Does Search Engine Optimisation Work? SEO Case Studies
There is a lot of talk about Search Engine Optimisation, or SEO, and its importance in the overall viability – even survival – of a web-based business. In my view it is absolutely crucial to any internet enterprise, because a well-executed SEO campaign addresses numerous potentially fatal issues.
SEO Case Study – BabyStuff
In a SEO recent project, we reviewed a PHP-based E-Commerce store called http://www.babystuff.co.nz/ which, oddly enough, sells a range of baby accessories etc. I say “oddly” because of the bizarre propensity for web site owners to choose Domain Names which offer no clues to the site’s purpose. That could of course be likened to cutting off one leg immediately prior to participating in a butt-kicking competition!
The site has a nice visual appeal, soft colours, good graphics – all in all, it was nicely designed and in keeping with its contents.
However, it does not matter how good it looks – its how it performs that counts! The old adage that “Form Follows Function” is particularly true of web sites. First, construct it to generate traffic! Then, and only then, think about making it pretty!
Site Shortcomings Assessed
However, on the downside, the site had;
- Deeply-nested Product Categories which placed actual product content very deep – 4, 5 or 6 levels down from the Home page!
- The site exhibited a serious lack of text content on all pages – Home, category, subcategory and product pages!
- Worse, it had generic Titles, Description and Keywords meta-tags!
- Worst of all, it had ZERO incoming links!
All of this conspires to render the pages to a level where they appear – at best – as poorly constructed doorway pages, and at worse as duplicated pages. Certainly, going to Google and searching for site:www.BabyStuff.co.nz delivered a string of identical results.
With no “identifiers” in key on-page and off page areas, any page that appeared in the search engine results would offer few clues to its actual content – meaning no “qualified traffic” from people who come to the site because it clearly offers exactly what they wanted.
Links Are Crucial
Lack of quality links is now the major issue in addressing search engine indexing and ranking shortcomings. Basically, if no one links to you, then the search engines – quite rightly – assess your site as not being worthy of inclusion in their index. Each “good” link is like a vote of confidence. In contrast, a “bad” link is virtually worthless.
Worse, the SE’s examine link titles and take note of the keywords – or lack thereof – and the keywords found there are what the search engines will “associate” your site with. In that respect, a title that consists of a business name devoid of specific keywords is of minimal value!
The best links are those from “trusted” sites. A common denominator of a trusted site is that it will be mature, classed as either a hub or an authority within its theme, and will have an above average page rank. Examples include The Open Directory, Yahoo Directory, government and educational sites, regional and local directories, and sites which are related to your theme such as your competitors or suppliers.
BabyStuff Links
To address the shortcomings here;
- We first examined the categories and products, and divided them into 5 main groups.
- This was followed by some keyword research to determine the exact keyword phrases searchers are using to find those products.
- Using that information, we wrote 5 sets of Titles and Descriptions containing a broad spread of high-use search phrases.
- We then selected a group of 500 web directories which had relevant categories, and submitted the site for inclusion in their indexes.
Because these directories are “human edited” they have higher trust value, and the links that are achieved contain specific keyword phrases in the link Titles. By submitting to precisely the right category, we achieve very high acceptance rates, usually above 70%. In the case of BabyStuff, we commenced 500+ submissions approx 10th November 2006, spread over a 4 week period. On Yahoo, the 1-Way Back Links have grown from 0 to 386 over a 4 month period. Google Page Rank has gone from PR0 to PR3. (See further details on Advanced Page Rank / Link Building)
Site Optimisation
As part of the implementation of our Intermediate SEO Package, we wrote up a list of recommended changes for 10 main pages, including Home page and primary categories. This included modifications to both on-page and off-page elements, writing new meta-tags, headings and 1st paragraphs. In addition we provided a range of recommendation for the site owner to continue on with, the goal being a progressive process of content expansion, particularly on pages devoid of relevant body text! (See further details on Intermediate SEO)
Like many small business operations, the site owner does a lot of the maintenance, and product additions etc. Small businesses have modest budgets, and we like to provide the necessary guidance and support to facilitate self-sufficiency where possible.
Search Engine Ranking Results
Google rankings are the key indicator of success! From zero, we’ve grown to 49 Top 30 listings on Google.co.nz! Across all the search engines surveyed, the site now has;
This has been achieved in a 4 month period, and is a strong testimony to the value of investing in Search Engine Optimisation. Those benefits will be sustained over the long term, and will deliver a demonstrable return on investment. Further SEO Case Studies
Yet Another Insightful SEO Article by;
Ben Kemp, aka The SEO Guy (Co. Ltd)
Web: http://www.comauth.co.nz/ – http://www.theseoguy.co.uk/ – http://www.theseoguy.us/
Email: SEO
Contact us for a Free SEO Site Review….
Link Value in SEO Campaigns
Links Defined
Link – a textual or image link TO another site – usually included for the benefit of your visitors because it contains important information relevant to your product or service. Usually set to open in a new window so visitors don’t “lose” your site when they open the link. Outward links are of minimal value to your search engine rankings – unless you have a lot of them relating to a common “theme” – in which case your site might be perceived as an “Information Hub” for referrals on a specific topic.
For example, it might be appropriate for a medical-related site to provide links to support groups, goverment/health agencies, doctors and pharmacies with whom they work etc.
Affiliate Link
You place a link to a provider in order to make a commission out of selling their product/service to your visitors. There is zero value in terms of search engine rankings. And of course, there is no point linking to them if you are not going to sign up and sell their products! 
BACK LINKS:
Reciprocal Links
Where two sites agree to provide LINKS TO EACH OTHER for mutual exchange of visitors, and to increase the relative importance of both sites by increasing total incoming link count. Reciprocal links have value in terms of improving search engine rankings, although this value has diminished in recent times. It is still a “natural” form of linking and should not be avoided – just apply this test – “Will the link lead to relevant information, of value and interest to my site’s visitors?”
If the answer is yes, then by all means exchange links. Done properly, constrained to sites with a similar theme, this may also lead to your site being perceived as an “Information Hub” for referrals on a specific topic.
1-Way Back Link
A link to your site, not requiring a link in return. These are the most valuable form of linking in terms of search engine rankings. Usually these are from clients – e.g. a manufacturer such as Sony/Toyota/Kodak will have a gazillion 1-way back links from retailers, users etc, as will government agencies, airlines, academic institutions etc. This can lead to your site appearing to be an “Authority” on a specific topic.
In most normal web site situations, your main source of good 1-way back links will be Web Directories. In these, a listing in the most relevant category can provide a very valuable “reference” or “testimonial” for your site. Because most directories are human-edited, the search engines place greater value on such links and the well established ones are often regarded by the search engines as “trusted sites.” The more important the directory, the greater the value. In the case of Google, they place huge importance on a site’s inclusion in The Open Directory, and also in the Yahoo Directory… It is important to select the most relevant category in which to have your site included – the content of the page in which the link is contained may also be assessed. 
