Alan Dunn
Having a website is an integral part of business today however achieving search engine rankings takes much more than just building a pretty site with pictures. Only a few short years ago a couple pages and some relevant keywords may have propped your placement up pretty high but today only the lucky few achieve any kind of substantial ranking without a lot of hard work.
While SEO may seem like a game to some it really is an art or science. Even sites with the most relevant content can often be ranked below sites which look (and are) far less superior. There are thousands of search engine optimization tips, rumors, theories and methods for improving SEO but the problem is what search engine optimization tips do you believe? How much should you pay for SEO assistance? Where do you go for help?
Many website owners spend hundreds of thousands of dollars on content, images and videos yet can’t explain what a title tag is, what keywords they are ranking for, think Aaron Wall is the name of Pink Floyd’s last album, Bruce Clay is a contractor from Montana and Matt Cutts has to be the name of a home cooking show.
If any of the above is true then it’s time to check your ego at the door and realize that you are not only missing out on critical information for the performance of your website but wasting money every day. In fact, you don’t have to be spending any money on SEO currently to be wasting it, but when the time comes to improve your website someone is going to get a payday fixing your mistakes!
Consider your website like your home – you real physical home – and the lot is simply your domain name. While your oceanfront domain name may certainly add value to the website the best part of owning land is building your dream home. Websites have this incredible unique feature over physical real estate however, where solid rankings can improve your bottom line and asset value by so many more zero’s than a typical real estate investment ever could. As a homeowner you are lucky to get zero percent return today and even in the boom times 20% was something most people would do circles over. With the right search engine optimization tips and strategies implemented you could see your business triple, quadruple or more. Any business which can improve their customer base by advertising must understand and embrace SEO. Although search engine optimization is ever evolving with no guarantees you will have the best chance at long term success online if you do it right. Some of the best search engine optimization tips are.
Relevant and Original Content is a must. Search engines love and reward relevant content and other website owners even love linking to original works.
Understand Title Tags, Descriptions and Keywords – If you own a business selling home security systems then make sure you are optimizing these elements with keywords people use to search for home security systems. Don’t use silly keywords in your title or description like “call us today†or enter your phone number in these valuable spots. Optimize tags for keywords using similar or exact match phrases that people actually use.
Invest in a Solid Domain Name – Exact match, short and brandabale domain names are very popular and the better your domain name the much better you will typically rank. If you are in the business of selling a product or service always check and see if the domain name of that product is being used. Many premium domains are still for sale and sometimes for just a fraction of traditional advertising cost you can pick up a truly premium domain name.
Create a Sitemap – Sitemaps not only assist search engine spiders in locating content on your website but are a proven method for informing search engines of any new content quickly.
Speed is good – The speed of a website can also help with better rankings. The faster a website loads the better for SEO and a much better experience for your visitors. If you visit a site and it takes too long to load what would you do? Probably skip the site and move on.
Title Images – having a picture called DMC071121887744551.jpg on a website has absolutely no benefit so spend time adding appropriate titles to your images.
Opt for a Dedicated IP – Shared hosting packages are quite popular but why risk your website getting penalized due to actions of other people on the same IP address? Anyone serious about building a quality website needs a dedicated IP address.
You also want to try and link to old content with any new articles you post and make sure to create url’s that are search friendly but the most important tip is to embrace the study of SEO and not just expect to post a few pictures and rank. SEO should never be an afterthought but a careful part of any business plan online.
Article source: http://www.businessinsider.com/seo-tips-for-search-engine-optimization-2011-7