SEO – Search Engine Optimization For Newbies

 

Why Link Building & Backlinks

 

On-page search engine optimization, SEO, is definitely one of the key methods if a website owner want to improve the search ability.

However, on-page SEO often entails technical skills. Why? Because a lot of people are not HTML enthusiasts. This is often what needs to be tweaked to do an excellent job in optimizing web pages.

What if a friend to you already did the on-page optimization and now you want to know how you can do this by yourself?
Off-page optimization is the next step. And the results you will have to pine for are one-way backlinks. Why? Because this is how many of the major search engines such Google, Yahoo! and MSN rank websites. The more backlinks from relevant sites with good page rank, the merrier.

 

3 Key Off-Page SEO Methods

So, how exactly do you gather backlinks? It’s not an easy task but it is definitely less nerve-wrackling then HTML if you are not the techie type.

Here are some off-page SEO tips:

  1. Article Marketing – Quality content has been discovered to be real king. Everyone is hungry for fresh and quality info and providing it will make backlinks go pouring in. It helps a lot to be a keen writer to be successful. Also, practice the proper way of using a resource box. It should only include a website that contains information relevant to the article you submit to the article directories.
  2. Forum Participation – Look for forums that are relevant to your websites’ content. Then you find some you keep on sharing information that will be indispensable for the members. Your signature or the tag-along message at the last part of each of your posts is what will work for your off-page SEO campaign. Keep it simple and make sure that it covers something about your website. Learn how to hyperlink to make it easy for people who want to visit your site.
  3. Blogging – Blogs or web logs are now the most popular weapons of SEO expertise. Aside from being easy-to-update, they don’t require a tool formal tone, which is what many readers are into. Informal dialog which can be accomplished through readers leaving comments and the blog author replying to the comments is what also keeps blogs fresh and search engine friendly. Maintaining a blog that’s again relevant to your websites’ content will keep the search engines in touch with your site. Don’t forget to have a link on your main website from your blog.

The secret to be successful in carrying out these off-page SEO methods is to be consistent. Submitting quality articles to website at least two to three times a week. Produce content regularly for your personal blog is also a surefire way to make you website stand out. Participation in forums should be something you do frequently. If you do that it will not only help you to make your website more popular with the search engines, it will also learn you new things.

 

Do Search Engine Optimization By Yourself

You may want to perform SEO services on your website by yourself but don’t know how to get started. You probably have always wanted to get involved more with SEO but simply do not have the time.
Unfortunately this is usually caused by the misconception that SEO is easy to implement. That you don’t need a lot of experience. Even though SEO does require experience and time there are several options out there to start doing SEO on your own and be successful.

Here are two options on how you can deal with the search engine optimization of your site.

  • Become an SEO Expert – This is the hardest path if you want to do SEO by yourself with great result. You need to spend a lot of time reading books and online articles to catch up on the latest SEO trend. Next you should start experimenting with different methods you learn about analyze the results, and change your website again. SEO is a continual learning process and takes a great amount of time, energy, patience, and resources. However, after several months when you start to realize the benefits of your work you will have a great deal of satisfaction.
    This option is recommended for those if you want to start offering SEO services as a part of your business or it you have multiple websites that you manage. If you only have one website and do not plan on providing SEO services to others, this route is probably not ideal to considering.
  • Find a Professional SEO Guide – This is the ideal option for most people who want to start internet marketing on their own. You will learn more about the industry and yet not incest a considerable amount of time in the project. There are several SEO consultants who would be happy to guide you along the way and assist you in creating a successful online campaign. This option let you learn everything on your own but will have an experienced professional at your side to assist you in creating a successful campaign. The most difficult aspects of SEO could be handled by your consultant while you could manage SEO implementation.
    An consultant could for example assist you in developing a keyword phrase list, sample methods of finding link partners, guidelines for using title, alt, heading, bold, internal link, and meta tags. After you have finished working on a few key phrases you could request your consultant review your work and give you further suggestions. At first you will probably rely heavily on your consultant for advice but as time goes on you will be more secure to handle the SEO work by your own. A consultant should also provide a monthly progress reports. Consultants can usually provide other valuable insights to help your business succeed online on subjects such as PPC, conversion, usability, professional image, email campaigns, banner advertising, and other online options marketing options.
    Although this method will require some investment but will be far less expensive than a full-service SEO package. Over time the cost will diminish as you become adept at SEO yourself.

