When building a website, you will eventually hear the term Search Engine Optimization (SEO).
SEO is more of an internet marketing strategy geared towards improving a website’s rank in search engine results.
You want your site to appear in the major Search Engines (Google, Yahoo, Bing) on page 1 because 95% of people do not look at page 2 or beyond. But how does your website get there?
One strategy is SEO. So what is SEO Optimization?
Already familiar with SEO? Get your free keyword tool here!
The Fundamentals of SEO
The search engines use sophisticated algorithms to determine what appears on the internet. For example, you may be searching for a motorcycle helmet. You type in the keywords “bluetooth enabled motorcycle helmets” because that is what you want.
As you can see, there are 334,000 results returned. The results at the top and on the right side are sponsor (paid ads).
The remaining 10 in the middle are organic (nonpaid results) from Google. Google has determine that these sites will suit your needs when looking for a bluetooth enabled motorcycle helmet. You should not find any sites that sell baby food, because that just would make sense.
My mini site is listed on page 1 position 7 as of this writing.
But what goes on behind the scenes? Search engines look at a variety of factors to determine the ranking of websites or webpages displayed. Factors such as:
- The content on the website or webpage is a major factor
- Keywords on the webpage
- The number of keywords on the webpage (keyword density)
- Relevance of keywords searched for (targeted keywords)
- How the website was built (optimized for search engines)
- Age of the website
- Links to and from the website
These are just a few of the factors that make up the algorithm that search engines use to rank websites. The weighting of the factors change constantly.
Bear in mind that the search engines keep developing and changing their algorithms, so there is no guarantee of continued rankings. What is important today, may have no impact tomorrow.
And search engines (Yahoo, Google, Bing, and the rest) never disclose their algorithms!
Influencing the Search Engines
So search engine optimizers seek to influence the outcomes of search results based on:
- how they THINK search engines work
- what online users search for
- the keyword terms or phrases used in the search
- which search engines are most preferred by the targeted audience.
All these affect the visibility of the site or webpage in search engines, which means the site is registering traffic in terms of both quantity (many viewers) and quality (longer viewing time).
Most optimizers keep researching and studying the various viable approaches they can optimize a page or site factoring in the influence of the algorithms.
The chart shows 11 ways to influence the search engines.
Content Is Still King
While search engine optimization is important, the most fundamental elements of its efficiency are in its most basic of techniques.
The more advanced the techniques get, the more diverse the game gets, which makes SEO not that appropriate for every website marketing strategy.
Does this sound complicated? Yes, it is. Do you need to know all of this? No, you do not!!
A well designed website should be optimized without much effort and knowledge of what goes on behind the scenes.
Providing valuable content to your target market should always be your number one goal when creating a website. Regardless of complex algorithms and optimization techniques, search engines will always provide the searcher with results that he/she is looking for.
With the proper keyword tools, it is easy to find people are searching for!
Are You Ready To Try It For Yourself For FREE?
Use our recommended search tool to try it for yourself! Just type in a phrase and click the Find Keywords Button
If you have any questions, please leave comments!