Changes To The Way SE’s Evaluate Links
Google bases approx 50% of its assessment of your site relevancy to a specific search on the site’s that link to you, and on the words contained in the links pointing to your site.
Yahoo has recently filed for patents for technology similar to Google’s Page Rank assessment mechanism, and is expected to gradually implement a similar emphasis on incoming link quality.
It is important to specify HOW the link to you should be implemented on other sites – and to that end I always add a “Link To Us” page on any site I work on, which specifies the exact wording to be used on links TO you.
Avoid Disaster – 12 Points on Picking an SEO Professional
There has been a flurry of entrants into the Search Engine Optimisation market in the past year or so. Judging by the horrendous rates some are charging, money rather than service seems to be the main motivation. Judging by the horror stories from clients who have arrived on my doorstep after being ripped off by sharp operators, in some instances there is evidence of a serious deficiency in both ethics and skills in some cases. I have a new client who spent almost $30,000 last year, with no work having been done on the actual site, no evidence of link increases, and according to traffic statistics, site visitors have gone DOWN by 60% – so read the following sections carefully.
So, how do you choose an SEO firm to entrust your business to? I believe that there are some simple checks to put in place before committing yourself to any SEO proposal, no matter how attractive it might seem.
The following sections lists a dozen few ways you can identify some potentially good SEO firms, and how to eliminate the dodgy ones, and thus reduce your chances of being disappointed.
1.) How Well Does Their Own SEO Site Rank?
Do a search for search engine optimisation, seo rates and/or seo firm on the country-specific version of each of the big 3 major search engines – e.g. Google.co.nz, Yahoo.co.nz or XtraMSN.co.nz. Alternatively, go to the main Google.com etc site, and search for nz seo, seo rates, or new zealand search engine optimisation (or your own country-specific version of those). The SEO market has become very competitive out there, but you should expect the SEO business you are contemplating doing business with to be on Page One on each search engine! If not, drop them from the list of possibles, because how much help could they possibly be to you? A list of 5-10 potential firms should quickly emerge from this process.
2.) Request For Proposal
From your initial research, you should have a list of contenders you are considering entrusting your business to. Contact each, and request a site review. This usually a free service, and will invariably result in a detailed analysis of your site, and a proposal which sets out what remedial action is required and should include an indicative costing to achieve this. Having now received a series of these, apply the following criteria against each one.
3.) Guaranteed Inclusion in Google/Yahoo/MSN
If an SEO firm offers a guarantee of inclusion into any major search engine, or assures you that they have a special relationship with a major search engine, immediately drop them from the list of possibles. Frankly, search engines simply do not enter into such relationships. That would be as likely as a close friendship between a poacher and a gamekeeper!
4.) What Are They Proposing?
There are two key ingredients to web site optimisation, and if both are not assessed and addressed, drop the SEO firm’s proposal from the list of possibilities!
- The first element is on-site optimisation of individual pages to improve organic or natural search engine rankings. This involves keyword research with associated analysis of the business products and services. This is the most important aspect because it delivers ongoing traffic which is essentially free after the initial work is carried out.
- The second key element is link analysis and recommended remedial action. Basically, the more links to your site from trusted sites carrying high Page Rank, the better. Insufficient links can mean your site appears not worth indexing. Proposals to increase your 1-way back-links from web directories and other trusted sites are good. Use of blogs, and article marketing is also current best practice. However, should there be any suggestions for participation in link propagation schemes, or placing main emphasis on reciprocal link strategies etc, drop the SEO firm from your list because they are not up to date with current best practice.
5.) Google Adwords & Yahoo Search Marketing
Some SEO firms boast that they are certified Adwords practitioners etc. That’s all well and good, but what they mean is that with YOUR money, they are real confident of getting you top placing in the keyword bidding warfare! There can be some short term benefits in that, but guarantees along those lines are not overly helpful to your business. If a proposal places primary emphasis on Pay-Per-Click, slip it down to the bottom of the pile!
6.) References
Can your SEO firm provide you with some reference sites they’ve worked on successfully, case studies, and/or some clients or web developers you can contact for comment? Bear in mind that there are likely to be some commercial sensitivities that apply constraints.
7.) Is There Value in 1 Year Contracts?
Frankly, not to you! The hallmark of a professional, ethical operator will be a fixed price contract to carry out the initial remedial action on the site. As a reassurance, they will usually let you know that ongoing support is available if required, because the rules of the SEO game do keep changing. The best SEO practitioners do not attempt to lock you into 1 year contract because they know the initial work will often take 8-12 weeks to deliver full benefits, and the project cost will usually include a built-in monitoring component over that initial period. It is, in my view, a little unethical to double-dip on the project costs!
Not only that, but what if you are not happy with the results of the SEO firm or their level of service? A 1 year contract might just guarantee you receive a full 12 months of unsatisfactory services! My advice – do not lock yourself into a long-term contract until you have grown comfortable with the SEO team you are dealing with.
8.) Fixed Price Contracts
Insist on one! A professional SEO firm will set out exactly what is wrong with your site, and explain the precise remedial action in a coherent and logical fashion. The actual work will be specified and a total cost provided. It is customary to require payment in advance. This is usually 100% for smaller jobs, which I would define as less than $1500. For larger projects, expect to pay a 50% deposit with balance on completion and/or when Top 30 rankings on agreed keyword terms show a demonstrable improvement.
9.) How Much Should It Cost?
Well, each proposal should come down to a judgement by each SEO firm on how many hours of work are going to be involved in the project. However, some seem more inclined to make an assessment of your ability to pay in big chunks! There can be obvious, huge discrepancies – its common to see variations of 1000% e.g. you will see that some firms initial cost proposal can be 10 times that of competing SEO firms! From your point of view, you want to know;
- How many pages are going to be amended
- What will be done by way of increasing incoming links
- Are articles being published, and if so, how many?
Reduce it to a known quantity, compare apples with apples! When you are systematic about it, the choices become more obvious, and a decision becomes easier!
10.) You Need to Know What Will Be Done
An SEO professional will involve you at each step of the process, providing you with a preview of all site changes before implementation. You will be able to measure progress of the work on a page by page basis, and see the results in your site traffic statistics as well as SE ranking reports. As in all aspects of life, failing to plan is planning to fail! If there is no plan, no road map, don’t expect a happy ending or any rights of redress.
11.) Black Hat vs. White Hat SEO
There are other danger signs to be aware of. If your SEO proposal suggests cloaking, redirections, doorway pages, hallway pages, invisible text, multiple domain names for duplicated content etc, immediately drop the company from the list of possibles!
There are many Black Hat SEO operators who prefer to attempt to subvert the Search Engine guidelines, essentially looking for rapid, short-term ranking gains by ANY means, instead of taking a responsible, professional approach. If your site is caught up in any scheme like this, banishment from search engine indexes is assured! Essentially, good White Hat SEO involves thoughtful restructuring of site content, within the SE guidelines and parameters, and taking no risks of any kind.
