In this article, I’ll run through some fairly standard forms of SEO that will help your site acheive better organic results in the search engines.
Meta Tags.
<meta> These sit inside the <head> tags at the top of your web page. They aren’t visible to people viewing your site but they are picked up by the search engines. There are lots of meta tags that can be put on your web page but the most important one is Description.
Description – <meta name=”description” content=”your page description” /> Each description should be unique to that particular page of your site. It needs to give the search engine a brief summary of the page contents and should contain some of your site’s keywords. You don’t need to write an essay (60-70 words at a maximum).
Bear in mind; if your description is relevant to the page and not overly ‘spammy’, it will more than likely appear underneath your site’s title in organic search results, meaning that a well written description could increase your click-through rate.Title Tag.
<title> These also sit inside the <head> tags of your page and refer to the individual title of the page. You should try to stay away from using generic page titles like ‘home’ and instead use it as a kind of strapline. Again, this will appear in organic search results and should ‘sell’ that page in one short line.
Heading Tags
<h1>,<h2>,<h3> etc. These are placed in the body of your page and define the hierarchy of the page content to search engines with <h1> being the most important heading, <h6> the least important. Treat them as chapter headings in a book. Each heading should define the following content’s importance in the page.
Keyword Density.
When you are writing the content for your web page, make sure you include some of your keywords. However, don’t be tempted by ‘keyword stuffing’ as search engines may well decide this is spammy. Try and aim for a keyword density of 6 – 10%. This also has the benefit of making your page more readable for humans too!
Internal Links.
If you are talking about one of your services on the home page, make that a hyperlink to the relevant page elsewhere in your site. A good technique for cross-selling too.
Alt Attribute.
The alt attribute is used as a text-equivalent for any images on your site. If images are disabled on the visitor’s browser, they will still see your alt attribute telling them what the picture is. Not only good for search engines but best practice for website accessibility too.
Example:<img src=”http://www.elanwebdesign.co.uk/blog
/wp-admin/images/myimage.jpg” alt=”a brief description of my image using keywords” />Title Attribute
The title attribute is different to the Title Tag. You should use title atributes with all links on your website. Not only good practice for SEO but makes your site more accessible too
Example:<a title=”Our collection of quality products” href=”http://www.elanwebdesign.co.uk/blog
/wp-admin/mypage.html”>Products</a>XML Sitemap.
Always submit an xml sitemap to google. This will help Google index and crawl your site. A handy xml sitemap generator that I use is www.xml-sitemaps.com
Similar Posts:
- FREE Ways To Get Your Business Noticed Online (Hints And TipsTop 5 Lists)
- FREE Ways To Get Your Business Noticed Online (Hints And TipsTop 5 Lists)
- Analyse Your Traffic With Google (Hints And TipsLikes)
- Analyse Your Traffic With Google (Hints And TipsLikes)
- Top 5 Ways To Make Your Website Accessible (Top 5 Lists)
Hi,
Thanks for the really great tips. I would add link building to the list, as this really helps a site rank well for specific keywords.