SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION By: IT-Freedom 1 Page Compiled By -
INDEX 1) What is SEO?. 3 2) Why Website need SEO?.... 5 3) How Does Search Engine Work... 6 4) Why Content Is Important In SEO 8 5) Type of Content in SEO.. 9 6) SEO techniques are classified into two broad categories. 11 i. Black Hat SEO ii. White Hat SEO 7) Two ways of optimization. 13 i. On page SEO ii. Off page SEO 8) Tips Related to SEO 17 i. To-Do List ii. To-Don't List 2 Page Compiled By -
What is SEO? SEO is short for search engine optimization or search engine optimizer. Search engine optimization is a methodology of strategies, techniques and tactics used to increase the amount of visitors to a website by obtaining a highranking placement in the search results page of a search engine (SERP) -- including Google, Bing, Yahoo and other search engines. The Basic Concept of SEO Search engine optimization, commonly referred to as SEO, is the procedure to improve organic ranking of a particular website on major search engines. Professional SEO companies like A2Z help to improve a website s search engine ranking for their customers by amending the site to reflect their objectives and what the search engines look for in a better and clearer way. There are two major factors that play the most important roles for a site to getting better ranking on major search portals and those are placement of effective and sought after keywords in unique contents published on the site and the number of good links to the website. Other factors may include internal site linking structures, site s age and quality of the links. Content optimization Well-written, error-free, unique and optimized contents play an imperative role in the success of SEO of a website. We, at A2Z, have an experienced team of well-versed, creative and highly efficient content writers who have the ability to write state-of-art, informative and relevant contents to target the preferred market while maintaining proper keyword density and page length to meet the requirements of search engine algorithm. Internal Link Structure Optimization Having an easy-to-follow and transparent internal linking structure helps engines like Google, Yahoo, MSN to find internal links on the client s webpage and this procedure is known as internal linking structure optimization. It helps to maximize the value from the link-building campaign. HTML Code Optimization HTML development tools check and ensure that the coding of a website is non-erroneous. Coding error can affect ranking significantly. 3 Page Compiled By -
Website Design Optimization Page layout and graphics impact a site s ranking and SEO potential to a great extent. Unless a site represents a pleasant visual look to the visitors, it is hard to get easy and sustainable flow of customers and thus the need of website design optimization comes into play. Link Building This is one of the most important parts of search engine optimization. It is the process of obtaining superior-quality inbound links pointing to a website. Most popular search engines use popularity of link the way of measuring quantity and quality of the links pointing to a website as the most crucial external factor towards ranking. Nevertheless, all links are not the same. For instance, to recognize quality links and verify a page s value, search engines use an algorithm known as Page Rank. Other than evaluating the number of links to any particular website, it also checks the quality of a page linking to a website. Some effective tools that SEO companies like A2Z use for link building may include article writing and submission, blog writing, social networking and bookmarking, and link baiting. Sitemap Creation and Submission to Major Search Engines This is an important service that allows the search engines to easily find internal links to any particular webpage. Most major SEO services build sitemap along with submitting them to leading search portals. Meta Data Optimization Meta data optimization includes Meta descriptions and Meta tags that work together along with website content to enhance ranking for specific keywords on a page on major search engines. 4 Page Compiled By -
Why Website need SEO? The majority of web traffic is driven by the major commercial search engines, Google, Bing, and Yahoo!. Although social media and other types of traffic can generate visits to your website, search engines are the primary method of navigation for most Internet users. This is true whether your site provides content, services, products, information, or just about anything else. Search engines are unique in that they provide targeted traffic people looking for what you offer. Search engines are the roadways that make this happen. If search engines cannot find your site, or add your content to their databases, you miss out on incredible opportunities to drive traffic to your site. Search queries the words that users type into the search box carry extraordinary value. Experience has shown that search engine traffic can make (or break) an organization's success. Targeted traffic to a website can provide publicity, revenue, and exposure like no other channel of marketing. Investing in SEO can have an exceptional rate of return compared to other types of marketing and promotion. 5 Page Compiled By -
How Does Search Engine Work Search engines perform several activities in order to deliver search results Crawling Process of fetching all the web pages linked to a website. This task is performed by a software called a crawler or a spider. Indexing Process of creating index for all the fetched web pages and keeping them into against database from where it can later be retrieved. Essentially, the process of indexing is identifying the words and expressions that best describe the page and assigning the page to particular keywords. Processing When a search request comes, the search engine processes it, i.e.it compares the search string in the search request with the indexed pages in the database. 6 Page Compiled By -
Calculating Relevancy It is likely that more than one page contains the search string, so the search engine starts calculating the relevancy of each of the pages in its index to the search string. Retrieving Results The last step in search engine activities is retrieving the best matched results. Basically, it is nothing more than simply displaying them in the browser. Search engines such as Google and Yahoo! often update their relevancy algorithm dozens of times per month. When you see changes in your rankings, It is due to an algorithmic shift or something else beyond your control 7 Page Compiled By -