12.) Who Are You Dealing With?
Does their site have some personal profile information? Are you dealing with a seasoned IT industry professional, a kid fresh out of high school, someone moonlighting from their primary job, or maybe somebody who has English as a second (or third) language? SEO is very much about words, semantics, languages skills and this, plus broad SEO project experience over several years, should be a key indicator to consider!
Your web site is an integral part of your business. The people you work with should have an intuitive understanding of your business, products and services, and should by now have demonstrated that they have given your particular circumstances some personal attention. Some, on the other hand, may have merely used automated site assessment tools. From the initial proposal, and exchange of emails with questions and answers to clarify any issues that have arisen, do you feel a sense of rapport with anyone? The best people to work with are those you are comfortable with.
I hope that this has proven a useful and thought-provoking summary of how to weed out the space cadets, cowboys and make-a-quick-buck operators. I really hope you do find yourself a competent, professional SEO practitioner, because they are out there, toiling away. doing a great job for great people like you!
Good luck!
Web Designers – Why Not Outsource Your SEO Needs
Web design and search engine optimisation are two quite different disciplines, and usually people specialise in either one or the other, but rarely in both.
However, there are synergies and consequent opportunities for strategic partnerships and alliances…
A great many web sites are launched every year, and during site creation, SEO requires extra effort and consequent additional costs. For that reason, many site owners opt to not do SEO at the outset, but will find it necessary to address SEO later – when site traffic and sales revenues do not match initial expectations.
The SEO Reseller Option
Recently, we’ve had a number of approaches from New Zealand & Australian web design companies interested in outsourcing professional SEO services to offer to their existing clients. In each case, they lacked in-house SEO expertise, and preferred to work with an established SEO practitioner instead. They also felt that pricing from some other SEO firms they had contacted was exorbitant and much preferred our more modest search engine optimisation rates!
In response we developed and offered an incremental range of competitively-priced SEO services. This was so successful that we’ve decided to further expand our business by actively marketing our SEO outsourcing service on a commission basis e.g.;
- You quote our price to your clients and you bill them once work is completed
- We supply the webmaster (usually you) with the SEO amendments to insert, meaning there is additional billable work generated for you in the process.
- On completion, we bill you the previously quoted amount, less the commission.
We are willing and able to work cooperatively with any web designer or web site developer seeking to outsource SEO reseller services for their clients.
It’s our preference to offer SEO services on a fixed price basis. This presents clients with a known quantity for budgetary purposes. To review these rates and services [click here] and then contact us to discuss details.
The SEO Imperative…
To any business enterprise hoping for significant Internet-based sales, it’s imperative that prospective clients can actually find the web site. Many business / client relationships commence through contact established via search engines such as Google, Yahoo and MSN.
The prospective client seeks a product by searching for a specific keyword or phrase. If your site doesn’t rank in the Top 30 results, you have minimal chance as barely 10% of searchers will go to (or past) the 3rd page of results. If they don’t find what they want on the 1st or 2nd page, the majority will either refine their search term, or go to a different search engine.
Search Engine Optimisation is all about marketing a web site more effectively, with the goal of improving the site’s exposure to customers and clients on the Internet.
I’ve been practicing SEO since bG (before Google); back when Alta Vista, Excite, Hotbot and Northern Light ruled the search engine world. Additional background information is available at TheSeoGuy’s web site.
SEO Return On Investment…
In terms of the potential results for your clients, reflect a moment on the fact that there is a great deal of competition for rankings on the search engines. Not ensuring that a site is properly optimised dooms to mediocrity. The “return on investment” for SEO is usually very good indeed.
No-Risk Test of our SEO Services!
Pick a “normal” site whose owner thinks it needs a rankings boost, and provide us with the details. We are so confident of success that we will put our money where our mouth is by offering a do a Basic SEO Package project for one of your clients on a “no cure, no pay” basis. E.g. we do a SE ranking report before commencing the job, and again after completion – if there is not a demonstrable improvement in Top 30 rankings in 6 weeks, the job is free! You could document the project, and include the details in your monthly newsletter.
Hey, thanks for taking the time to read this, and I look forwards to hearing from you soon!
Kind regards
Ben Kemp
aka “The SEO Guy”
+64 9 974-3553
URL Decisions – Whats in a Name
A rose, by any other name, would smell as sweet… but in the World of the Wide Web, picking the the wrong name stinks!
I’m often asked if the Domain Name is important, and I have to say yes, the selected domain name is a very important element in the overall scheme of things, for a variety of reasons. Some of these are outlined in this article.
Keywords in Domain Name
The search engines assign some relevance/importance to the words used within the domain name. You can see some evidence of this in Google’s search results, where any words in your search term that exist in the URL are highlighted.
When starting a new site, it is important to maximise whatever advantage the name might give you! I can’t say for certain just how important it is, but as sure as God made little apples, every little element that you have working in your favour can only be regarded as “a good thing”
There are limits… not only to the total length of the URL, but in terms of what might be acceptable, and the only thing the SEO experts are consistent on is all having a different opinion!
However, here are a few thoughts;
- From a total length perspective, there is a limit to what people are prepared to type in…
- keyword spamming would not be a smart idea here as in any other area…
- Some suggest separating all words with hyphens, others say use only one hyphen at maximum…
- I’d say two to three primary keywords is enough – any more and it becomes difficult to enter accurately.
Dot.Com or Country-specific
The choice of domain type does have an effect on the way the search engines categorise the site. If you are a New Zealand or Australian business selling to a lot of USA or UK clients i.e. if its a global deal, then a Dot.Com URL is arguably a better option. Not least of this is that its easier to get it listed in some international directories.
However, if you are marketing a specific NZ/AU product/service in the domestic markets of New Zealand/Australia, then a .CO.NZ or .COM.AU is the best choice.
With the increasing trend of search engines towards “Local” content, explicit in the Google.Co.NZ, Google.Com.AU and Google.Co.UK, it will become more and more difficult for a non-country-specific site to dominate within a specific country. To put that in context, a Dot.Com site will struggle to out-rank a .Co.NZ site in Google.Co.NZ…
Google, Yahoo, MSN, Alta Vista, Lycos etc are all expanding their country-specific indexes. These do (kind of) get incorporated into the main index in the parent Dot.Com site, but you would need to be more specific in your search for a country-specific product.
E.g. if you were on Google.com, and search for “mats” the results would be different to carrying out the same search on Google.Co.NZ (having specified NZ sites only).
However, if you searched on Google.Com for “mats new zealand” the result might well include sites which ranked highly on the Google.Co.NZ search.
Multiple Domain Names
You CAN have the two or more URL’s pointed at the same site… but I would not advise any attempt to actively promote more than one! There is a danger that the SE’s could could punish you for attempting to get duplicate content indexed, which is a forbidden practice.
