Search Engine Optimization
SEO or Search Engine Optimization – what is it and how do you do it?
Can your local customers find you in Google search results on the first page?
SEO or Search Engine Optimization is what you must do in order to be in search result pages in Google and other search engines.
We can tell you exactly what to do in order to optimize your website for the terms people use to search for your business.
Cover you bases using basic SEO: Make sure you have the city name and main site keyword in combination on your site. use it extensively in your site as explained below.
Search engine indexing: When Google comes and looks your website over it must categorize (index) your website. Google uses key words and keyword phrases to accomplish this indexing. The number of keywords/phrases are located, counted and scored.
This score is compiled by Google to calculate the web site relevance to the keyword used in the search. This score is used to decide in what order a website will be shown in the search result page when some one searches using the keyword/phrase you wish to be found for.
Is it possible to be on top or in the top 3 search results? Yes it is but it gets harder to achieve when there is more competition for your business category. That is where the city name comes in. Adding the city name to your product or service makes it much easier to achieve a top 3 listing because there is usually much less competition locally then there is nationally for any business category.
The website shown on the top spot is the one with the highest score. Do you want to beat them and be on top? You have to increase your score, You have to optimize your website so Google finds the right combination and usage of the keyword/phrase you want to be found under.
You must find out what key words and phrases are used to search for your business and incorporate these into your website. Fail to do this and you simply will not be found in the search results pages in Google, Yahoo and Bing or any other search engine.
Secret keywords – what are they – how does this work?
Fact is they are not secret, they are just not visible. What this means if they are on your web site but can only be viewed by the search engines because they are in the code that is in the head section of your web site. This section is called the meta tags section. It looks like this:
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<head>
<TITLE>Web site name or title – VERY IMPORTANT</title>
<meta http-equiv=”Content-Type” content=”text/html; charset=windows-1252″>
<meta http-equiv=”expires” content=”0″>
<meta name=”AUTHOR” content=”The web site author”>
<meta name=”COPYRIGHT” content=”Copyright (c) 2005-2025 by The web site author”>
<meta name=”KEYWORDS” content=”site keywords – VERY IMPORTANT”>
<meta name=”DESCRIPTION” content=”Site description – VERY IMPORTANT”>
<meta name=”distribution” content=”Global”>
<meta name=”resource-type” content=”document”>
<meta name=”revisit-after” content=”7 days”>
<meta name=”ROBOTS” content=”INDEX,FOLLOW”>
</head>
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There are 3 sections above that are very important – they say very important on them above.
1. Keywords
2. Site description
3. Site title or site name
Title is the title that Google will display when your site is shown in the Google search results. Get this wrong or as some sites do, and not even have a site title and you have lost the battle right there. Title is used to score your site – does your site or page title have your main keyword/phrase in it – the answer should be YES.
Site description. This is what Google displays right under your site title. This is a sales pitch to get people reading the search results to visit your site. It is also something Google uses to score your site. Your main keyword/phrase should be in this using 2 or more combinations.
Meta keywords: This should match the content of your site plus include some related keywords and short phrases that fit your site. This section is also used to score your site.
This is the hidden or secret section of your web site known only to webmasters like us and search engines such as Google. Website visitors who are regular people never see these except as described in the search engine results page.
On page SEO. This is Search engine optimization through keyword/phrase usage and frequency in the descriptive text on your web site. You should have enough descriptive text so people and search engines know what you offer, what your service is, what your product is and how they need to go about getting your service, product etc.
Keyword/phrase frequency should be 2% to 5%. Some people go higher but it is said that Google may consider a high keyword frequency as keyword stuffing. This could lower your web site score.
On site SEO. This means how are your keywords/phrases used on your site as far as site navigation goes. Are your keywords used in links that go from one page or part of your site to another? One method Google uses to index your site is using your own site links to categorize your site, in other words how does your own web site categorize itself?
Do your visitors have to click on certain keywords/phrases to find certain things on your site? While indexing your site Google says, hmmm this site has a certain keyword in the title and in the description and maybe in the meta keywords but never uses that keyword/phrase for site navigation so maybe I should place a lower score on this site for this keyword. Do you want that to be what Google thinks? Hell NO!
