Search Engine Optimization (SEO) Tips
If you are designing your own website on a minimum budget and
can’t afford to hire a professional SEO
services company, here are a few
tips that will significantly help your chances of performing
well with your site.
These tips in no way cover the entire spectrum of the field of
SEO, which is extremely complex, requiring an understanding of
HTML coding, Search Engines, Writing, and of the internet as a
whole. These tips are intended to help you design their own
site; these tips alone, however, will not produce the same
results that a SEO consulting firm
would. Much like any do-it-your-selfer, you must accept that no
matter how talented you are, your finished product will most
likely not be as successful as a professional’s.
Tip #1 – Research your Keywords
Before you do ANYTHING with your website, it’s good to know what
keywords you’ll be optimizing for. The easiest way to determine
this is to run a keyword analysis on some of your soon-to-be
competitors. Free SEO keyword analyzers can be found
numerous places online…I prefer
Webmaster Toolkit.
To find more keyword phrase options type a keyword into the
search window at
Wordtracker. You will be provided
with a list of phrases and the number of times they have been
searched in the past month. If you are on a low budget, it is a
good idea to go after more specific keyword phrases (those
containing more words) and phrases that are searched less
frequently. Keep SEO
target marketing in mind when choosing your keywords.
Tip: ALWAYS optimize for a keyword phrase, not a
single keyword.
Tip #2 – Pick an SEO friendly URL
SEO begins at the very foundation of a website – deciding on an
appropriate domain name. The most successful domains are often
those that include SEO-friendly keyword phrases. URL plays an
extremely important role in the success of many sites. For
instance, if you search for ‘used cars’, usedcars.com is the
first site that appears.
Tip #3 – Create an SEO friendly sitemap
Before writing any SEO articles, it’s a good idea to jot down a
temporary site map. A good sitemap should including not only a
home page, an about us page, and a contact us page, but also
subsequent pages that will attract web surfers by targeting
keyword phrases (which you found on wordtracker).
Tip #4 – Write your SEO content
This can get tricky. As an SEO
copywriter and consultant I highly recommend allowing a
professional to write content for you, as few non-writers have
the ability to create natural sounding SEO text.
For each SEO article (which will become a web page on your site)
you should target one or two keyword phrases. Each word within
these phrases should be optimized at 3% or higher density.
Density refers to the frequency with which a particular word
appears in a text. If, for instance, an article contained 300
words and the word ‘auto’ appeared 30 times, the density for the
word ‘auto’ would be 10%. Individual keywords must reach
these densities…so even though you are targeting specific
keyword phrases, you won’t need to list the
phrases in order throughout the document. For example, if I
was targeting the phrase ‘keyword phrase’ in the last sentence,
the previous format would be acceptable. You’ll notice that the
plural ‘keywords’ is listed…this is because search engines
accept both the singular and plural forms of words. However, if
possible, it is best to stick with the exact keyword phrase.
Tip: SEO optimized articles should be at least 250 words long.
Tip #5 – Internal Linking
Now it’s time to refer back to the site map you made a few tips
ago. Return to the SEO copy you have just written, or are in
the process of writing, and weave in 2-5 text links per
article. These text links should link to pages within, or
internal to, your site. Internal linking occurs within a
site. Note: Our
one way link
building services help develop external links.
Please contact us with any questions
regarding search engine optimization. We specialize in
small business SEO and
internet
marketing and consulting.
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