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four tips to increase search engine ranking
Four Tips to Increase Search Engine Ranking
By Scott Buresh
Most businesses don't take advantage
of various techniques to increase search engine ranking,
but few things on the Internet can be as beneficial
as a high ranking on a search engine. A recent Forrester
Research report showed that 80% of web surfers discover
the new sites that they visit through search engines
(such as Yahoo, Google, or MSN). According to iProspect,
85% of web users use search engines to find solutions
and vendors. Properly optimizing a site to increase
your search engine ranking for each page helps it
to attract numerous, highly targeted visitors- visitors
that may become buyers.
For the technically inclined, there
are numerous places on the web to get detailed, in-depth
information on how to achieve a high ranking on a
search engine. However, many people don't care about
the technical aspects of search engine optimization-
they just want to know what is wrong with their site
(and how to fix it). What follows is a practical guide
that covers some of the most basic tips that can be
used to increase search engine ranking. It is in no
way intended to be comprehensive, but it should help
the average site owner determine whether their site
is optimized, and if not, how to make some simple
changes to give each individual page of their site
a better chance for a high ranking on a search engine.
Issue #1- The Title Bar
This is one of the most often overlooked techniques
to increase search engine ranking. On your homepage,
what does the title bar say? If you use Internet Explorer,
this is the blue bar at the very top of the window
that displays your page (it may include the words
"Microsoft Internet Explorer" at the end).
Does your company name appear here by itself when
you have more important keywords to emphasize? Worse
yet, does it say "untitled"? If you want
to increase the search engine ranking for that page,
this area should contain the most important keywords
you see on your homepage. To check the rest of your
site, click on any link from your homepage and see
if the words in this title bar change for each page
in your site. They should - and each title bar should
contain the most important keywords from its corresponding
page. Note: Very long keyword strings in the title
bar should be avoided - six words or less is optimal.
Also, words in the title bar should not repeat more
than once, and identical words should not appear next
to one another.
Issue #2- Content
Search engines all try to list sites that contain
good content. Translation: you need words on your
pages to achieve a high ranking on a search engine,
not flashy graphics. This text should contain the
most important keywords that your potential customers
would use to find you on a search engine. If you have
very few or no words on a page where you wish to increase
the search engine ranking, it is a good idea to add
some, ideally around 250 per page. For aesthetic reasons,
this is not always practical, but even 100 well-written
words will give you a better opportunity for a high
ranking on a search engine than none. It is also important
that you make certain that the words are written in
a language the search engines can read. Using your
mouse, bring your cursor down to the text on one of
your web pages. Clicking and holding down the left
mouse button (make sure you aren't near a link) see
if you can highlight just one or two words of the
text. If you can, everything is most likely fine.
If nothing happens, or you can only highlight a large
block, it is most likely in graphic form. To increase
search engine ranking in such cases, the graphic text
needs to be replaced by standard HTML text to allow
the search engines to read it. Your web expert should
have no problem understanding what you require, and
the transition should be fairly simple and affordable.
Issue #3- Meta Tags
Some people believe that meta tags are the Holy Grail
of achieving a high ranking on a search engine. Unfortunately,
their effectiveness is limited (many engines ignore
them completely), but they can play a limited role
on some engines. To see if your site has meta tags,
go to your home page. Click the "view" command
at the top of the browser window. From the pull-down
menu, select "source". This should open
up another window that shows your code. Much of this
may seem indecipherable, but there should be two commands
there (usually near the top of the code). One of these
says meta name="description" content= and
will go on to describe your company and products,
and one says meta name="keywords" content=
and goes on to list applicable keywords for your site.
If these tags are missing, have your web expert insert
them. Again, this may not do much to increase search
engine ranking, but it will not hurt.
Issue #4- Links
Link popularity has become increasingly important
for those who wish to increase search engine ranking,
with 19 of the top 20 engines using it in their ranking
algorithms. Simply put, search engines give a ranking
boost to sites that have links from quality, related
sites. There are numerous free tools on the web that
will allow you to see what sites link to yours (just
type "free link popularity check" in your
favorite search engine). If you don't have many sites
linking to yours, it may be time to start a link building
campaign. This is where you find quality, non-competing
sites in your industry and ask them to link to your
site. An additional benefit of link building is that
these links can bring you additional, highly targeted
traffic.
Conclusion
Although following the above guidelines will by no
means guarantee you a high ranking on a search engine,
fixing one or more of the problems should help increase
your search engine ranking. For the volumes of potential
customers that a search engine can send to your site,
it's certainly worth the effort.
© Medium Blue 2007
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