There is so much misinformation floating through internet regarding search engine marketing and optimization that it’s important to shed some light on a few common errors and misconceptions. The following list highlights some of most critical issues involved in determining success or failure of a web site’s search engine optimization and marketing strategies.

1. Lack of "Search Friendly" Content. Every week I review web sites with no real search engine indexable content. Web pages composed mostly of graphics, flash and other bells and whistle are commonly over-looked by search engines. Search engines determine what content is of value per web page based on text used on that page. A truly optimized site should contain at least 200 words of keyword-dense text. There is some debate among experts on exactly how many words should be used, but generally 200 words will suffice. As a point of reference this paragraph contains about 200 words. It is equally important for text content to contain keywords that match page titles. For example, a site selling peanut butter owned by a company called "ACME Foods" might have a title of "Acme Foods, Inc. Wholesale Food Products". We have to consider how many people are likely to search for term "Acme Foods, Inc. Wholesale Food Products" it is much more likely that people will search for term "peanut butter". Knowing this, we can say with confidence that it would be a wiser choice to title a page, "Peanut Butter, ACME Foods" and page content should reflect this same keyword strategy.

2. Insufficient Link Popularity. Search engines make every attempt to qualify results which are displayed in search results. One of ways that they do this is by tracking number and quality of incoming links to a web site. A site with a large number of incoming links from quality sites is given a higher ranking in search results. This is an important consideration that is sometimes over-looked by those attempting to market web sites. Services that promise to link your site to thousands of other sites are far from productive; in fact they can sometimes do more harm than good. Most search engines these days consider services like this to be spam, so called "link farming" and often give sites with these types of links a low ranking or drop them all-together from search results. Incoming links to a site that compliment it and are relevant to site contents are golden and can greatly boost a site's ranking. Google's page ranking system is a good example. A site with a page rank of 1 if given a link from a site with a page rank of 8 can see its page rank boost to 4! Link popularity is one of most time consuming and difficult aspects of search engine optimization. It's no wonder that many of search engines give so much importance to this web site measurement.

3. Lack of Keyword Research And Updates So, you have a web site. Do you know what pages in your web site are generating most interest? Do you know what terms people are searching for that result in them finding your site? Probably not. Let’s use peanut butter analogy again. You own a web site that sells peanut butter. You spend some money on paid search advertising, logically; you assume that key phrase "peanut butter" is a prime candidate to target. What happens? usually one of two things, one, term peanut butter is such a popular search term that thirty million other web sites are competing for same key phrase. Two, term peanut butter is so unpopular that it’s unlikely that it's searched for more than once in this lifetime. Proper keyword research can solve these problems. Let’s say for sake of argument that keyword research is performed and that it is determined that a significant number of people are searching for "organic peanut butter". It just so happens that our peanut butter company manufactures a whole line of organic, all natural peanut butter. We have discovered a niche. The right amount of people searching for specific product that we want to sell. It's perfect match. So, what must be done to capitalize on our findings? First we optimize our web pages for our target keyword, we change title, and content so that they include term "organic peanut butter", then we scrap all of paid search advertising that wasn't working and focus on targeting our "organic peanut butter" market. The point is, successful search engine marketing relies on constant research and updates internet is fluid and evolving. What works today might not work tomorrow, we have to be able to identify strengths and weaknesses in our internet marketing campaigns and must be prepared to research, update and adapt.

4. Designing First, Optimizing Later I have seen this mistake repeated hundreds of times. Even experienced web designers fail to consider results of design decisions on search optimization until it’s too late. What is point of spending thousands of dollars for a well "designed" web site if nobody ever sees it? Consult a search engine specialist early in design process. Even if your web site marketing strategy relies heavily on paid search advertising a consultation with a professional optimization expert may expose flaws in your site's layout. Points in flow of information that tend to cause users to lose interest or become confused may become apparent, better to address these issues early on.

5. Relying Too Heavily On Paid Search Advertising This is a mistake made by Fortune 500 companies and small businesses alike. The fact is that most businesses, small and large aren't getting it right. The rationale is that since search advertising can be purchased it isn't necessary to focus on search optimization techniques. On surface this might make some sense, you can buy certain keyword phrases that people are searching for, so why bother optimizing your site for search engines? For a company with a huge internet advertising budget this means spending huge amounts of money to drive traffic to their sites, when, if their site had been properly optimized from beginning, these costs might be half as much for same amount of viewers. For many smaller businesses trying to compete in internet marketplace simply becomes overwhelming. While paid search advertising is a highly effective means of targeting an audience, organic search optimization greatly increases chances of success for any web site. Make sure that site you are advertising is one that people can find easily without assistance of a paid search campaign.

As a small business owner you probably don’t have millions of dollars to spend on advertising campaigns to drill your company’s name into your prospects minds. That’s okay. Many small business owners find their success by effectively developing and using their marketing message. You can use your marketing message to position your business in such a way that your prospects will think of you when they decide it’s time to take action to tackle a problem they have that you help solve.

A marketing message is not a slogan or catch phrase. There is an important difference. An effective marketing message speaks directly to a specific audience and features benefits, results and value of a product or service. Slogans and catch phrases often have nothing to do with a specific market or results and benefits. Slogans and catch phrases are used by big companies to imprint their corporate image in our minds simply by sheer repetition. They need not relate to hamburgers or sneakers for us to immediately associate a couple of words with appropriate company.

Here are five simple steps you can take to help maximize attention for your business.

1. Drop Slogan If you’re using a slogan or catch phrase to market your small business you’re probably missing opportunities to have prospects identify you as solution to their problem. If your slogan does not clearly identify population you serve and results you provide you are definitely allowing business to pass you by.

Make decision to drop slogan and develop and use a marketing message. You will increase your ability to develop new business.

2. Develop or Correct Your Marketing Message Once you have decided to let your slogan go way of Dodo you must develop your marketing message. When writing your marketing message think about those you help and benefits they seek from your product or service. Ask yourself as many questions as you can to identify your customers and results they seek. When you’ve answered these questions you can use information you’ve gathered to put together a marketing message that sells.