02. SEO ARTICLES

A Beginner's Guide to Search Engine Optimisation

Search engine optimisation has become a popular topic for webmasters and website owners looking to boost their internet profile and attract more customers, yet the subject is still widely misunderstood, often misrepresented and occasionally shrouded in secrecy. So what exactly does search engine optimisation entail? In order to get to grips with this question let's start by breaking the subject down into 3 distinct areas.

1. Keyword research
2. Page Optimisation
3. Link Building

Keyword research

Keyword research is the first stage in any successful SEO campaign and it is important to get this right from the start. Here are a few useful tips:

• Try to select popular keywords that are not overly competitive.
• Use keyword research tools to ensure you choose the best keywords.
• Make sure the keywords you choose are relevant to your site or visitors will simply leave.
• Don't be too general - choose specific keywords appropriate to your market.
• Choose keywords that cover all your main products and services so you don't leave anything out.
• Focus in particular on keywords that relate to your most profitable or best selling products and optimise your site for these keywords.

For futher information please see our article: The Essentials of Keyword Selection

Page Optimisation

Once you have completed the keyword selection process you can now optimise your web pages in line with your chosen keywords. You will need to look at each of your pages in turn to see which elements can be optimised for which keywords. Here are some of the main factors to consider when thinking about webpage optimisation:

• Check your site for any structural issues that may have a negative effect on your search engine postioning. Things to look out for include the use of frames, flash and dynamic web pages.
• Make sure your site navigation is clear and consistent.
• If possible use text links for navigation rather than images.
• Use a site map.
• Ensure your site has no broken links.
• Write good HTML and ensure that your code is error free.
• Optimise your title tag and your meta description tag. Your title tag should be unique for each page.
• Where appropriate, include your keywords in header tags, alt tags and anchor link text.
• Include keywords in your page content (especially near the beginning of the text).
• Write interesting content and provide useful information to keep visitors coming back.

Link Building

Link building is seen as an increasingly important aspect of search engine optimisation. In one way or another, all the main search engines consider link popularity in the algorithms they use to determine which web pages are displayed in response to a particular search query. External links to your site are seen as a plus point in your favour as they normally indicate that other people find your site useful in some way.

Link building needs to be seen as a medium to long-term strategy rather than something that can be achieved as a one off exercise. Here are a few of the issues which you will need to bear in mind:

• Avoid companies who offer to submit your site to hundreds or thousands of search engines automatically. These companies use auto-submission software to submit your site in ways that could potentially harm your search engine rating.
• Submit your site to some of the top web directories such as DMOZ, Exact Seek, Buzzle and others.
• Try to space out your submissions by doing 3-4 every couple of days for a month rather than submit to 50 directories all at once.
• Consider writing articles and press releases about your company, products and services as a way of promoting your business online and obtaining links back to your site
• Try to get some links to your site from other sites in your field who already have a good ranking in the search engines.