Just launched a website and have no idea how to get it up and running? Do not worry. There are many companies offering their services that will help make your website work for your business. SEO stands for Search Engine Optimization and can be defined as the process of increasing the quality and volume of traffic to a specific website. SEO helps your website appear higher in search engine results, which draws people to your site and ultimately benefits you. So if you are a newbie in the web arena, it is best to hire an SEO company to work for you.
But before you start pouring your hard-earned money into an SEO company, please choose carefully. There are many companies online that are amateurs in this field and hiring them will ultimately have a negative impact on your website. Companies that promise you “guaranteed page 1 placements” are probably no good. This is because SEO is tough and since people who browse online are quite unpredictable, such high guarantees are meaningless. So, before you hire an SEO company, you’d better learn a little bit about SEO yourself.
- Optimization of each page: This is the most important part. Every page of your website should have concise content that ranks high in search engines. Optimizing the specific content on each page will drive traffic.
- Keyword Optimization: Keywords are what people search for on search engines like Google, Yahoo, Ask Jeeves and MSN. If your website is filled with appropriate keywords and a potential customer searches for it in a search engine, your website will drive traffic. Keyword research is definitely not easy. There are some keyword tools available online such as “keyword discovery” and “word tracker” that you can use.
- Good site content: Writing content for your website is not very easy. A good SEO company will be able to write in a way that attracts readers with its user-friendly writing and keeps the keyword density right to rank high on Google.
- Optimization of page titles: If you hire a smart SEO expert for your web promotion, one of the ways he can get your website up and running is by adding the keywords in the blue bar that appears at the top of the screen. Not only will this help your website rank high, but it will also help visitors remember exactly what it is about.
- online directories: Submitting your website to online directories is extremely necessary for proper SEO promotion. Not only will it drive traffic, but search engines will find it easier to index you.
- Be descriptive in links and pictures: Another great SEO trick is to make your site’s links and images as meaningful as possible. Let the person who clicks on your link know exactly what to expect. Indeed put the keywords in the descriptions. This allows search engines to find your website through links and images. The anchor text should be descriptive with all the top keywords.
- Make your website spider-friendly: You may have created a wonderful website using Javascript and Flash graphics that will amaze everyone who visits it. However, remember that search engines cannot decode these codes. So if you have a lot of graphics, a smart SEO advertising idea would be to allow the search engine “spiders” to dig deep into your site with navigation alternatives to get your site indexed.
- fresh content: If you have created a website and want to increase traffic to it, you need to work on it regularly. Search engines are always looking for websites whose content is regularly updated. Even if it’s a product you sell, if you post fresh content, search engines will regularly come back and index your site. Forums and blogs are a great way to add new content with the least amount of effort. But don’t start a blog just for web promotion. Start it only if you have interesting things to share with your readers on a regular basis.
- be unique: Uniqueness counts in every field and the web is no different. If your website offers something new and unique to the target market, not only will search engines rank you highly, but random people will actually start referring you to blogs, forums, and chat rooms. Interesting websites attract prospects whose word of mouth will ultimately benefit you. Think digg.com, eBay.com… Got the idea?
- Social networks: Social networks like Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, LinkedIn, Friendfeed and Bebo are gradually gaining ground as a very good SEO tool. Getting people to click the link to your site on these networks is a great way to drive traffic. If people on these social networks like your website, you can be sure that the next time they “tweet” or “write on walls” they will tell other people about it! Dell and CNN are just two examples of the amazing business success that can be achieved through these sites.
- Website Promotion: Promoting your website is not easy and if you find it too time consuming, hire an SEO expert to do the work for you. He submits your website to various online directories and starts optimizing your search engine rankings.
- SEO Affiliate Marketing: Affiliate marketing allows people to refer other people to your website and they get paid when the referred person makes a purchase. So you share your profit with people who help you achieve it. It’s a wonderful way to increase traffic.
SEO is a science. One mistake you should never make is trying to trick search engines. Tricks like hiding keywords by making the text color match the background color, merging links, and other sneaky tricks will ultimately help you get out of the search engine results. And it will be difficult to gain access again.
So the best thing for you would be to make your website an interesting place and subscribe to a great SEO program that will let people know that it is!
