Search Engine Optimization. It sounds like one of those techno-babble phrases that means almost nothing to the everyday person. It’s the kind of thing you could easily ignore, simply leave it to the tech geeks (like all the folks at SolDesign) who constantly review the specs of their brand-new, food-themed internet phones. If only the term didn’t leave you with one sneaking suspicion: it may be one of those phrases. The ones that have surreptitious, quiet, unnoticed control over every aspect of your life, your work, your business, your money. You need to know what that phrase means. Understand the phrase; control your world.

And here at Sol, we’re not ones to keep that information from you. No, no, we believe in the starlit wonder of access.

So what is it? Search Engine Optimization is the process of making your website easier for search engines (like Google) to find and offer when someone searches for the products and/or services you offer.

So why do it? Making your website more search-friendly can increase the volume of quality traffic to your site. Quality traffic is the folks not just coming to your site (they’re great), but actually buying or signing up for something (they’re greater). You want people to come to your site, but also to use your services and/or buy your product.

So, here’s the problem:
When people search online, they usually only look at the first page of suggested sites, be it on Google or another search engine. More often, they only look at the top 5 results. You can’t blame them; you do it too. Admit it. So, to have a successful website, you need to get your site into the top five, or better yet, the very top.

And here’s the proverbial rub:
There are a few tricks you can use that work for every search engine. Clarify what your site is about. Make it easier for search engines and site visitors to find what they’re looking for. Further down, we’ll talk about Google Local’s fancy-pantsy new One-Box on Google.com, and get some hints on how you might be able to get closer to that top three.

1. This one’s simple, but a lot of websites don’t bother with it, so that’s your edge. Give every page of your website a title, keywords, descriptions, meta keywords, and meta descriptions.

2. You don’t need to put the same keywords and title for all the pages of your site. If the different pages deal with different issues, go ahead and differentiate their titles and keywords as well. For example, here at Sol, we offer web design, graphics, search engine optimization, as well as a number of different other services. We could title every page with Sol Design: web graphics, design. But then, we’d only connect with people looking for web design or graphics. Instead, on each page, we have different titles, based on the page. On our page about SEO, we included SEO in the title and keywords. On our page about internet marketing, you won’t believe it: the title is “internet marketing”.

Making sure each page is specifically titled and keyworded increases the chances that people will find your site, when they’re searching for a specific product or service.

3. When you’re writing the copy for the page, include your keywords a few times. There’s no need to go wild with this; most search engines will reject your site if they think you’re just shoving the keywords in all over the place (it’s seen as manipulating the search engine to produce useless results for the visitor). You should have the keyword included a few times, but keep an eye to how the copy reads. If people click over to your site only to find it’s an unreadable mess of keywords, they’ll leave without buying anything from you. Most people skim pages to see if it’s got what they’re looking for. So write it simply and offer bolded and sized headings and subheadings with the appropriate keywords.

4. Don’t just include the keywords and title in your page’s description and meta description. Some search engines list that information on their list of offered sites, so people might actually be reading it! Make sure it reads well and sounds interesting. Use every tool you’ve got to get people to your site.

Speaking of good tools: Take a look at Google Local: One-Box of Super Marketing Potential!!

Google Local is a great avenue for internet marketing for businesses that offer a location-based service or product. It’s fabulous for small restaurants or shops that are geared toward a local clientele and can’t put a lot of money into internet marketing.

Google Local uses GoogleMaps to search for businesses matching search criteria in a user’s area. So, if Google.com knows where you are, and you search for pizza, Google Local will offer you three local pizza listings, right next to a map of those three locations (thus, One Box). This is huge, because businesses that aren’t at the top of Google.com’s search listing can come up at the top of Google Local’s search listing. Businesses don’t even have to have a website to be included; they just have to have a business listing. Needless to say, if you can make it into their top three local businesses, you will get incredible exposure, even if your website is not at the top of Google.com’s search listings.

There are a few basic ways to make sure your site is as Google Local-friendly as possible.

1. Submit a business listing to Google’s Local Business Center. Basically, tell Google you’re here. At the same time, you probably want to tell some other national listing services you’re here, as well. Yellowpages.com, infoUSA, Superpages, etc. This will not only increase your exposure, but Google Local will also be more certain that it’s got an accurate listing from you. Actually, you know what, go ahead and get listed on every free service you can find, including the ones that mostly do local businesses, like Citysearch and Yelp. The more places you’re listed, the more likely Google Local will pick you.

2. If your business doesn’t already have a website, get one. It’s not necessary to get into Google Local’s One Box, but in competitive cities, it might just nudge you over the next site. Besides, you need one anyway, right? You’ve been meaning to do it, but everytime you set down to do it - you know, something comes up.

Now you’ve got some simple search engine optimization tools, and we know you can handle them. Go out, forward, into the world, and take control of that phrase!

References:

http://sbinfocanada.about.com/cs/ecommerce/qt/seobasics.htm
http://www.smallbusinesssem.com/2007/02/16/
10-likely-elements-of-googles-local-search-algorithm/

This entry was posted on Wednesday, September 10th, 2008 at 5:46 pm and is filed under Internet Marketing, Search Engine Optimization, Web Development. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.