However, it is completely legitimate and common practice to point multiple URLS at the same IP address;
- To prevent competitors pinching your domain name/s on .com, .biz, .info etc etc.
- To prevent confusion e.g. the client types the “wrong” URL, but still finds you – e.g. a miss-spelled version.
- Having a longer keyword-rich URL to maximise Search Engine ranking gains, and a shorter (easier) one for people to type in to get to the site.
You could easily a Dot.Com URL for advertising purposes, letterhead, business cards etc, and even use it as Google Adwords “display URL” but be careful to only use the primary (.Co.NZ) URL for all search engine promotions, link building, search engine and directory submissions.
How To Tell If Your Site Needs Optimising
If you search on Google, Yahoo and MSN using a keyword phrase that you would expect your site to rank highly for, but cannot find your site on pages 1-3 of results, then you definitely need to optimise your site for the search engines, and to secure some professional SEO help.
The keyword phrase is not a broad, general word or term, but one that you in particular should rank for, e.g; if you sell a particular product or service in a set location such a motel based in Riccarton, Christchurch, your search should be a specific;
“motel accommodation riccarton christchurch” and not a general “motel accommodation” Equally, it could be your “motel name+location.”
If your site does not appear in pages 1-3… call The SEO Guy!
Approximately 90% of searchers will not go past the 3rd page of results! Something like 60% will not go past the 2nd page… So if your business is not listed on the first 3 pages of search engine results, its certain that you are missing a lot of potential clients for your products and/or services.
Have You any Hidden Perils Within Your Web Site…
Imagine the nausea and anxiety of having your site disappear without trace from multiple major search engines in the space of a few days… no longer able to be located on Yahoo’s new search engine, and consequently MSN, plus other Yahoo search partners! And this a niche tourism site which, by design, had for the past few years enjoyed No.1 placement on all the major search engines for an array of relevant keyword phrases, and was generating 10,000+ “qualified” visitors per month.
We are not talking about a slip in the rankings here either – we are talking about a total purge from Yahoo’s web results, despite the site being a long-standing, high ranking site within the Yahoo directory. We are also talking about a site which continued to rank No.1 on Google throughout this little crisis. A site which had not had any significant recent modification, had no “dodgy” optimisation trickery, and which has been a stable, reliable repository of 300+ pages of useful, regularly updated content. How could a site like this disappear, you ask? Could it happen to me, you ask? Let me explain how it evolved…
After checking search results intently for a week, hoping the site would bounce back into the limelight, and wracking our brains to figure out what had happened, we decided to subscribe to Yahoo’s Site Match program to get the site re-indexed. And re-indexed within a couple of days it was, according to the Site Match stats, but still it did not reappear in the index. An urgent message to Site Match support received a very prompt response, as follows;
“Hello Ben,
Yahoo does not like custom NOT Found pages used to advertise other links to your site. You may want to revisit this approach.”
Best Regards, Overture Site Match Support, Overture
Gulp… the site had always had a custom 404 page, and since a major site revamp 3 years ago the 404 page has had a mini site-map providing links to content relocated onto other sites. We very quickly blew all that stuff away, but the anticipated reappearance in the Yahoo search results did not occur. Again, a mayday to Site Match support received another prompt response, as follows:
“Hello Ben,
It is apparent that you had fixed your 404 problem. However, we ran your URL through an HTML validator and found that it did have errors in the code. Even though this is not critical, every little bit helps in getting good placement to drive traffic to your site. Here is that URL to the validator. We hope this helps. http://validator.positiontech.com/anthr.cfm”
Best Regards, Overture Site Match Support, Overture”
Well, under stress, its always good to have a goal…. So after a visit to the validator URL above, and verifying that there were indeed some issues, we downloaded a copy of CME’s HTML Validator Lite 3.5 from www.htmlvalidator.com and systematically eliminated every issue. None were major – some extra and tags, which translates as incorrect nesting. The home page title had an ampersand done as “&” instead of “&” So now, there is not a single HTML error in the site’s index.htm page…
Now, I have to say we had serious reservations about something as simple as this being the key to reinstatement in the Yahoo index. I mean, since when have search engines been pedantic to the point where they will completely banish a site for a few minor code errors? Google, the epitome of search engines, has obviously accommodated or ignored the minor errors on the site.
White text on white background, ok… but an ampersand? Please!
Well, to my complete amazement, within 12 hours the site was back in the Yahoo index, sitting at No.1 for the expected range of keywords within Yahoo web results.
All the best stories have a moral, and this one could even achieve parable status.
- First thing is, go check your custom 404 pages.
- Second, tidy up your HTML code before they drop your site.
This exercise has got to be good for you (just like organic muesli, bran flakes etc). After all, how often do find a legitimate excuse to mess with raw HTML code these days? Honestly, either option is about as appealing as a bout of self-flagellation!
Speaking for myself, I have an intense dislike of anything that raw – muesli and/or html. I must also make the point that I did not make the HTML code mistakes myself, you understand? (Well, maybe I did the & ampersand thingy) J
Complacency is the issue – the site was error free on creation, but has been online for several years, generating business. The regular maintenance, rebuilds, rearrangements etc had obviously allowed accumulation of some minor HTML code errors over time, and we had foolishly not kept a close eye on that particular issue, relying on the HTML editing software too much.Like most webmasters, since their invention I’ve cheerfully and unashamedly used a “WYSIWYG” HTML Editor – which of course inserts the dodgy code all by itself. In my case, the culprit is Microsoft’s FrontPage, which I am very fond of. I love it because it does lots of really, really clever stuff at a very sensible price. There is a touch of irony to this story, because MSN Search is currently getting its results via Yahoo… Microsoft’s own software could therefore be responsible for eliminating some very good sites from its own search index.
So now, we’re back in the Yahoo index at No.1 but not yet out of the woods. We are out a hundred US bucks though! To sign up for the Site Match program, first there was the US$50 sign-up fee for the indexing for a year, and then the US$50 in advance for the 15c per click-thru from the search result listing…. However, we’re very grateful for the rapid and accurate advice from the Site Match support team!
I wonder what happened to those guys?
Good Site Design Criteria Incorporates SEO
1.1 Introduction
1.2 Focus on the Product
1.2.1 Decide on Site Name/URL
1.2.2 Internal Page Naming
1.2.3 Image Names
1.3 Design Issues
1.3.1 JavaScript
1.3.2 Flash
1.4 FRAMES
1.5 Splash Pages
1.6 Databases vs Text
1.7 Page Layout
1.8 Content
1.9 Links
1.10 Geographic/Location Searches
1.11 HTML Coding Errors
1.12 Choosing a Designer
1.13 Site Maintenance
1.14 Ten SEO Design Rules
1.1 Introduction
Should you be contemplating a new web site, or the rebuild of an older site, there are many issues you need to consider. High in the priority list at the outset should be search engine rankings, and design of the site to maximise the site’s potential web profile is crucial to success. A key design criteria should be to ensure that the web site, as launched, will require minimal remedial search engine optimisation. In the process of site creation there is almost always conflict between form (design) and function.