 

But how do you decide which option is the best? When deciding between these two options the most relevant question to ask yourself is how much time do you have to invest in SEO. Through experience I would estimate that having an SEO consultant at your side will reduce the time you need to invest in your SEO project by about 50-75%. You must also determine how competitive your industry is. The difference between a national web hosting company and a local pest control company can play a huge factor here in how much time it will to be successful.

 

The Importance Of Link Building

One of the easiest way to improving your ranking in the search engines is to let them know that your site is important. But how do you do that?
Well, the best way is through the process of link building. Link Building is when other websites link to you own website. If other websites are linking to your website, your link popularity will increase. When it does search engines will deem your website important, and in turn, you should receive more traffic.

But link building is a time consuming task. And it is for his reason that most all website rank so poorly in the search engines. Many website owners are unware that link popularity can have such an effect on their search engine rankings. This is good news for you. Start building your links now and establish you web cred.

Page Rank

Google, the Internet’s most popular search engine, measure a website’s link popularity through the use of Page Rank. To view a website’s Page Rank, just download the Google Toolbar. The toolbar will display the Page Rank of every website you visit, measured as a little green bar. A website’s Page Rank can very from a low of zero to a high of 10. Don’t worry if your website has a low, or no Page Rank. Many website only have a Page Rank of 1 or 2. But the Internet’s most popular websites posses a Page Rank of 8 or 9.

Quality Counts

Search engines are not just looking for the number of links that point to a website. The most important aspect of the process is obtaining quality links. Quality links are links from website that posses a high Page Rank. Get a link from a website with a high Page Rank is best, although any site with 1 or above is beneficial . Search engines also consider the theme of a website which links to you. It is best to get links from websites that are associated with the industry in which you do business.
For example, if your niche is website design you should have the majority of the links from webdesign related websites.

Getting Links

On of the best ways to advance your link popularity is to offer quality and informative content to your visitors. If they find the information interesting enough, they will naturally link their website to your.

Directory submitters are probably the fastest and easiest way to obtain some inbound links. Because Internet directories link to thousands of other websites, the value that they can add to your Page Rank gets diluted by all the other links. If you only operate local submit your website to local directories if there are some. After that you should submit to industry related directories to indicate to the search engines your line of business. A Google search can help you find these types of directories.

If you feel that you have a lack for writing, a good way to generate inbound links is to write articles. submit them to article syndication websites, where other webmasters are free to use your article on their website. But, there’s a catch – they must provide a link back to your website in return for using the article. If you don’t have time to write articles, you can participate in industry related discussion forum. Just remember to include a link to your website in your signature.

The last way to generate quality inbound links is through reciprocal linking. This type of strategy involves contacting other webmasters and proposing a link exchange. Find some non-competitive, but related website and simply email them to see if they are interested. It is best to already have a link on a page in your website before the proposition.

Linking Text Importance

When employing any of the above approaches, it is important that you try to use targeted keywords as a part of you link. The search engines read this text to determine what your website is all about. If your website involves ‘Red Widgets’, try to use this as part of your link text.

 

Link popularity is very important when attempting to rank well in the search engines. Link analysis is only going to get more important to search engines, not less.

This type of strategy is resistant to manipulation and justifiable way to measure a website’s importance. The link building process must be given high priority in your internet marketing efforts, and since it takes time, the sooner you begin the better.

 

 

Wrapping Up

Meta tags, quality incoming links and informative content are all important to achieving top search engine placement. To win the razor-sharp competition on the interment today, you need to have a good search engine optimized page.

You need to know or have the techniques requires to optimize your site well, if not you will not be on the top. One option if you don’t have the technical skills required you can always hire an SEO consultant. This will cost you some money but you will be ensured that your page is optimized enough.

 

 

 

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