Search engines are all a bit
different but at the end they simply
try to match keywords entered by
people surfing the internet to
keywords found in web pages found on
the internet. The best matching
websites are displayed on top of the
search results. Here is how to
optimize your ranking.
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In many
ways, getting attention from the
search engines is similar to
publishing a newspaper. To get a
reader's attention, an article has to
use a nice picture or a catchy title.
The first few lines have to convince
the reader that the article is worth
reading. The body of the article has
to be easy to read and present
information that is meaningful,
useful, and well organized. At the
end, a summary repeats key concepts.
For optimal ranking, your keywords
need to come up at least once in the
text of your page. Search engines put
more emphasis on keywords found on the
very top, the headline, the first
paragraph, and the last paragraph of
the pages.
Each
page of your website should focus on
two or three keywords so rework your
texts and reorganize your pages as
needed. Your texts should sound as
natural as possible to avoid scaring
your visitors. If you can not find
ways to use certain of your keywords,
they probably should not have been in
your keyword list to start with.
Please see our
researching and choosing keywords
tutorial for key concepts about
keywords.
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In the
publishing industry, titles or key
concepts are usually displayed bold or
oversized. For optimal ranking,
titles, headers, or key concepts
should stand out and include your most
important keywords. This can be
accomplished through the use of font
functions or through the use of the H1
& H2 HTML tags.
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The META
tag "keywords" is an invisible portion
of each web page. For optimal ranking,
it should include the complete list of
your keywords in decreasing order of
importance. The META tag "keywords"
should contain no more than 20
keywords for a total of 500
characters, including spaces.
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The META
tag "title" is an invisible portion of
each web page. For optimal ranking, it
should include your most important
keywords. The META tag "title" is
usually displayed on the search
engines results page. It should be no
more than 12 words and 80 characters
long, including spaces.
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The META
tag "description" is an invisible
portion of each web page. For optimal
ranking, it should include your most
important keywords. The META tag
"description" is usually displayed on
the search engines results page. It
should be no more than 24 words and
200 characters long, including spaces.
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The web page comments
are an invisible portion of each web page,
originally intended for web designers to document
their work. For optimal ranking, your most important
keywords should be used as web page comments.
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Outbound links are when
you link to another page or website. For optimal
ranking, your most important keywords should be part
of the text of your outbound links.
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Picture file names and alternate text |
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Pictures are not part of
web pages but are separate entities being referenced
to. For optimal ranking, your most important
keywords should be used as your pictures file names.
If a picture can not be found, an alternate text can
be displayed. For optimal ranking, your most
important keywords should be used as alternate text
for your pictures.
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For optimal ranking,
your most important keywords should be used as file
names for your web pages.
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META tags \ keywords analysis |
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Run your site through
search engine optimization tools such as the ones on
Submitexpress, or
Site solutions. Correct errors and make the
necessary changes to optimize your results.
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The
Internet is a very dynamic place, with thousands of
web pages being added or modified every hour. These
changes constantly modify relative rankings. To maintain optimal
ranking, you should consider optimizing your
website, about twice a year.
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Spamming is abusing the
system and is considered cheating by the search
engines. They will penalize you BIG time for that,
up to the point of completely dropping your website.
Here are a few things you might be tempted to do but
should not. There are others. Use your
brain and do not cheat!
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1.
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Do
not repeat the same keyword more than 6 times
in your META tag "keywords".
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2.
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Do
no repeat the same word over and over in the
text of your pages.
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3.
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Do
not hide white text on top of white background
in an attempt to squeeze a few more keywords
in. |
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4.
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Do
not repeat your keywords over and over in your
page comments.
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5.
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Do
not put have more than 50 outbound links on a
single web page. |
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6. |
Do
not create web pages with the sole purpose of
repeating keywords.
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