Three
Quick Ways to Get More Clicks to Your Site,
Right Now, For "Free"
Back to
the original question of search engine optimization--how
does one go about making their site relevant
and reachable so it may be listed in the
top search rankings? Here are three things
you can do that search engines take into
account when determining where to rank your
site for specific keyword search:
1) USE
KEYWORD STRATEGIES & IMPROVE CONTENT.
Ok, that's two in one but to improve
your content, first decide what your keywords
should be. If you are having trouble coming
up with keywords or knowing what your keywords
should be, try these strategies:
a) You
might have 1,000 things you sell on your
website or you might have only one service
you provide. Either try to narrow down
your keywords by determining your best
seller with the least web competition
or expand your words by also targeting
other aspects people might search such
as your location, or information about
the services or products you provide.
b) Look
at your competitor's website. If you are
on their site, click "view"
on your web browser menu, then click on
source. Find the title of their page,
and then look for the meta tags. Most
websites also list their keywords in their
meta tags. These tags will look something
like <META name="keywords"
content="keywords, more keywords">
c) Use
a keyword tool,
like Google
Adword's Keyword Tool or
the SEO
Book Keyword Suggestion Tool.
Once you
have a good list of keywords, you are poised
for positioning them on your website. If
you manage your own website, place your
keywords within your content as often as
possible without deterring from the readability
of your site. If someone else manages your
site, ask them to incorporate the keywords.
Now search engines will be better able to
read your site and know what it is your
site sells or provides.
The search
engine crawlers read your site and compare
its content to hundreds, possibly thousands
of other sites. But don't be fooled! Typing
running shoes running shoes running shoes
running shoes running shoes won't help anything.
The search engines could pick up on this
(it's called keyword stuffing), decide your
site is not trustworthy and pull you from
their searches, abandoning your site completely.
The best strategy is to reuse your keywords
within your content which consists of helpful
information about your products and services.
Another
good content tip: if you were selling tennis
shoes, chances are many of your customers
will be runners. So list some resources
about running in general and give your customers
some handy information that they can use
and will come back to your site to use again
(and again).
2. GET
LINKS. If other quality websites
link to your site, you'll get better rankings
from search engines. How do you get other
site owners to link to you? One way is to
find the sites most likely to want to
link to yours, and then email the webmasters
of these sites or their partner/affiliate
department and ask if you can swap links.
There are many other ways of link building,
but this is a start.
3. USE
EFFECTIVE WEB DESIGN. This includes
having appropriate and relevant keywords
within your title tags, meta tags, alt tags
and rich content that describes the product
or service. Make good use of the title tags
(don't use more than 65 characters in a
title tag) and meta description tags, as
these show up in the search results page.
You should
not use design code that is difficult for
search engines to sift through. Skip fancy
design ideas and "intro pages" and go for a clean, simple site, that is
easy to navigate, and easy for search engines
to read.
4. You
get a bonus 4th tip for reading all three
search engine optimization tips. Make sure
you site is indexed in all three major search
engines. This will not automatically ensure
you get top rankings, but at least they
will know you exist.
If you're not sure
whether it is or not, use
this tool from Self SEO.
To
index your site, see
the SEO
Tutorial and Do-It-Yourself
page.