The key premise must be that without visitors, the site is worthless. To achieve a return on investment (ROI) the site needs to generate the maximum volume of “free” traffic. Your design goal is generation of qualified traffic i.e. potential customers who want what you offer, and arrived on your site by choice because it was relevant to their search. These days, you will see this referred to as “organic” search results.
Aside from this, the site may also generate traffic from newspaper advertising, mail-outs, your business stationary and business cards etc containing the site’s URL, and from pay-per-click advertising campaigns on search engines via Yahoo Search Marketing and Google Adwords. This is not “free” traffic because it is generated at additional cost over and above your site’s establishment and operating costs.
Ranking highly establishes brand recognition and there is the underlying impression of credibility if you are always in the Top 10 on search results. Organic search results achieve a much higher click-thru rate than paid advertising.
The items covered here are all elements within any serious search engine optimisation program, and should all be incorporated into the site design to varying degrees. Each of the major search engines has a great many elements in its ranking algorithms and the more you can get right, the better the results. You are setting out to make a crystal clear and unequivocal statement of what your site is all about.
1.2 Focus on the Product
Be very clear what it is you are selling… and aim all content and copy at ensuring that potential customers know that you have it available.
1.2.1 Decide on Site Name/URL
There is definite benefit in having primary keywords in the site’s URL. e.g. www.fast-food-delivery.com There is a balance to be struck between wanting to include multiple important keywords, and user inconvenience in typing very long URL’s.
Separatong words with a hyphen; e.g. www.fast-food-delivery.com is possibly better than stringing them together as www.fastfooddelivery.com – although some SEO guru’s suggest being sparing with the total number of hyphens. Some say one is enough…
1.2.2 Internal Page Naming
There is also definite benefit in having keywords in the site’s internal HTML page names, e.g. www.fast-food-delivery.com/riccarton-food-delivery.html The more clues you can give to the search engines regarding the content of a page, the easier it is for the SE to rank it.
1.2.3 Image Names
There is also benefit in giving descriptive image file names e.g. gourmet-hawaiian-pizza.jpg is better than pic1.jpg
The keywords contained in the image names will not be ignored by the SE’s and will usually gain you some additional traction.
Search engines now index image files, and it is therefore useful to give all your image files descriptive names. Some traffic will be generated this way, so you might as maximise the opportunity.
1.3 Design Issues
There are many elements to be considered in building site that will rank well on the search engines.
1.3.1 JavaScript
Bear in mind that pretty much anything contained within JavaScript is ignored by the search engine spiders. A nice JavaScript menu is all very fine and dandy, so by all means use one – I always do. However, because the links to internal pages within that menu will not always be seen by Googlebot and other spiders, it is crucial to provide an internal HTML pathway that allows the spiders to index all your content. Achieve this by;
- Content links – provide text links to internal pages from within the Home page. Anchor text that uses primary keywords, linked to an optimised page that has relevant information, will score you lots of brownie points. Pages with direct links from the Home page are also accorded a higher value.
- Site map page – ensure you have a text link on the Home page to a site map page which has a text html link to every internal page. Spiders seldom go deeper than 3 levels, so this tactic ensures all pages are accessible at no more than 3 levels deep.
Use JavaScript sparingly – every additional word and comment tag within a page diffuses keyword density within that page.
Use an external file and “call” your JavaScript applications instead of adding them to the pages. This is more efficient and, where a change is required, means editing one file instead of dozens of pages.
1.3.2 Flash
Do NOT use it to build a site in its entirety. There is no known benefit and lots of downside. Seriously, Flash animations should only be used where they can serve a key purpose – perhaps to establish a theme, or to tell a story. Images should be kept small, and file sizes less than 200k if possible.
On the Internet, attention spans are short, time is precious, and we want as near to instant page load times as possible. Flash is slow to load, content is not easy to index, and maintenance is more complicated and expensive. Please remember that not everyone is on Broadband yet…
1.4 FRAMES
Frames are an architecture solution for strictly controlling what the viewer sees on the screen. They are also a disaster from a search engine perspective, as search engines cannot readily penetrate into internal content Were search engines able to index internal pages, a viewer directed to the indexed pages would not see that page within the normal context of framed page menus, headers and footers, making navigation a confusing experience. Do not allow your web designer to use FRAMES.
1.5 Splash Pages
A growing trend on web sites is to have a “splash” page which might have a nice animated Flash graphics introduction etc, and looks superb.
Do not permit your designer to use a splash page. It forces your users to “click to enter the site” and this irritates people enough the first time, and really reduces their enthusiasm to return.
A “Splash” page is like the box-within-the-box type of present – really amusing for the guy who cello-taped up the boxes, but bloody irritating for the person trying to get inside to the goodies.
Splash pages are invariably a monument to the designer’s graphical and artistic genius, and serve no purpose in the site’s function.
1.6 Databases vs Text
I am fixated on not using databases, as this is generally an awful approach to building a web site from a SEO perspective. For most “small business web sites” there is simply no sound justification for a database-driven approach. However, on an e-commerce web site it will almost certainly be necessary to drive your online ordering system via a database, often using extensive JavaScript programming etc. What I’d recommend is building an “outer” HTML-based site with an inner Shop.
For an example of this, take a look at www.kozitoez.co.nz or www.BenArthur-Photography.com – These are modest little static HTML-based sites with an osCommerce core and a reasonably seamless integration of SEO requirements… Perhaps your online ordering application could work in a similar same way, where the outer HTML pages would be unique and fully optimised with individualised file names, titles, description, keywords etc.
Most database-driven sites make it difficult to produce unique pages – usually there are generic title, description and keyword tags to make it easer to maintain. Databases are also famous for impenetrable URLs – any URL having a “?” or “&” in it makes life difficult for search engine spiders trying to index internal content.
Databases are often promoted on the “ease of maintenance” grounds. Instead, I recommend the use of “include” pages to produce standard elements such a header, footer, side menu. One change on one page is reflected across all pages.
1.7 Page Layout
Keep it simple. There are some basic rules to be observed that will ensure best results in search engine rankings. These can conflict with the site designer’s view of the world, and you need to make informed decisions when/if compromises are to be made.
The search engines place greatest emphasis on the top of the page – the 1st heading or title, and the 1st paragraph. Your keywords must be placed prominently there. Use a narrow header holding a company logo, this header could be common to every internal page.
Follow this with a Title/Heading in H1 style to emphasise its importance, and containing the keywords/ key phrase. Follow this with a brief first paragraph, containing the keywords/ key phrase at the beginning, highlighted in bold. If possible, using an iteration of the keywords/ key phrase as the anchor text, add a link to an internal page containing more detail.
