Search Engine Optimisation - What You Need To Know

In simple terms, SEO - Search Engine Optimisation - is a strategy you use when you try to get your web site (and products) on the first page of a web search by someone looking for your product. You can have the best widget on the internet at the best price with the best bonuses and value for money. But if the buyer cannot find you in a web search, you are not going to make money online. SEO is the term used so that your web pages become seen on the internet - they appear on the first or second results page for a given search keyword or phrase.

As soon as SEO gets mentioned, the eyes of many beginner internet marketers begin to glaze over and the whole subject becomes enveloped in a hazy mist with the belief that it is too techie and too difficult for mere mortals to understand. Let's explore the basics.

THE WEB PAGE - Meta Tags: Keywords

If you right click on some web pages you will be able to view the page source. Under the html headers, you will see a "meta tag" mentioned that will contain "keywords". When you or someone you pay, creates a web site, they will enter keywords into this meta tag. These meta tags are not seen by the page visitor, but is what the search engine robots (crawlers) look for, when they index your web page. This is how they can match your web page to the keyword that someone types into a web search (such as google, yahoo, bing, etc).

If you want to target a certain keyword, it is essential to have it in the keywords meta tag if you want your web page to score highly for that search keyword or phrase.

Meta Tags: Description

In the page source you will also see this meta tag. This is a short sentence to describe what your page is all about. Keep it short, concise, and full of the keywords you are targeting in your advertising campaign. The web crawlers also look for this meta tag - so it is again, essential, to have the keyword or key phrase you are targeting, in the description.

Page Title

This is what appears on the title bar of your browser when you look at a web page. It is different from the address bar that gives the URL of the page you are looking at. Guess what? Yes, you need to have the keyword or key phrase in the page title, if you want to score more points with search engines. If you also get a domain name with the keyword embedded in the URL, so much the better!

Keyword Density

This is where many people fall down - they don't know where to put the keywords or key phrases. Ok, let's look at the basics. I am browsing the web looking for information related to a certain keyword - where on the page will I hope to find them? The answer is simple, in the headings! In the main heading and the sub headings. Also, what do I look at first? The opening paragraph - usually the big bold header at the top of the page - does it contain the keyword or keyphrase I used to search with?

It is important to have the keyword or key phrase in the first 50 words of the web page to score more points.

How often does the keyword or key phrase need to appear throughout the web page? The general rule of thumb here is between 1% and 4% - a minimum of one time for every 100 words of the page content. Seems easy, but how do you do this and still make the page read well? That is where a lot of people fall down - usually they write the copy (sales letter) and focus on other things, not the keyword they are targeting. For example, if your sales letter has 6000 words, then you need to have the key word or key phrase appear at least 60 times.

Once you have ticked all the above boxes, what next? The answer is simple, submit your web page to the search engines so that they will come and visit, scan your page and index it for the keywords you are targeting.

This can take several days for the results to start showing up in your page ranking for a web search made using the keyword or key phrase you are targeting with your product.

If you decide you want to do some PPC (Pay Per Click) advertising, you are also likely to score highly for the keyword you are targeting, with the result that your Adwords or other paid advertising strategy, will cost less per click, a whole lot sooner, because of the relevance of your web page to that search keyword or key phrase.

Next to consider, are backlinks - what are they?

Ok, let's use article marketing for an example - you get to put your web page URL in the resource box for each article directory you submit your article to. You generate backlinks - your site will be referenced by other web sites, which is a factor to consider, when looking at link popularity, as used by many search engines, when they index your web page.

These are the basics - it's not rocket science - there is no great mystery or hazy mist to find your way through - just keep to the basics and you will start to see results. Some search engine submitters also offer a free SEO analysis and tools to improve page title and meta tags. It is up to you which you use, if any. Just focus on the basics then test and test again with your headline tags for each keyword you want to target.

Oh yes, not forgetting one thing - make sure the keyword or key phrase you are targeting is one that will attract a lot of traffic - a minimum of 40000 searches per month, for general niches - this can be lowered to 20000 for targeted niches as you will be drilling down into a target niche with specific long tail search phrases, more often than not, for highly targeted traffic to come visit your web page.