What is Search engine optimisation (SEO)?
SEO describes the techniques used to increase the position of your webite on search engines such as Google and Yahoo. Each search engine has it's own program called a 'web spider' or a 'web crawler' that crawls the internet reading web pages and collecting the content. The 'spider' then deposits the information into the search engine's database or index. So when you enter a query into a search engine, they can find the most relevant results to the query by matching it with the information in their index.
To rank high in search engines takes time
It is important to remember that search engines constantly change and update the way they look for and rank information so what may have worked last year may not work this year. Beware of companies that promise 'first place ranking' search engine optimisation as there will always be a catch. The age of your site will also be a factor - older domain names have a history and so they are seen as being more credible than a website that appeared last week - so you need to remain patient.
Keywords
Try to include keywords that you believe are relevant to your web page. Think about the phrases you would search for if you were looking for a company or group that offers your products or services. If you write your content with these phrases in mind then you should see an increase in the amount of visitors to your website. Don't include phrases that you think will be popular searches but have no relevance to your website or services. The search engines will mark you down for it!
The right content
Good quality content has recently gained higher importance in search engine ranking. Like before, the content must be relevant to your website and informative for your reader. To learn more about this see writing content for websites.
Stay away from Splash pages and non-spiderable Flash menus
Your homepage is probably your website's highest ranking page so it is important to have a simple but effective page that search engines can easily read. Animated flash pages and fade in menus may look cool but their text is embedded in the graphic so search engines can not understand the page content, this will affect their search engine ranking.
Linking to other websites
Your search engine ranking can improve if other quality websites link to your site. Search engines see this as a mark of respect. Try and use your keyword as the link text - for example if your business is a children's shoe shop based in Manchester but your business name is 'First Step' don't use 'First Step website' as your link text, try and use a phrase that people would search for such as, 'Children's Shoes Manchester'.
If you would like to discuss your website SEO please call 01457 838 010 or email: hello@eberle.co.uk