Many webmasters who build web sites use words such as “click here” for links from one section of their web site to another. Is google supposed to categorize your site content as “click here”? No, even Google is not that stupid. The point is this: if you use techniques that assure google is not confused about what your site is about, what you offer, where you are, how to order or get your service or product than Google is going to give your site a higher score for your chosen keyword/phrase.
Off site SEO – what is that? How can there be an off site factor that effects your web site rating? Simple, google counts each link to your site from another web site as a vote. The dirty little secret is this: All votes are not counted equally. See, Google and other search engines count links as higher and more valuable if they are made using descriptive text as links. it looks like this:
Link example one:
Hello, I found this cool web site – “click here” to see it.
The live click-able text is “click here”. This is an example of link text that could be found on any web site out there. What does that tell google about your site? google counts this as a vote but at a lower level. Why? because the words click here are non descriptive. They can not be used for site categorization, only as a site vote.
Link example two:
Hello, I found this website for a business called “LL Bean” it is a great place to find outdoor clothing.
This live link text here are the words “LL Bean” This word is not descriptive – it does not say anything about outdoor clothing. But there is something else that happened here? See what it is? It is called descripting text or an IN-TEXT link. This means the descriptive text that tells what the site sells is very close to the live link. Goole counts this as a higher vote for the LL Bean site due to the link being an IN-TEXT link.
Now for the link example three the “big kahuna” of links:
Hello, I found this great website that sells “outdoor clothing“, it is called LL Bean.
The live link text are the words “outdoor clothing”. This is the highest vote your site can get! Why? Because it is a vote but it is also a categorization and description of what the LL Bean site offers. Google can use this as a vote and as a site categorization tool. This link helps LL Bean be found higher in the search results when some one searches for what LL Bean sells: “Outdoor Clothing”
So, go out and ask for links from other web sites and ask them to do a sentence of descriptive text with a live link using your main product or service together with your business name. If you are not able to get an entire descriptive sentence then ask for the live link as your main site keyword. You can offer a little explanation to them telling them you need the product name to be the live link. Some times they will do it and some times it still comes back as your business name is the link or, the webmaster will screw it completely up and place the link as “click here” after your business name. It is still a vote for your site, just a lower one then you would like.
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The 10 golden Rules of SEO:
1. Tell your website visitors where you are and what you do using your city name and main product/service.
2. use main keyword/phrases in your page names
3. in your meta page titles,
4. in your meta page description
5. in your meta keywords
6. in your website products and services description.
7. do this in multiple places on each page using different word/phrase combinations
8. in multiple ways using multiple keywords that relate to your business.
9. use keyword/phrase combination as live links from one part of your site to another part that has info concerning these product/service you offer
10. find other businesses with web sites who will link to you using these keyword/phrase combinations
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SEO Services
We can cover all Search Engine Optimization or SEO for you – internal linking – keyword research – articles for your website and link building with other website owners for an agreed on price or on a per hour basis.
SEO Assessment: We can do the research and find keywords/phrases needed for your web site.
We have the tools and the knowledge to get you to where you need to be with both on-site SEO and off-site SEO.
Website link acquisition: We do link acquisition for you via phone. If you are doing link building for your site we suggest you contact all web site owners via phone. Some companies will try doing this via email. We have found that using email is a dismal failure. Why? Most business owners get a lot of spam that offers SEO and other services. Usually these are from Russian or Indian firms. Business people ignore or dump this email right into the spam folder.
The only thing that works is a phone call and quick simple explanation of who we are, what we are doing and why the business owner should give us a link to your site. After that we can use email to communicate with this business owner as he/she knows who we are then.
Internal linking: We can asses your web site and suggest changes that can help with SEO.
We do basic SEO for our clients while building the client web site. We include proper keyword/phrase usage in the meta tage section of your site. We use proper internal linking and in-text linking to keep your site properly categorized in Google and other search engines. We offer counsel for our clients who run their own websites and update/build their own pages using our site control panel.
Already have a website and not in the search results? We can help re-design your website with the needed changes to get you on the search results page for your city and business category. This page may offer you enough knowledge to get started but if you would like our help we are available for simple or extensive SEO assessment depending on your needs.
Call us now to talk things over.
Robert Barnes
Owner
NCW-Online Internet service
Cheapskate web design and hosting
509-663-1124
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