Some search engines will look for the first iteration of the search phrase, and include a portion of the paragraph as their results for the search. Its crucial that you control what searchers see by providing good copy.
You need to have around 300-500 words on the page. Place some strategic links to key pages on the footer, plus your address with all relevant geographic location details.
1.8 Content
Content is king, content rules, ok! To achieve consistently high rankings, you need good content, able to be readily indexed. To me, this means a series of simple heirachical HTML pages, which might include;
- Products and/or Services
- Contact Us – a form-based interface for customers to contact you with suggestions, complaints etc
- Web Resources – a links page to sites of interest to your clients
- A “Link to Us” page outlining your preferred link-back text
- Site Map page listing every in text hyperlinks
- Company Profile
- Newsletter
- Location Map if applicable
- Coverage Area Maps
- Special Deals and promotions
- Hours of operation
- Rates
Build yourself a dozen or so unique pages with around 400 words apiece, targeting slightly different keywords/phrases on each page. Now you’ve got some substance for the SE’s to work with.
1.9 Links
Incoming links to your site are a crucial element of the search engine ranking game, and especially important on Google. In fact, its very difficult to get indexed at all on Google if there are no incoming links to your site.
The quality of links and their context are more important than the quantity. E.g. a link to your site from Telecom’s Internet Yellow Pages, on a page of content related to your theme is worth 25 links from B&B’s, hotels etc.
Search out all the local business directories in your area of operation. See which ones rank well and get listed on them even if it costs you a few $ annually to do so.
When you have nothing to do, sit down and look for sites that link to your competitors and contact their webmasters seeking reciprocal links.
1.10 Geographic/Location Searches
These days, most searchers refine their query with multiple words, frequently using location e.g. “fast food delivery Christchurch” or “hotel accommodation Ashburton.” If you are city or suburb specific, be specific about that. E.g. specify this in page Title, Description, Body text etc. Include city, suburb, address, postal code in the page footer on all pages.
Search engines are also heavily focused on “location” as an indexing element that enables increased relevancy searches, in particular geographic location.
1.11 HTML Coding Errors
Ensure the designer does produce perfect HTML code. You can easily validate (check) this, but be sure to indicate to the designer that this is a prerequisite. Yahoo in particular will not index a site if there are HTML code errors – and this as a consequence would exclude you from MSN and many other search engines and portals as well!
1.12 Choosing a Designer
By now, you’ve got a better idea of the overall design goals, and you can use these points to help in specifying your design requirements. Set out a design brief and circulate it to several designers for appraisal and request project cost estimates.
Refine the list to a group of 3 potential designers from the preliminary response to your design brief. Meet with each and discuss the site project with them, ensuring that they understand what you want. Redefine the plan, refine costs.
Request a “fixed price contract” which requires that you have agreed on everything before hand. If it takes longer than estimated, that becomes someone else’s problem, not yours. Any amendments required by you are obviously a variation to the plan, and must therefore be made at additional cost to you. All such amendments should be requested in writing, costed by the designer, and agreed to by both parties.
1.13 Maintenance
Site maintenance is a key issue. There will be ongoing site changes – to the links pages, food specials, pricing etc. You need to figure out who will do that for you, and to keep it as simple as possible. Rather than requiring expensive, complex software, or arcane FTP file transfers etc, you need a simple maintenance process, no more complex than using a word processor.
Many of my clients use MS FrontPage 2003 for site maintenance because it gets the job done reliably and at a modest price. A good alternative, although somewhat more complex, is Macromedia Dream Weaver.
Maintenance becomes an issue for many, either from a technical or lack of time perspective. Usually the task does not require a full-time webmaster, and but for small business there are not always skilled staff available to handle it the task. Your site designer will usually offer to do maintenance for you, and there are also “contract webmasters” available to assist.
1.14 The SEO Guy’s 10 Design Rules
1. No “Flash”
2. No “Splash” page
3. No “FRAMES”
4. No unnecessary databases
5. Simple layout – Logo, Heading, 1st paragraph, followed by balance of body text
6. Use HTML pages – fast, easily indexed
7. Unique Pages – every page has a different title, description, keyword targets
8. Fast page load times, minimal graphics use
9. No Coding Errors permitted
10. Use of Headers, Footers, Side Menus– via “include” pages, to minimise maintenance
Hell, if all designers did this, The SEO Guy would be looking for another job!
So What the Hell IS Search Engine Optimisation – A verbose explanation…
Table of Contents
1 Introduction
2 The Two Approaches Traffic Generation
2 Site Optimisation
2 Pay-Per-Click
3 Search Engines
4 Some Immutable Laws
4.1 Form Follows Function
4.2 You Never Get a Second Chance to Make a First Impression
4.3 What vs Who
4.4 Content is King
4.5 No Page More Than Two Clicks Away
4.6 Mighty Meta-tags
4.7 Dubious Practices
5 Site Submissions
6 Summary
What actually is search engine optimisation? This article sets out to dispel some of the myths surrounding SEO, and to promote awareness of the practice as tool to achieve a return on investment for your web site.
There is obviously confusion in the minds of many, as evidenced by the varied approaches seen within any cross-section of web sites. A lack of understanding is apparent on the part of many web designers e.g. those whose design techniques ensure that search engines cannot penetrate to any internal content!
In essence, SEO is the art of clarification and qualification, with a clear emphasis on the principle that “form follows function.” Thus, it is semantic, pedantic, and language-orientated rather than the marvel of the technical wizardry inherent in the dreaded Flash and JavaScript which (usually) serve to undermine it. Many designers obsess on form, building sites that serve as monuments to their creative genius. In an ideal world, a site would be first designed to fulfil its “function” of attracting clients and making sales, and its “form” would be one supporting element in the overall strategy aimed at achieving a “return on investment” for their clients.
To some degree, SEO is a moving target. Indeed, the pace of change in the past 2 years the major search engines have developed a habit of revising their relevancy ranking algorithms, amending listing options, changing alliances, altering customer base, changing names and content sources, not to mention buying and selling each other.
The bottom line is that it does not matter how good your site looks, if no one can find it.
There are several immutable laws that, if adhered to, will ensure your site prospers, and delivers the elusive ROI. The goal is generation of “qualified traffic” – defined as those who come to you because they want what you offer, and not by accident.
2 The Two Approaches Traffic Generation
The two approaches to raising the profile of a web site, SEO and PPC, are quite complimentary. Because it is difficult to optimise a site for a very wide range of keyword phrases, PPC marketing can greatly extend your reach. Optimise your site for the major keyword terms, and use PPC to target less obvious, lower volume keyword search terms.
First and foremost in generating traffic is site optimisation which, after the initial outlay, generates “free” traffic from search engines based on your ranking for particular search terms. This is the “Content is King” approach, and requires us to persuade the search engine that we have the content most relevant to the search. Volume and organisation is important, and we ensure that search engines can index all supporting content.
