Let’s face it, internet marketing and online businesses are here to stay. It’s also a fact that a large percentage of people find new websites by entering search terms (keywords) into the search engines of their choice. With this in mind, it’s easy to see why SEO (search engine optimization) is so important. At it’s most basic level, SEO is nothing more than making your site look better to the search engines so they will place your site higher in the rankings when somebody searches for your targeted keywords.
In practice, SEO can be tricky, frustrating and complicated. However, don’t let that stop you. A little SEO is better than no SEO at all. Besides, you are sure to learn a lot in the process of optimizing your sites. Also, you will most likely see a boost in your site’s rankings as well as a boost in visitors and potential buyers to your site.
As mentioned, effective SEO isn’t always the easiest thing to do. For that reason, many people choose to hire somebody else to do it for them. While there is nothing wrong with that, it’s a good idea to have some understanding of SEO techniques. If you choose to do your SEO yourself, you will need to know them anyway. If you outsource it, you will have a better idea if they are doing a good job or not.
Before you do anything else, you need to have a plan in place. What are you going to do to rank higher, How will you structure each page, How will those pages be linked together, What about backlinks, The better your plan, the better your chances of success. Don’t worry about being locked into the plan. If, while you are doing your SEO, you find a way to do things better, then by all means, go ahead and adjust your plan as needed. Once you have your plan, you can move on to your keywords.
Keywords are the main foundation of any SEO campaign. No matter what techniques you use, they will all revolve around your keywords. Do not try to take shortcuts when selecting your keywords. Take the time to do the research, use free or paid keyword tools and see what your competitors are doing.
A lot of people prefer to have one page dedicated to each of their keyword phrases. That doesn’t mean you can’t use other keywords on those pages, but that the focus will be on one keyword. For example, the address, title and other parts of your page will contain that keyword.
There is one final thing worth mentioning: your pages need to be user friendly. While you may be working hard to use SEO to rank higher, none of it matters if people don’t like your site. Don’t overdo using your keywords, make navigation simple, and do your best to provide relevant information as it relates to what people are looking for. The good news is that being user friendly and impressing the search engines can both work in harmony with each other.
