Search Engine Optimization March 23, 2011 Google Search Engine Optimization Starter Guide

SERPs  An acronym for Search Engine Results Pages.  Basically they are the search results you receive when doing a search at a search engine.

Backlinks Pointing to Site  Crawlers look for links back to your site and count them as a “vote” A Quality Link  On topic (The page linking to your page is about the same main topic)  Ranked well for the key phrase you are after (In the top 1,000)  Contains the keywords you wish to rank well for  Tip: If you run a local business, add your information and website to Google Places.Google Places

Using Social Media  Search engines look for regular updates  Blog is a great way to regularly update content  You should be distributing links to fresh content on your site across appropriate social networking platforms such as Facebook Social Media Checklist media-check-list-1891/

Before you write one line of code:  Do keyword research to determine what keywords you want to target.

Optimize your content  Use keywords liberally yet appropriately throughout each page  Have unique content  Have quality content

Keywords -- Simple  Advanced PHP Programming is better then  Advanced PHP Programming Is Really Cool And Stuff

Keyword Optimization  Should clearly describe the content and purpose of the site  Think of keywords as search terms  Use keywords in content but not more than 5% of entire text  If you have too many keywords on your site spiders are programmed to ignore sites guilty of “keyword” stuffing

Ask yourself 3 questions  How are people searching for your site?  Which sites are winning those searches, why?  Which searches can I win?

Keyword Tools  Google Keyword Suggestion Tool  Google Trends

What is anchor text? Webmaster Forums  The anchor text for this link is "Webmaster Forums".  This is important in search engine rankings because the search engines use anchor text to help determine the relevance of a page being linked to for those keywords.

Anchor Tag Best Practices  Avoid writing generic anchor text like “page”, “article”, or “click here”  Avoid Using the page’s URL as the anchor text, unless you are promoting or referencing a new website’s address.  Avoid creating unnecessary links that don’t help with the user’s navigation of the site.

Meta Tags  The large majority of search engines do not use Meta Tags as part of their ranking algorithm.  Should you use Meta Tags in your site? Yes.  Write a nice concise description of your page and throw in a sampling of keywords

Optimize your URLs  Use Search Engine Friendly URLs  Use keywords in your domain (  Use keywords in your URL (  Use dashes or underscores to separate words in your URLs (keyword2-keyword3.html)

Heading Tags(, etc)  Make sure you are using correctly  Good practice for head tags-imagine you are writing an outline  Use headings sparingly across the page  Avoid using heading tags only for styling text and not presentational structure

Title Tags  Use keywords  Make unique title for each page

 Which is better for SEO: text links or graphical links? Text links are better for SEO. Text links can contain the anchor text that your page wishes to rank well for and that is an important factor in all three search engines, especially Google.

Search Engine Friendly Navigation  Do not use inaccessible site navigation (Pictures, JavaScript or Flash menus)  If you use a JavaScript or Flash menus include an alternate text menu at the bottom of the page, so it can be followed by the search engines

Image Optimization  Naming matters  Use the “alt” attribute with images Allows you to include a keyword rich description for every image on your site

 Use semantic markup - HTML is a powerful tool that search engines use to determine the context of a page  Use a sitemap - sitemaps make sure your pages are easily found by the search engines (good for humans, too). Good Crawlable Design

How do I check if my site is search engine friendly? Turn off JavaScript and CSS in your web browser and view your website. This is how the search engines most likely see your website. If you can successfully view your content and navigate your website your site is mostly search engine friendly.

Sitemap Create 2 Sitemaps:  One for Users In HTML simple hierarchy structure  One for Search Engines XLM File or plain text file  Sitemap Protocol Sitemap Protocol  Google Sitemap Generator Script Google Sitemap Generator Script

Submitting Sitemaps using Google Webmaster Tools  Before you begin, make sure you have the site on which the Sitemap is located added and verified in your Webmaster Tools account:Webmaster Tools account  Upload your Sitemap to your site.  On the Webmaster Tools home page, click the site you want.  Under Site configuration, click Sitemaps.  In the text box, complete the path to your Sitemap (for example, if your Sitemap is at type sitemap.xml).  Click Submit Sitemap.

Submitting Web Sites  Google  Yahoo  Bing

Submitting websites to the Search Engines  Do it by hand.  It will not take long to do and will ensure that you are successful in submitting each form with the correct information.  Only submit your Website once.

Why aren't all my pages being indexed?  Takes at least six months  After six months make sure you have: Made a sitemap? Used search engine friendly URLs? Used search engine friendly navigation?

Web Tools  Google Webmaster Tools  Google Analytics  Yahoo! Site Explorer  Bing Webmaster Center