websites with a PageRank of 5 or higher. Then asking them to include a link to your site (giving themrepparttar 127734 proper code to paste in).

Another way you can receive a higher PageRank is to have a ton of content on many different pages and then linking allrepparttar 127735 pages together in a way that will raise your PageRank. With that said this type of strategy will not boost your PageRank tremendously, so if your site doesn't contain thousands of pages don't stress over it. It is important though to link strategically with keywords betweenrepparttar 127736 pages of your site.

You can download google's toolbar at http://toolbar.google.com/

7.

This is an HTML header tag used to define size of text withinrepparttar 127737 tag. Search engines place more importance on text that is placed withinrepparttar 127738 H1 tag. It's like tellingrepparttar 127739 search engines that 'hey this text is important to my site'. The problem is that it can look unsightly. There are ways around this if you know about CSS styles, but for this basic intro article just know that inrepparttar 127740 end most people won't be bothered by howrepparttar 127741 heading looks, and it will makerepparttar 127742 search engines like you more.

8. Creating Credibility An often overlooked part of free publicity for your website is writing free articles like this one that relates to your intended audience. There are many websites onrepparttar 127743 internet where you can submit your articles for other people to place on their websites. I even employ this same strategy for my website. It's really a win win situation. They win because they get quality relevant content for their site and you win because your name and website info is included atrepparttar 127744 bottom ofrepparttar 127745 article, driving traffic to your site.

You increase your inbound links (PageRank) and provide free publicity for your website. It gets your name out there branding you an expert in your field of expertise and provides free web traffic to your site.



Leah West

http://www.westmarketing-design.com Providing complete search engine optimized website design and internet marketing services for your small business success. Sign up for my Fr*ee ezine at http://www.westmarketing-design.com/ezinesubscribe.htm


Designing a Website So the Search Engines Will Like You

Written by Leah West


Continued from page 1

**More Places for Keywords**

There are other places that search engine spiders look for keywords besides your website copy. If at all possible try to get a domain name with one of your keywords in it. For instance if you sell dog collars, a name you might want for your website would be www.dogcollarsales.com or something like that. It might take some thinking and some time to come up with a related name that someone hasn’t already taken, but it can be done.

Another good place for keywords is in your page title. Instead of puttingrepparttar name of your business which most people won’t know, instead place a keyword rich sentence or phrase. Usingrepparttar 127732 dog collar business example again here is a title page you could use.

Dog Collars – We sell dog collars and other products for your beloved pet.

It clearly tellsrepparttar 127733 search engines whatrepparttar 127734 page is about. Remember thatrepparttar 127735 title of your website is indexed byrepparttar 127736 search engines and is part of what is shown to someone who is searching on that keyword.

So if I typed in dog collars into my search engine,repparttar 127737 title from above and my meta tag description would show in my search results. Make sure you put some thought into your title.

This rule also applies to your meta tag description which is also viewed when a search engine pulls up your site. Make it only one or two keyword rich sentences. The meta tag keyword has less impact today then it did a few years ago, but I still recommend adding a few keywords. Don’t go overboard and write out 50 keywords or your site will be considered spam torepparttar 127738 search engines.

Most websites that are designed today rely heavily on graphical content and not much else. Another tip on keyword placement is to try to place a keyword rich sentence nearrepparttar 127739 very top of your page. Some people have spots for banners and such atrepparttar 127740 top of their pages, this isrepparttar 127741 same kind of idea and can be made to look pretty and not out of place. This is important becauserepparttar 127742 search engine robots start atrepparttar 127743 top of your page and work down. The closer torepparttar 127744 top ofrepparttar 127745 page you have keywordsrepparttar 127746 morerepparttar 127747 search engines will think your page is relevant.

**A Frontpage Trick**

Search engine spiders will look at a block of text and if any words or phrases are typed in an H1 size then they consider that phrase to be ofrepparttar 127748 utmost importance torepparttar 127749 page. This is a great place to have a keyword look very important torepparttar 127750 search engines.

Now for those of you who don’t know, an H1 size is pretty big and would definitely stand out on your page and can oftentimes look a little ugly. There are ways around this if you know CSS well, but if you are designing your site yourself and have no clue what CSS even is then I can help you.

*This tip is only for those of you who are using Frontpage as your web editor.*

You can showrepparttar 127751 search engines thatrepparttar 127752 text is in an H1 size, but then changerepparttar 127753 size ofrepparttar 127754 text back down to whatever size you want instead. Here’s how you do it.

In Frontpage selectrepparttar 127755 text you want to use and set it to an H1 size. Then go over torepparttar 127756 font size drop down and change it to whatever size you want to use. It’s that easy.

Now one drawback to using this technique is that there will be empty space aroundrepparttar 127757 phrase that is designated as an H1 size. Basically it is still taking uprepparttar 127758 same amount of room it normally would, it just doesn’t look so blatantly obvious. This technique is best used for titles of paragraphs or break points in paragraphs, so that it won’t look weird to your visitors.

**The ALT Tag**

This design tip is a pretty clever way to get an extra keyword or two into your site. The ALT tag is an HTML tag that is used when you want to give a written description for a graphic element onrepparttar 127759 page. It was designed initially so that if someone couldn’t download your pictures, they could see an alternative description in text describingrepparttar 127760 picture.

Instead of describingrepparttar 127761 picture you can place a keyword inrepparttar 127762 alt tag instead. Here’s an example of whatrepparttar 127763 HTML code would look like.

img border="0" src="myimage.jpg" width="640" height="150" alt="keyword phrase"

These are just a few proven techniques when designing your site to improve your search engine ranking.

Leah West

http://www.westmarketing-design.com Providing complete search engine optimized website design and internet marketing services for your small business success. Sign up for my Fr*ee ezine at http://www.westmarketing-design.com/ezinesubscribe.htm


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