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Search Engine Marketing 101: What Search Engines See
When They Visit Your Web Site
by Robin Nobles
If you have a Web site, have you
ever wondered what a search engine sees when it visits
your site to add the site to its index? Do you know
that it doesn't see the beautiful graphics or the fancy
Web design? Do you know that it only sees the source
code, or the "skeleton" of your Web site?
Do you realize that knowing this
little tidbit of information and doing something about
it can make a huge difference in your search engine
rankings and, ultimately, the success of your online
business?
One very important thing that you
need to remember is: the search engines like simplicity.
The simpler your Web site is, the easier it is for the
engines to determine what your Web site is about. And,
if the search engines can determine exactly what your
Web site is about, you have a better chance at top rankings
under the keyword phrases that are important for your
online business.
Let's look at this concept in action
with a page I recently created for one of my online
businesses: Search Engine Workshops.
http://www.searchengineworkshops.com/articles/search-engine-seminars.html
As you can see, it's a very plain,
simple page that was not created to be the "main" or
"home" page of a Web site. Rather, it was created to
pull in traffic through the keyword phrase, "search
engine seminars."
What I really want you to see is
the source code of the page. So, when viewing the page,
click on View on the top menu bar, then Source or Source
Code.
The most important part of a Web
page is what appears at the very top of the page.
So, what appears in the <head>
section of your Web page is very important, because
the <head> section is at the top of the page.
Let's look at the <head> section
of the source code:
<HEAD>
<TITLE>search engine seminars--are you ready to
have a successful Website?</TITLE>
<META NAME="keywords" CONTENT="search
engine seminars, conferences, workshops, CONFERENCES,
WORKSHOPS, Conferences, Workshops">
<META NAME="description" CONTENT="Consider
attending a search engine seminar to learn how to take
a struggling Web site and bring it to the top of the
rankings!">
</HEAD>
There are only three tags in the
<head> section of this Web page: the title tag,
the keyword META tag, and the description META tag.
Because the title tag is in the <head> section,
and because of the importance that most engines place
on the tag, it is considered one of the most important
tags on your page, so it should always be the first
tag in the <head> section.
Notice that in the title and keyword
META tag, the important keyword phrase (search engine
seminars) appears as the first words in the tag. In
the description META tag, the keyword phrase is still
toward the beginning of the tag, as opposed to the end.
In other words, where you place your
keyword phrase in the tags and content of your page
is important. If you place your keyword phrase toward
the beginning of all of your important tags and toward
the beginning of the contents, you're "proving" to the
engines that the page is really about that particular
topic.
I've mentioned one reason why the
title tag is important, but there's another reason too.
The title tag is important because it almost always
appears as the title of the site in the search engine
results. Your description META tag may appear in the
search engine results as well and is considered important
by some of the engines. So, when you create your title
and description tags, remember two things: put your
keyword phrase toward the beginning of the tags, and
make the tags captivating and designed to pull in traffic.
Think of it this way. If your site
is #10 in the search engine rankings, but if the sites
above yours haven't gone to the trouble to create appealing
titles and descriptions, a search engine user may skip
over those sites to visit yours.
Now, let's go back to the source
code. Look for this tag, which isn't far from the <body>
tag:
<IMG SRC="images/banner3.jpg"
ALT="search engine seminars, search engine conferences,
search engine workshops" WIDTH="220" HEIGHT="100">
This is the image, or graphics, tag
for the Search Engine Workshops banner that appears
at the very top of the page. Notice that the engine
doesn't "see" the graphic itself. It sees the name of
the graphic (banner3.jpg), and it sees the ALT text
that describes the image. It sees the width and height
of the graphic. But, it doesn't see the graphic itself.
So, the engine doesn't know that the graphic says, "Search
Engine Workshops."
Next, look for this tag, which directly
follows the image tag:
<H1 ALIGN="center"><FONT
FACE="Arial">Search Engine Seminars</FONT></H1>
An <H1> tag is a heading tag,
and heading tags are very important to a Web page. Try
to put a heading tag at the very top of your page, if
at all possible, and use your important keyword phrase
in that heading tag. When you look back at my actual
Web page, do you see the words "Search Engine Seminars"
right under the graphic? That's the heading tag.
Now, look for this tag in the source
code:
<P><FONT FACE="Arial">
Is your Web site achieving the success that . . .
This is where the contents of the
Web page begin. Look on the actual Web page and find
the text: "Is your Web site achieving the success that..."
Notice that the keyword phrase (search engine seminars)
appears in the first paragraph.
In other words, with all of these
tags and the placement of our keyword phrase in the
page's contents, we're proving to the engines that the
page is really about "search engine seminars."
So, let's visit your site on the
Web. View the source code. What's in the <head>
section? Are your title and description tags using the
keyword phrase that's important for that particular
page? Are your title and description tags captivating
and designed to pull in traffic? Each page of your site
should have different title and description tags, and
those tags should be based on the focus of that page...
what that page is really about: in other words, its
keyword phrase.
How many graphics do you have before
the actual contents of your site? If you have a lot
of graphics, navigation bars, or buttons before the
contents of your page, the engine has to sort through
all of that source code before it gets to the actual
keyword-containing content.
Does your page contain lengthy Javascript
or other code that pushes the important contents toward
the bottom of the page? If so, it could be hindering
your chances at top rankings.
Are you using a heading tag that
contains your important keyword phrase toward the very
top of your page? Is your keyword phrase used in the
first paragraph of the page? Is it used in several places
throughout the page?
Look back at my page. Notice that
the keyword phrase, search engine seminars, is used
as link text to describe several links. Are you using
your keyword phrase to describe links that are leaving
the page? If not, try to do so.
Study your own site carefully, and
apply these guidelines to your pages.
Doing whatever you can to push your
important keyword phrase toward the top of the page
and toward the beginning of your tags is the first step
toward having a successful Web site that's ranked in
the top of the search engine rankings.
In Summary:
Achieving top rankings for your Web
site does not have to be an impossible goal as Robin
Nobles has outlined above. The tips she's given will
certainly help move you in the right direction.
Unfortunately, most keywords are
competitive enough to require additional page refinements
in order to break into the top 10 listings. Moving your
page from position #936 to position #48 may be a remarkable
improvement, but unless you are in those top 10 to 30
positions, you'll receive little to no search engine
traffic.
Fortunately, WebPosition Gold 2 gives
you the extra competitive edge required to push your
rankings to the top. Its Page Critic module analyzes
your page and gives you specific advice custom-tailored
to your keyword, page, and targeted search engine. It
eliminates the guess-work and the need to remember all
the many "rules" and "to do's" of search engine optimization.
Robin Nobles is the Director for
OnlineWebTraining.com, which teaches online training
in search engine marketing.
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