Three SEO Tips for your site
01 Choose one main keyword per page Search engines understand what a particular webpage is about by reviewing the frequency of words and phrases in its content. By choosing one main keyword or short phrase for each page on your website, you encourage the search engines to associate the page with that keyword. 02 Increase the Keyword Density for each page Search engines expect the keyword or phrase on each webpage to make up 6%-10% of its content. The frequency of the keyword or phrase is called Keyword Density. If your page has 100 words and your keyword appears six times, you have a Keyword Density of 6% Caution - if the Keyword Density is too high, search engines may consider the page to be spam and penalize your website in the search results. However, if your phrase does not appear enough, it will not be identified as the keyword for the page. 03 HTML tags emphasize your keywords The purpose of an <h1> HTML tag is not to tell web browsers to use a large, bold font - it is used to indicate that this is the most important text on your page. We browsers will just display it in a large font by default, because it is important. Search Engines decide which words and phrases are the most important on your page, based on the HTML tags that are used. The most important tags to include are the <title> which sets the title in the browser bar and should always include your keyword; <h1> (which should only appear once and should also always use your keyword) and <h2>, ideal to emphasize supporting words that ar similar to your keyword or phrase.
Using HTML tags for Search Engine Optimization
Effectively using h tags will not only improve your SEO efforts, but also the structure and accessibility of your web content. H tags are used to denote section titles in your content.
<h1> tags are normally used for the title of the content and then lower h tags (such as <h2> and <h3>) are used for sub-headers.
01 Use h1 to h6
HTML has six heading elements: <h1> through to <h6>. Use <h1> for your main page heading, then <h2> for sub-headings and so on, where necessary.
02 Prioritize your content
Search engines view the <h1> tag as the most important title of the page and then go down to <h2>, <h3> and so on. This means that you should always ensure your <h1> tag contains your most important keywords and that our <h2> tag contains your secondary keywords.
03 Match your h1 tag to your page title
It’s important to have your <h1> tag at the top of your page and to include the same important seach content as your title tag. This highlights to search engines what your page is about.
04 Don’t overuse h1 tags
If <h1> tags are so important, why not add lots of them? Don’t risk it: just use one <h1> tag with your most important content and then use as many <h2> and <h3> tags as you need alongside your content.
05 Put your visitors first
All good SEO comes from putting site visitors first. If you structure our headings to make it easy for users to read, you will automatically make it easy for search engines to spider and index as well. Remember: users first, SEO second
What is a Web Directory?
A “Web Directory is a directory on the internet that specializes in linking to other sites, and arranging these link according to the themes of the websites they link to.”
A Web Directory is also known as Link Directory, as its a hot spot for links. A really good example of a directory is the Open Directory Project. To Date, Web Directories form an important part of Link Building.
There are different types of Web Directories as well- Paid, Free, Reciprocal and Affiliate being the major niches.
Here are five reasons why Web Directories are important:
- It gives you a backlink.
- It makes your site more visible to the spiders.
- You submit your site to the directory unlike search engines for whom you have to wait.
- You can be assured that your Site comes under the right category and hence it helps to make your Website’s profile stronger.
- You also have the odds of your link being clicked by a random visitor, though this does not happend much with Web Directories.
What is a Reciprocal Link?
Reciprocal links in simple terms “are links arranged on the basis of an agreement between two sites to provide a link to the other site within their own site”.
This is mainly used for increasing link popularity and consequently web traffic. Its an arrangement that is made out of trust and also with the understanding that there is mutual benefit. Reciprocal Links is a major force in Search Algorithms.
So what are the advantages of having a Reciprocal Link?
- You get visitors of other sites, directed towards your site.
- Search Engines also counts the number and quality of the sites that link to your site, so it helps rankings.
- It creates the opportunity of friendship between the various active users across the web and hence more quality as well.
- It make things easier for users, as they can know where to find related information and also at the same time, whom their favorite site prefers to read or visit.
- A cheaper(most of the time free) and more effective tactic, when compared to other means of garnering link popularity.
What is a Robots.txt file?
A Robots.txt is a “file that is added to your server, to prevent Search Engine Spiders from crawling to certain sections of your site, or your entire site”.
The Robots.txt file is easy to create, as its a simple notepad file. It’s a major tool used by illegal sites to survive on the Internet. But there are some valid advantages to it as well.
These are some reasons why people use Robots.txt file, or why you should use it:
- If you don’t want your unfinished site to already appear in public.
- It can help you escape from spammers, who try to collect email addresses.
- You have sensitive information that you do not wish to be shared. Porn Sites, come under this category.
- You can cut off specific pages from the Search Engine Listing, and that can be a useful advantage.
- It can act as an invitation for bots to crawl to your site as well.
What is Black Hat SEO?
Black Hat SEO, is “the use of unethical techniques to make search engine rankings go up”.
It’s still widespread in spite of all the backlash from Google. It breaks rules and regulations that exist in Search Engine Optimization and also runs the risk of getting the website being banned. There are groups of people who claim that if Black Hat SEO is illegal so is basic SEO.
Here are some methods of Black Hat SEO:
- Keyword Stuffing- This is stuffing your site with keywords in a non-logical manner.
