Post written by Dana Prince

SEO, or search engine optimization, is something that most online entrepreneurs quickly become aware of. One of the first things you need to learn, in order to be successful online, is to optimize your website so search engines will be able to find it.  But what some new internet marketers don’t realize is that there are many aspects of search engine optimization.

SEO consists of on-page optimization tactics, that occur directly on your website and off-page optimization tactics that happen outside of the site. Both are important and both can help you get traffic to the site.

On Page SEO

Search engines index pages. Every page in your website has the ability to be indexed and contributes to the overall popularity and ranking of your website. For this reason, there are various aspects of the web pages that you need to optimize.

Some novice internet marketers believe you can optimize a home page and be done with it but traffic has the ability to enter your site on any public page and because of that, you should optimize each and every page.  Here are some examples of areas of the page to optimize:

The URL:

A domain name can help your ability to be found online. When search engines read your page, they’ll want to categorize it and the domain name is one of the areas they look at. For this reason, it’s a good idea to pick a domain name that relates to the niche you’re in. Beyond that, you should choose a link structure that also utilizes relevant keyword phrases. If you’re selling widgets, your url could get more traffic if the domain is something like: widgets.com/buywidgets.

The Tags:

When you search online for something, the search engine results pages will show you a description of websites it deems to be relevant. The meta tag is the 2-3 line description that tells people what your site is about. From an SEO and SEM perspective this is important.

In terms of SEO, keywords will help. In terms of SEM, or search engine marketing techniques, writing a descriptive and keyword dense meta description can tell search engines and people that your site’s link is worth clicking.  You can also enter keyword tags for each page which gives the search engine a quick answer on what the page is about. Image tags are another area of importance in SEO. Not only do pictures help you from aesthetics and selling perspectives but search engines can read the tags related to the photos so remember to use keywords in image tags so that you increase the relevancy of your page to your topic.

The Title / Header:

A formatted and relevant title will tell search engines what the webpage is about. This can help drive the right traffic to the page. If all pages on your website are labelled the same way, this doesn’t help search engines send people to the page on the site that’s most relevant to the topic so it’s important to label your pages optimally. Keyword optimization of subheadings is also helpful.

Keyword Density and Latent Semantic Indexing:

If your page is about widgets, the word widget should appear on the page. Words related to the sorts of widgets you sell should also appear so that search engines know exactly what the page is about. For example, if you’re selling Apple computers, you’ll want to also list other words related to computers so that the search engine doesn’t think that people looking for information on apple-picking farms should be sent to your page.

Linking and Navigation:

Having an easily navigable site is going to help visitors and search engines find what they’re looking for. People and search engine spiders (software programs that index web pages) can enter on any page and it’s a good idea to help them easily find their way around your site. A site map can be helpful for giving search engines a bird’s eye view of your website and linking within the site while using appropriate keywords as link anchors will also help your site get desired traffic.

 

Off Page SEO

While what exists on the pages of your site is a very important part of internet marketing, what exists outside of the website can also be quite helpful in bringing you traffic and favorable search engine rankings.

Search engines look at popularity when indexing web pages and various things that you can do outside of the site can impact that popularity and perceived relevancy to your topic:
What’s the best off page SEO strategy? Get backlinks. Links pointing to your site from authority blogs and sites will help you tremendously with your search engine optimization efforts. If other sites link to your site, this is considered a popularity vote.  If that site links with a keyword anchor, this can help you even further to rank for the keyword or keyword phrase in that anchor. Article directories, website directories, press releases, guest posts on blogs, and social bookmarking links can all help. Social bookmarking creates links to your site that can be seen by people and indexed by search engines so the more high quality links that point to your site — the better. If the site linking to you is relevant to your topic and is well optimized, this is the ideal scenario.

There are many facets of SEO that can help a business or an entrepreneur gain online exposure. Learn all you can about how to optimize your site(s) and you’ll increase your chances of online success.

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