This topic can get very involved and is one of many for discussion on how to optimize your website for higher search engine rankings. However, since some of you may have little to none online or web experience, I am going to try to summarize and make this as simplistic as possible. If you have any questions, feel free to post your questions on my Blog and I will respond as soon as possible.
It is very import that you select the right key words for your website. If you do not, you will likely never see results. Those of you who have purchased a “canned” website may or may not have the ability to modify your site as I am going to explain in this article. It will depend on how the company has setup your website. You will need to inquire with them. For everyone else who is maintaining their own website, you all should be able to apply these methods and get results.
First you will need to do some research (as always). A good tool to help you with this research is Good Key Words, which can be downloaded for free at http://www.goodkeywords.com/ . Once you have downloaded this tool you can enter the most generic key word for your website and it will provide you with a detailed list of related key words and how many searches (Count) they receive on a monthly basis.
I am going to tell you right now; NEVER start with the #1 keyword on the list. If you do; you’re setting yourself up for failure. The reason for this is because if the #1 key word is searched over 1 million times (just for example) that means the competition you will have to outrank is extremely fierce (over 1 million competing websites for that main keyword…scary!) Starting with a very competitive key word or phrase is just not very smart.
So you have entered a generic key word and Good Key Words has provided you with a detailed list of additional key words and phrases. You will want to select a more specific key phrase and one that does not generate millions of searches. I suggest staying in the 1500-5000 search/hit range. Now, you will need to pick 3-4 keywords or phrases that fall in between that range. These will be the key words or phrases that you should start optimizing with.
Next you will want to check out the competition….fun! Let’s say your key word/phrase was “work at home success stories” (this is for example only) You will want to go to Google and do a search on this phrase and review what the #ranking website is doing and then you’re going to do the same but better.
Click on the link that will take you to the specific website; right click anywhere on the page of the website and select “view source” (standard for Internet Explorer). Here is what we will need to look for:
1) Whether or not the #1 website is using h1 header tags and are placing the key word/phrase “work at home success stories” within those tags.
3) Whether or not they have bolded, underlined, or italicized the words “work at home success stories” anywhere in the body of their web page. This is something you can start doing right away, even with a “canned” website.
4) Whether or not they are using
5) The last thing you will want to review is whether or not they’ve placed the keyword once at the very beginning of the page and once at the very end of the page.
Now that you have completed your review you will be able to determine whether or not you can out rank the #1 website or even obtain top 10 rankings. Remember, the main idea behind ranking well in Google is to analyze the top ranked websites to find out exactly what they’re doing and then do those things BUT just a little better to one up the competition and obtain a better ranking.
You will want to do this again for the remaining three keywords or phrases. It is recommended that you analyze the top 5 ranking websites for each key phrase. From my research and training I have been told that if any of the top 5 sites have a Page Rank (PR) of 6 or higher, it is best not to target that website at first. After you have built a better online presence, you can come back and attempt to outrank them later. I was taught that PR is very IMPORTANT for Google and you must get your PR above 5 to gain any type of Google popularity or to rank high in search engines. However, I have done my own searches in the past and have found #1 websites that have a PR of 0 or less than 3. Well that is odd I thought, but after I have investigated a little later, it appears that PR is no longer even being used by Google themselves. I can’t prove whether or not that is a true statement, however when doing searches I have seen websites with a PR less than 3 and they are ranked #1, so go figure! So I don’t want you to focus on your PR right now. You should be familiar with it, but at this point I do not believe it is necessary for you to achieve higher rankings or to build a stronger online presence.
Now everything that you reviewed for the #1 ranking website, you want to implement for your website….to recap this you will need to do the following:
1) Place your keywords/phrase within your h1 header tags.
2) Include your keywords/phrase within your title tags.
3) Bold, underline or italicize your keyword/phrases (recommended at least 3-4 times within your page).
4) Include your keywords/phrase within your
5) Lastly, make sure you place your keyword/phrase at the very beginning of your page and at the very end of your page.
I know this is a great deal of information to take in; especially if you’re not familiar with how search engines “really” work or web design. It doesn’t stop here there is so much more to come.
My next article is on “Optimizing Your Web Page” – this is a continuation of what we learned above. If you have any questions, you can use the contact me page of my website or simply post a comment on this blog.
You’re on your way to success, one step at a time!
This article has been provided courtesy of MommyOnline.net.
Resources: A good website to learn about basic web design and HTML is Boogie Jack I have been using his website for the past several years and find that they have a very easy to understand and learn web design instruction.