Why Content Is Important In SEO Once upon a time, if you wanted to use SEO to increase your rankings, you simply crammed your website as full of keywords as possible. Some less scrupulous web designers crammed their sites full of popular, but irrelevant, keywords. Of course, that only worked for websites who only wanted to display ads and were not concerned with getting visitors to come back. Today, SEO isn't just for con men anymore. Respectable businesses are learning how to optimize their websites so they can be found by people who are searching for the products and services they want to sell. This means, of course, that they don't just want visitors to drop by once. They hope to keep them coming back. This is why content is so important. There are two important aspects of web content. For simplicity's sake, we'll call them Quantity and Quality. Quality means that the content should be well written and be free from those embarrassing typos that make visitors wonder if your website really knows what it's talking about. For our purposes, however, it also means that content should be rich in keywords, informative and interesting, so that the visitor feels they've learned something. Such is the power of Quality content. Quantity, on the other hand, means that your website should be updated regularly with new content added. A visitor may return to an informational article once, or even two or three times, but if your website's content never changes, eventually, there will be no reason for him to return. How often should you add new content to your site? This is where experts differ. Some say once a week is often enough. Others say twice a day, at least. It depends on the nature of the site, of course; a website's commercial blog should be updated once - or even twice - per day. Static content, however, can be added once or twice a week. Try to space it out. Going for weeks without adding anything then suddenly adding ten different articles isn't going to get you anywhere. Content truly is king on the Internet. Use it properly, and first-time visitors will become repeat visitors. 8 Page Compiled By -
Type of Content in SEO SEO content can include any of the following: Product Pages These are the bread and butter of any retail e-commerce site. A good product page can serve as both SEO content and a PPC landing page. Blog Posts A blog is one of the easiest ways to create a regular stream of SEO content. In general, blog posts are more engaging and more likely to attract links than product pages, so they can be a great way to build some authority for your site. Articles Think news article, interview, or feature piece. This is the main kind of content you ll find on most newspaper- or magazine-style websites. Lists A list is really just a kind of article, but framing it as a list (such as 10 Ways to Lower Your Energy Bill or 101 Things I Hate About Google ) makes it easier to scan. These types of titles also seem to be more clickable when found in search results or in social media feeds. Guides A guide is a longer piece of content that explains in detail how to do something. You can post a full guide on your website, or you can post a summary or excerpt, requiring visitors to fill out a registration form to read the full guide. This can be a good way to generate leads, but keep in mind that putting up a registration wall will likely reduce the amount of SEO traffic you can drive to that guide. Videos In general there are fewer videos on the web than pages of text; consequently, it can be easier to rank on the first page for a competitive keyword by creating a video instead of an article. Depending on what type of site or business you run, videos can be a great way to attract and reach 9 Page Compiled By -
an audience. Consider creating video tutorials of how to use your products. Or illustrate a process that is related to your business. Info graphics Info graphics, or large-format images that contain a lot of data (often in the form of graphs or charts) on a single subject, can rack up a lot of page views and links. However, because so much of the content is embedded in the image and therefore not readable as text by search engines, it s important to carefully optimize the rest of the page. You can use one of these five free info graphic templates to get started. Slideshows A slideshow is a way to display a series of related images. Sometimes pictures are more important than text say you re trying to show what all the stars wore to the Oscars. Here again, SEO of your title, captions, image file names and so on is important because there is less for the search engines to read. Glossaries More people use Google to look up terms than they use a dictionary. (Do you even know where your dictionary is?) If you work in a specialized industry, a well built-out glossary can be a good way to capture some search traffic. Think cooking terms, medical terms, fashion terms, architectural terms. Directories A directory is a useful taxonomy of links to sites or resources around a given topic. For example, a perfume blog might create a directory of places to buy perfume, from major department stores to independent shops around the country. These are just some of the basic types of SEO content, but don t let this list limit you the possibilities are virtually endless. 10 Page Compiled By -
SEO techniques are classified into two broad categories Black Hat SEO Black Hat SEO is SEO that don t follow Google s rules. It results in a website that Google won t want to display because no-one will want to read it. Black Hat practices include: Paying another site to link to yours. Creating keyword-rich links using dodgy techniques, such as trackback spam. Participating in link exchanges with sites that have nothing to do with yours. Scraping other people s content to use on your site. Using hidden text that readers can t see but search engines can (e.g. putting lots of keywords in white text on a white background). Getting your site linked to from link farms. Basically, if a technique sounds too good to be true, it probably is. You can t automate the process of building links to get hundreds overnight. 11 Page Compiled By -