The “Function follows Form” approach, where you are quite prepared to pay to ensure people find your site, sometimes because its cheaper than rebuilding it. You “bid” for sponsored listing placement, and pay each time a visitor clicks on a “sponsored link” on a search engine and goes through to view your site. PPC allows you to generate traffic even if your site is poorly optimised, but is by far the most expensive option long term.
An advantage is that PPC campaign setup can allow the viewer to go direct to the page with the content most relevant for the term being used, e.g. bypassing splash pages etc.
The two heavyweights of PPC are Google’s Adwords, and Yahoo Search Marketing (previously Overture) Each has a slightly different approach to the PPC solution. Both are affordable and both have easy set up processes for establishing advertising campaigns. Copywriting is the key skill, as both have limited title and description space, which will have you sweating as you try to squeeze a sales pitch into a 35-40 character title!
There have been huge changes in the search engine scene in the past couple of years, from the spectacular rise of Google to the demise of Northern Light as a public search facility. Overture purchased AllTheWeb and AltaVista, and in turn was purchased by Yahoo, and so it went on. Google now supplies search results to almost half the lesser search engines – Anzwers, AOL, Netscape, ICQ Search, IWON etc.
However, from an SEO perspective the important changes are more fundamental than that, and relate to directory vs spider-based indexing. For a long period of time, an accurate listing in both the human-edited Yahoo Directory and the Open Directory were crucial to search engine traffic. Back then, even the spider-based engines such as Google placed great emphasis on directory categories, and if you were not listed in Open Directory, Google might not index you at all!
Both those directories seem now to have passed their “use-by date” in terms of delivering traffic but Google and Yahoo still place great emphasis on their links. Listings in the DMOZ and Yahoo directories are of tremendous credibility value to your site, and are probably the best links of all to have!
Between them, Google, Yahoo and MSN, account for almost 90% of all searches performed on the web, and all three of these search engines now derive their bulk content from spider-based indexing processes.
Therefore, it is more crucial than ever before that your site is optimised to allow your content to be indexed by search engine spiders!
There are some rules to be followed for success to occur…
Decide what role your web site should fulfil in your business plan. Build and maintain it to meet the defined functions. Keep it simple, make it fast and clean and above all, avoid any technology which impedes functionality. This includes unnecessary animations or graphics which slow page load times, encouraging visitors to move on to more responsive sites.
Databases can also be a serious impediment to indexing of internal content, and in many cases are total overkill, especially for smaller sites. Usually, they defeat the goal of creating multiple unique pages by serving generic Title, Description and Keyword meta-tags. They also generate complex URL’s which search engines cannot always penetrate, and even the creation of Site Map pages is rendered overly complex. Any URL with an “&” or a ‘?” in it has the potential to at best impede or at worst block a search engine spider’s access.
In most cases the use of databases is gratuitous and unnecessary, a fast-fix solution to the designer’s goal of churning out a site at the least possible cost and the greatest possible profit. In many cases a template approach would have been more suitable.
Templates if thoughtlessly implemented, may create equally serious impediments to unique page content. I.e. many template implementations do not provide for unique, page specific meta-tags.
Having one generic Title, Description and Keyword meta-tag on every page of the site is a truly appalling, but common, design “feature.”
4.2 You Never Get a 2nd Chance to Make a 1st Impression
Splash pages annoy people! This is a serious tactical mistake when you are trying to convert window-shoppers into clients. Splash pages are usually “slow to load” Flash or JavaScript applets which serve no purpose other than impede access to the “real” content. Attention spans on the Internet are short, and there are plenty of “good” sites to choose from. Eliminate every impediment and impel your visitors directly into the “guts” of your site.
The dreadful “Click to Enter Site” splash page with no content expels potential clients into cyberspace, looking for a “better” site that delivers immediate gratification to their quest.
Worse, the search engines place primary emphasis on the entry or Home page. If this page has no content, a fault common to almost all “splash” pages, can you guess where your rankings are going to be? Nowhere, because the search engine cannot find enough content to even categorise the site, let alone establish its relevancy to a query.
Clarify what it is your site offers, and ensure that this is clearly articulated throughout its content. Unless you are a “household name” brand, the focus should be on what you produce, sell or service, not on who you are.
Searchers usually refine a query with 2-4 words, e.g. “stainless steel spade” It is amazing how many sites waste vital opportunities with fatuous lines like “Welcome to my web site.”
Define the key words or phrases that potential customers would use to find you. Ensure that those are prominent components of every title, description, heading and paragraph, and part of a coherent sales pitch. For example the Johnson spade manufacturer’s site title ought not be “Welcome to the Johnson Agricultural Implements Web Site.” Instead, a minimalist “Stainless steel spades by Johnson” would provide maximum keyword density.
- The goal of search engines is to deliver the most relevant content for each search
- Your goal is to make sure your content is relevant to any search made for products or services you offer!
The best way to ensure “free” prominence for your site is to provide valuable, in-depth, relevant content. A few lines of explanatory text buried inside a Flash animation do not do this. Product reviews, case studies, white papers, client testimonials, newsletters and manufacturers specifications are good content creation sources.
Make each page unique, and target a specific key word or phrase in meta-tags and body text.
Sites constructed entirely in Flash might look great, but they are destined for mediocrity in the “free” search engine traffic stakes.
4.5 No Page More Than Two Clicks Away
Wherever you are within a site, no page should be more than 2 clicks away from you. The search engines will usually only drill 3 layers deep. If you want all content indexed, this is a crucial issue, usually resolved via a Home page link to a site map page which in turn has text links to every internal page. A recent alternative is the Google Site Maps submission service which is well worth the effort of signing up to, not least for the excellent statistical information Google will provide you!
It is also important to provide hyperlinks to main internal pages from within Home Page body text. This elevates their importance, and reinforces keywords or phrases within the Home Page with relevant supporting content.
There are many meta-tags. Most are ignored. Some, like the “keyword” tag are now less used by search engines due to persistent abuse. However, there are still two meta-tags crucial to your goal of a steady stream of qualified traffic. Both provide an opportunity to control exactly what viewers see by way of search engine results, and thus influence viewers decision to select your site from that list.
Both provide valuable information to the search engines as they try to determine the site’s theme, category, type etc;
First is the Title, the content of which is displayed on the top line of the browser when viewing a site. The page title is also used as the “headline” displayed when/if it appears on a search engine’s search results page. This is a crucial 1st impression, and again, “Welcome to My Web Site” does not cut the mustard. Summarise your offerings in less than 10 words, ensuring that the primary keywords or phrase is pre-eminent, thus ensuring maximum keyword density.
Second is the Description tag, often used verbatim in search engine’s search results page. Again, this gives you an opportunity to influence a searcher’s click-through decision, and should reinforce the message in the title in less than 25 words / 200 characters. Again, the primary keywords or phrase should occur at the start of the description to ensure emphasis, and total character count should be restricted to 200 in order to maintain maximum keyword density.
