If your web pages are full of Javascript, graphical navigation buttons, Flash animation, and other glitzy stuff, your odds of ranking high in search engines sink like a stone. The spiders may never even find your site, let alone start adding your pages to their search results.

You say you just can't give up those cool Javascript menus or that glitzy Flash intro? Then be prepared to get shunned by search engines. Spiders are good at only two things: reading basic HTML and finding text. If your sites throw obstacles in their path, resign yourself to obscurity - and poverty!

The most important SEO secret you will ever grasp is incredibly simple. Your web site must be built so spiders can read your text. The text is where gold is. This means no Flash animations. Your HTML must be plain and clean. Your graphics must be kept to a minimum. And links should always be text - not Javascript buttons or drop-down menus.

Millions of dollars are wasted trying to outfox search engines. People everywhere scramble from gimmick to gimmick to be #1 for a general search term like "weight loss." Sometimes they even manage to do it - for about 10 minutes. Then one little tweak by Google ... and they're back to #8,734.

Yes, if you're trying to trick search engines, THEN - they're out to get you - BIG TIME.

BUT, if you're willing to work with them and help them, then they can seriously be your business's best friend.

Here's how:

---------------------------------------- Writing Articles for Search Engines ----------------------------------------

Actually, you're writing articles for TWO people.

1. Search Engines 2. Your Potential Customers

. Why for Search Engines?

Because search engines love content, and it's that very content that let's you invite traffic from search engines.

These articles help you optimize your website for search engine rankings (more on this in a bit).

. Why for Potential Customers?

Because these articles are what your prospects are looking for on search engines - they land on that page, find information they need and then see your "recommendation" - aka affiliate link and they click, click BUY.

So, your articles eventually lead to sales and commission for you.

So once again, purpose of articles:

. Provide content/information for: . Search Engines . Potential customers . Promoting traffic to your affiliate program

---------------------------------------- Optimizing your Articles with Keywords ----------------------------------------

We don't want to make your head spin here, so we'll try to keep this AS simple as possible.

There are certain places you want to insert your keywords when building an article webpage.

Here they are:

. The title of page . The Description META Tag . The Keyword META Tag . In your Headline, use HTML Tag < h1 >< /h1 > . Your first line of text . Once or twice per paragraph . Once/Twice in bold . In text of a link

Some other tips:

. In your graphics - use keyword in HTML ALT tag . Use a secondary keyword also - a few times

Some Cautions:

. Don't Overkill - repeating your keyword an obsense number of times will not help you at all - it will hurt you. . Never hide keywords - never. . Nothing tricky - if it's tricky, don't do it. . Don't have a LONG keyword META tag

The above is how most search engines determine how relevant your webpage is to a specific keyword.