White Hat SEO White hat SEO Follow the rules. It results in a website that Google naturally wants to promote, because it s full of great content and easy for readers to engage with. White Hat practices include: Creating high-quality content for your blog. Using Word Press or another solid CMS (content management system) for your site, so it s well structured. Writing great guest posts for other blogs, putting the relationship (not the back link) first. Using Google Webmaster Tools to fix any problems with your site. Crafting clear, direct titles for your posts that use the same keywords readers would use. Black Hat SEO may lead to some quick results but these will be swiftly followed by a huge drop in traffic when Google catches you. (And bear in mind that Google s algorithms are getting cleverer all the time.) 12 Page Compiled By -
Two ways of optimization SEO helps to increase page rank of the website/a blog. SEO can be classified in to two categories. On page SEO Off page SEO SEO is the art of optimizing your website to for search engine friendly and getting a good search rank for various keywords. But there are two major categories of SEO named On Page SEO and Off Page SEO. In past we have published several posts related to SEO. This article is all about the types of SEO and formal introduction to these types. What is On Page SEO? On Page SEO is the process of optimizing the contents of a website such that it becomes friendlier to the search engines. This technique includes the optimization of texts, images, tags, URL structure, internal links, headers etc. Optimizing anything for search engine that is uploaded to your website s domain is treated as on page SEO. For example selecting the proper ALT tag 13 Page Compiled By -
keyword for an image on a webpage is such type of SEO. In a simple definition On Page Optimization is what can be done on the pages of a website in order to make it more search engine friendly to achieve good search engine ranking for targeted keywords. It refers to factors that have an effect on your Web site or Web page listing in natural search results. It involves major necessary SEO tricks to get it to rank well on the search engines. It involves major necessary SEO tricks to get it to rank well on the search engines. It gives you the first opportunity to get started in the Search engine ranking race while Off-Page SEO follows to add turbo to it. It will provide you with in-depth analysis of the keyword you are targeting to rank for, proper optimization of your posts, including image optimization, highlighting your keywords in post title, meta description, heading tagging, keyword density check, and many more. Important Components of On-Page SEO Here are some important on page optimization components that take crucial part in the improvement of any website. 1. Proper Post Title (H1 tags) 2. ALT Tags (Must use proper ALT tags with targeted keywords) 3. URL structure (One of the most important part in SEO, must contain your main keyword) 4. Meta Description Tag 5. Keyword Density 6. XML sitemap 7. Proper Content (Should be unique) 8. Internal Linking Strategy (Related articles must be properly interlinked within the website) 9. Proper HTML and CSS validation 14 Page Compiled By -
10. Title Tags On Page search engine optimization is the most important part in the process of SEO. It is said that if on page SEO is perfect 70% job of the SEO is done and rest depends on the off page SEO. What is Off Page SEO? Off page SEO is defined as the things you do offline to your website in order to achieve good search engine ranking. In simple definition off page optimization does not involve any optimization with the contents of the webpage instead it is the optimization which is done offsite the web contents. For example building quality links to improve the page rank of your website is such type of optimization. It is basically building reputation of your website in front of search engines like Google. So here you do not do anything with the content of the webpage. Off page SEO holds almost 30% of the overall SEO process. There are several factors that affect the off page SEO and those are listed below. Refers to techniques that can be used to improve the position of a web site in the search engine results page (SERPs). In general, it has to do with promotion methods beyond website design for the purpose of ranking a website higher in the search results It is very important if your blog/site/brand is to succeed online. Factors Affecting Off Page SEO 1. Quality Link Building (In order to improve page ranking) 2. Social Media Presence of your website This means how active is your website among various social media like Facebook, Google+, Twitter and many other social media. The active presence of your website over popular social media increases the brand value as well as reputation of your website with respect to search engine s algorithms. This includes social book marking also. 3. Directory Submission (Especially from DMOZ.org) 4. Forum Postings 15 Page Compiled By -
Forum posting impacts a lot in offsite optimization. If you participate in forum posting and posts questions or answer to any questions then you are getting a chance to get a good quality link from the forum to your website which improves the page ranking. 16 Page Compiled By -
Tips Related to SEO There are various other tips related to SEO. We have not categorized them into any special category and hence, putting these in miscellaneous category. Go through these tips one by one To-Do List There are various other tips which can help you to optimize your website for many search engines. Create logs of pages and each page should however contain a minimum of about 200 visible words of text to maximize relevance with Google. Create a Sitemap, Help, FAQ, About Us, Link to Us, Copyright, Disclaimer, Privacy Policy pages on mandatory basisseo33 Create a homepage link to each and every webpage and provide easy navigation through all the pages. Pay attention to your dynamic page URLs. Google can crawl and index dynamic pages as long as you don't have more than 2 parameters in the URL. Check your complete site for broken links. Broken links will reduce your other pages rank as well 17 Page Compiled By -
To-Don't List Don't keep hidden text on your web pages. Don't create alternate image spamming by putting wrong keywords. Don't use meta tags stuffing. Don't use frames and flash on your site. Don't exchange your links with black listed sites. Don't try to fool your site visitors by using misspelled keyword. Don't send spam emails to thousands of email IDs. Don't use too much graphics on your site. Don't create too many doorway pages. Don't try to create duplicate content of pages. Don't submit your website many times in a single search engine. Don't use sub-directory depth more than 1-2. Don't create too many dynamic pages. Try to convert them into static pages. Don't bloat your pages with code. Don't nest your pages. 18 Page Compiled By -