10 Search Engine Optimization (SEO) Tips

Small businesses today are more enlightened about the need to comprehend and put into use the search engine optimization techniques, if only just the basics. As you read the various small business websites and blogs, you will quickly notice there is a lot of confusion what exactly the basics are. It is hard to know which SEO tactics and strategies really work unless you consult with a SEO professional, there is so much misinformation on this subject.

This article is part two of a SEO checklist designed specially for the webmasters and small business owners. Last week the subject was the 20 things not to do. This week will be covering what to do, basic things that you need to be sure are included on your website whether you do it yourself or hire a SEO professional to do for you.

Make a commitment to this process.

SEO is not just one time.

• The algorithms of the search engines routinely change, so some of the techniques that may have been successful last year might be out-dated this year. So you need to commit to the SEO for the long term to get the results you desire.

• Have patience. SEO does not give you instant results. The results make take several months, the smaller you are this is even more true, and if you are fairly new to doing business on the Internet, you will find this holds true for you too.

You need to ask question of the SEO company when hiring them.

• It is your job after all to understand what techniques the professional will use. So you need the specifics. You should understand the risks if there are any. Then research the company online, also about the techniques they told you the used, and so on.

Study SEO

If you are going to do this work yourself, you will need to study SEO to learn the tactics or techniques you need to use. Lucky for you, many great online resources exist, one being Search Engine Land, and many informative books you can refer too. “Small Business Guide to Search Engine Marketing” written by Jennifer Laycock, “Search Engine Optimization: An Hour a Day” written by Jennifer Grappone & Gradiva Couzin, and Aaron Wall’s “SEO Book”, are just a few that I recommend and have read.

• The web analytics need to be instituted from the beginning.

• You need to have well-defined goals to reach for your efforts with SEO, and the web analytics will track what is not effective and what is working for you.

Build a solid website.

• I am positive that you you want your site to show up in the results on the first page. You need to question, “Is this website good enough to be in the top 10 websites on this subject in the world?”. Be completely truthful with yourself. If it isn’t improve it.

Have a site map page included on the website.

• Spiders are not able to index pages if the can’t crawl them. The site map helps the spiders locate any pages of importance on your website, and it also allows the spider to know the hierarchy of your website. This fact is especially true if your website has a navigation menu that is hard to crawl. When your website is too big, you may need more than one site map page. Have each one contain not more than 100 links. In fact make it 75 to be on the safe side.

Be sure your URLs are SEO friendly.

• Place keywords into your file names and URLs, like mydomain.com/blue-widgets.html. Be careful not to overdo it like some people do. When a file has 3 or more hyphens it looks too much like spam and people may not what to click on the file. Note the bonus tip here: Place hyphens in file names and URLs not the underscores. Hyphens are looked at like a space where the underscores aren’t.

Perform research on the keywords at the beginning of your SEO project.

• When you have a small budget, try WordTracker or Keyword Discovery they both have free versions, you can also get more options in their paid versions. Don’t pay attention to the exact numbers these programs show; do pay attention to the relative volume between on keyword and another one though. You could also use the free AdWords Keyword Tool by Google, it does not exhibit exacts figures.