- Use of Doorway Pages- Door Way pages are fake pages are that used for indexing purposes.
- Invisible Text- This is adding text that is the same color of the background.
- Spamdexing- This is the process by creating pages specifically for the search engine for obscure phrases.
- Link Cloaking- This process is basically hiding the actual content of the site and misleading users and search engines.
- The other processes include Buying Links, Data Mining and Page Rank Hijacking.
What is a Sitemap?
A Sitemap is “the representation of the navigation structure or the architecture of a website”.
The Sitemap lists the pages that the website contains in an organized fashion and the link to the Site Map can be usually seen in the bottom end of the page or sometimes at the top.
The Sitemap can be easily generated by various tools available on the net.
Here are some reason why you should have a Sitemap:
- It makes Search Engine Spiders find your pages easily, this is specially useful if your site is new.
- Visitors can look for specific things easily with the Sitemap.
- It is useful for sites that contain dynamic content.
- Helps really large sites that contain a lot of content pages which are not interlinked in the right way.
- A site map helps get pages that contain Flash or Ajax get indexed as well.
5 Awesome Tools For Keyword Research
I wanted to write this post earlier, but I was not able to write it owing to a mix of my lazy-ness and being bombed with work.
May of you keen keyword-junkies out there may already know about these tools, but nevertheless these are some awesome tools for the tiny little noobs like me out there.
Here’s what we start out with ( bear in mind, these are tools for keyword drilling and research and don’t delve into issues such as keyword density, page flow etc., )
1. Adwords External Keyword Tool
This tool can be called the “big brother” of keyword drilling based on generic ideas.
Its both a great tool for figuring out potential keyword combinations based both on ideas presented and semantic terms.
It also doubles up by showing search traffic for these terms according to G ( Even though I believe most of the data is skewed to a large extent ).
SCORES
Usage - 3/5
Finding New Keywords - 4/5
Finding Search Traffic - 3/5
Total - 10/15
CREDIT: PPC HERO
Keyword Discovery is yet another me-me service which tries to replicate the function of Wordtracker.
But, Keyword Discovery scores a home run when it comes to usability as well as finding regional search data.
If your out trying to figure out the search data for regional terms or optimizing for google.co.uk or .com.au, this is one awesome tool.
SCORES
Usage - 4/5
Finding New Keywords - 3/5
Finding Search Traffic - 2/5
Total - 9/15
3. Wordtracker
I included Wordtracker in this list after much resistance, not because the tool is not perfectly a keyword research tool, but because its more of an antique tool.
Wordtracker hasn’t evolved one bit over the years and still sticks to its basic function of suggesting keywords based on a thesaurus type model and displaying the search data based on meta-crawlers like Dogpile.
The only thing I like with Wordtracker is its keyword basketing system ( almost like an ecommerce site checkout ) and its massive KEI functions.
SCORES
Usage - 2/5
Finding New Keywords - 3/5
Finding Search Traffic - 2/5
Total - 7/15
Google Suggest is NOT EXACTLY a typical keyword research tool, its more of an attempt by google to tweak their search quality.
But, this tool is awesome for finding our longtail keywords!
I had to include this in the list for the amazing arrays of longtails you can optimize for with the help of this tool.
Afterall, longtails are gold!
SCORES
Usage - 4/5
Finding New Keywords - 5/5
Finding Search Traffic - 0/5
Total - 9/15
This is similar in function to Google Suggest, but I put this in the list because there are no tools which analyze search data according to the Yahoo perspective.
Yahoo is after all the second largest search engine in the web and it would be a shame to discount it from proceedings.
SCORES
Usage - 4/5
Finding New Keywords - 3/5
Finding Search Traffic - 0/5
Total - 7/15
I may have missed a couple of tools here and there, but I’ve to a large extent discounted the tools which were released by MSN.
I can guarentee you that these tools are some of the best you’ll find out there and these tools can help you create that foundation for a very successful search engine marketing strategy.
What is CPC?
Cost per Call
CPC or Cost Per Click System is “the amount an advertiser has to pay every time a visitor clicks on his ad.”
It’s a form of Internet Marketing and is also known as Pay Per Click. There is another form to it, and that is the Cost Per Call System, where instead of clicking on an ad, the visitor calls a number provided by the web page.
Though there have been scams, like “Click Fraud”, CPC is still an effective way of Internet Marketing.
Here are some reasons why CPC is effective:
- It boosts your sales.
- The payment is result oriented.
- It’s much quicker than many other means of promoting your site.
- Seasonal Promotion of your prodcuts is made easy.
- Implementation is very simple.
What is a Landing Page?
A Landing Page is “the first page that a visitor comes across after clicking a link”.
There are two types of Landing Pages- Reference(Provides Information) and Transactional(Service or Product Oriented).
A Landing Page forms the most important part of an online business, as the conversion of a prospective client to a client takes place within this page.
Here are four things that you should keep in mind when your building a Landing Page:
- Make sure that the keywords that your using to get the visitors is relevant to the content or service in the page.
- Give as much information as possible, and try and provide unique information.
- Keep it short - Don’t have a long drawn out page, be specific and stick to only one train of thought.
- Don’t add to many images or any kind of audio.