Google’s admittance that they do not utilize meta keywords for the web search rankings reinforces the importance of great content that matches search queries and that attracts inbound links. All competitors that are engaging in website development and search engine optimization are targeting the highly search terms, that are relevant to your industry and that have a low difficulty to rank for. So how do you differentiate yourself and obtain higher search engine rankings? There are two strategies to employ. On-page SEO and off-page SEO. On-page is the matching search queries to your targeted keywords whereas off-page is the links to your site.
7 Techniques to Develop Search Friendly Websites
1. Create Unique & Precise Title Tags. The title tags tell search engines and the users what is contained on the page. Each page should have its own title tag. duplicates confuse search engines as well as readers and raise click-off rates.
Example: Andrew’s Book Store. The title tag: Andrew’s Book Store – Buy Books, Book Signings, New Releases
This name of site is clearly stated along with focus areas. The title is short, direct and will be fully displayed. Title tags that are too long will be cut off.
2. Page Specific Meta Descriptions. The meta descriptions tell what the content on that page is about. Similar title tags however these are sentences or a combination of words that accurately describe that page. The meta descriptions can be used by Google as the information contained in the snippet (information contained in the search results).
a. Home page – create overall site description
b. Internal Pages – create page description.
3. Simple, User Friendly URL’s. Creating simple, relevant and structured URL’s clearly tell the search engines and the user what is focused on for that page. Using the example above, for an internal page:
Andrewsbookstore.com/murder-mysterybooks.html
The more targeted the URL, the more attractive it is to link to by other sites.
4. Logical Navigation. Unless you have a blog or a highly successful product(s), the main page visited is the home page. Take time to go through the navigation to be sure that this is the natural sequence potential users will go through the site. Create a site map (not to be confused with a XML Site Map that is submitted to Google through Webmaster Tools). This is useful if someone has difficulty navigating back to a page.
a. While enticing, avoid linking to each page of your website from the content on your home page.
b. Do place internal links at the top or bottom of the page, referred to as breadcrumb links.
5. Create Relevant Frequently Updated Content. A blog is one of the best ways to keep the content fresh and have more web pages that are indexed. Keep the content focused on your product or service to allow for frequent and return visits by users.
6. Descriptive Anchor Text. Linking internally or externally to pages that support your content and show why you are linking to that page. The most common mistake is having a sentence “For more information, click here” as the hyperlinked click here becomes the anchor text. Link to the most relevant word that describes why you are linking to the other page.
7. Create Page/Paragraph Headers. Headers are the H1 to H6 tags that stand above the paragraphs or at the top of the page to tell what is to come below. An outline of sorts. Not all H1 to H6 need to be used. Use headers if the content immediately beneath warrants an introduction.
These tools are designed to get you started in the best practices for web development and optimizing website pages to improve search engine rankings. Search engine optimization is an ongoing process as rankings can change with each indexing of your site pages.
photo credit: Danard Vincente