Necessity is the mother of invention, and the vital importance of Top 10 search engine rankings has spawned some seriously dodgy mechanisms to enable sites to climb to the top of the heap. These have ranged from the simple tricks of hidden text to the mysteries of doorway and hallway pages, link farms, and on to the intricacies of cloaking and redirection.
Basic rule of thumb should be – don’t do anything which might be construed as spamming, or subverting the search engines indexes.
Once a site is banned from a search engine index, it’s pretty much dead in the water. The search engines are always on the alert to newly discovered loopholes and close them quickly once discussion of new “trick” begins in search engine forums and list servers. Instead, rise to the top of the heap on merit, it’s a better long-term strategy!
Having rebuilt your site in a search engine friendly fashion, how do you ensure it’s included within the indexes of the various search engines. This is another area which has changed dramatically. A few short years ago, listings were free. Not that long ago, you’d have to buy into a 48 hourly indexing process on Inktomi etc to ensure you stayed listed. Such a system delivered good value to the customer whilst generating good revenue for the search engines.
The state of flux seems to have eased. Indexing footpaths have been constructed between linked sites – to the point where if you have no good links TO your site, you may not be indexed at all, regardless of manual submissions.
The “Submission to 10,000 Search Engines for $99.95” was never good value, and is even less so today.
In terms of total traffic potential, the three main search engines are Google, Yahoo and MSN, each of which feed their results into sundry subsidiary search engines and portals. The Big Three account for around 90% of all searches performed on the Internet. They are all now “spider” type engines, which index the content of web sites in an automated manner, and are not hierarchical, human-edited directories. They all have supplementary “sponsored listings” derived from PPC advertising subscription systems.
For a site owner, search engine optimisation of your web site is now even more important than it ever was. Your goal of a steady stream of qualified traffic is best met by ensuring you have the best content, organised/optimised in the best manner, and supplemented by well designed and managed PPC campaigns.
If you are a web designer, you have an obligation to your clients to ensure their sites are built in a manner which facilitates search engine indexing, instead of impeding it. Establish the function first, and the form as a secondary issue.
If you are business planning a new web site (or contemplating reconstruction of an existing site) insist on making SEO the most important design criteria, it will save you money in the long term, and ensure the return on investment (ROI) timetable is shortened.
Ben Kemp,
aka “The SEO Guy” (NZ)
Authors Note: Ben is a free-lance IT consultant and one of NZ’s longest serving SEO practitioners, working mainly for small to medium-sized business clients in New Zealand and Australia. A recipient of NZ and Australasian awards for achievement in Information Technology, he works either from his home on the rugged West Coast of New Zealand’s South Island, or from an apartment in Thailand – depending on the weather, and if its trout fishing season or not!
Contact Details;
———————————————-
The SEO Guy (NZ)
Email: bjk
Web: www.comauth.co.nz
Phone (+64) 0274 778 078
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So… what the hell IS Search Engine Optimisation? a brief explanation…
A great many web sites are launched every year, and in some respects it’s a little like building a shop in the middle of a forest e.g. you can’t see the wood for the trees.
Web design and search engine optimisation are two quite different disciplines. Most web designers are focused on form – intent of producing a visually attractive site which will gain a cusomers interest and attention long enough to make the sale etc. Few web page designers implement SEO as an integral part of the web development project.
Retrospective SEO requires a great deal of extra effort and, consequently, additional costs. For that reason many site owners opt to not do this at the outset, but find it necessary to address it later when site traffic does not match initial expectations.
For any business enterprise hoping to make any Internet-based sales, or promote its services, it is crucial that your prospective clients can actually find your web site. A great many businesses and clients will make their first contact via search engines such as Google, Yahoo and MSN.
The prospective client seeks out a service or product by making a search using a particular key word or phrase. Those web sites that appear in the first 1-2 pages of results have the best chance of making a sale. If your site does not rank in the Top 30 results, you basically have no chance of success, as barely 10% of searchers will go to or past the 3rd page of results. If they don’t find what they want of the first or second page, the majority will either refine their search term, or go to a different search engine.
Search Engine Optimisation is all about marketing your web site more effectively, with the goal of improving your site’s exposure to customers and clients on the Internet. It has often been described as “part art and part science.” There are two main aspects to SEO;
The first is where we improve your “organic” or natural search results -achieving higher rankings by optimising and increasing the relevancy of your site to a specific search query. This is done by carefully analysing your sites ‘”theme” and ensuring that it is easy for the search engines to accurately categorise and index it. This requires the ability to concisely and accurately describe precisely what the site is about, using correct key words and phrases.
These key words and phrases are positioned at the strategic on-page and off-page locations that search engines expect to find such descriptive elements. These elements include meta-tags such as Title, Descriptions, Keywords, Image ALT and Comment tags, page and image file names, hyperlinked anchor text & bookmarks, paragraph headings, and body text.
Organic search engine rankings are regarded as the ultimate because they are “free” once the initial work is done. Better still, searchers regard these “natural” high rankings more favourably than the sponsored listings type described next.
The second aspect of SEO is pay-per-click, where your site appears in the “sponsored listing” section of the search engine’s results page and in Adsense advertising panels in many individual web sites. This requires you first to develop a list of relevant keywords or phrases. Then, you write advertising copy by way of titles and descriptions to be displayed to a searcher who uses the keywords or phrases you’ve chosen.
If a searcher clicks on your listing within the “Sponsored Listings” and goes to your site, you pay a predetermined amount per click. You set the “bid” threshold that you will pay, and this ranges from a few cents to over a $ for very competitive keywords. The most commonly encountered example of PPC is on Google – do a search for anything, you will 2-3 sponsored listings at the top of the page, and a block of them down the right hand side.
For many businesses, a combination of organic and PPC search engine optimisation works best. This is especially true if you sell a wide variety of items. Under those circumstances, it can be difficult to target all possible permutation of keywords and phrases within pages on the site. However, using Google Adwords or Yahoo Search Marketing, it is possible to target hundreds or key words and phrases – the usual editorial criteria being that you can only use terms which are relevant to the content on your site. Listings are validated by the PPC editorial staff prior to allowing them to go live online.
Both organic and PPC options are good at delivering “qualified” traffic to your site e.g. these are visitors who actively searched for the specific product or service, found a link to your site and clicked on it.
These days there is a great deal of competition amongst millions of web sites for rankings on the search engines. If you do not ensure your site is properly optimised for your specific theme, product and service, then it is doomed to mediocrity.
The consequences of NOT optimising your site are;
- most people will only find you by accident
- you don’t get “qualified” traffic – visitors who want what you sell
- you miss out on sales of products and services - your competitors get them instead!
However, the “return on investment” for SEO is usually very good indeed!
A properly optimised site will see prompt and measurable increases in search engine traffic, usually accompanied by an increase in enquries and sales.
Author: The SEO Guy
