Search Engine Optimization

Everyone wants to show up on the first page of the search engines. We can help improve your rankings and make sure you are listed in coveted directories. We can help you achieve your goals and guide you through the process. To be most effective, we ask that you take an active role in this process.

As I write this article today, Cyber Element, Inc. is currently listed as number 2 on Google and number 4 on Yahoo for a search of "Colorado Web Designer". We achieved these rankings ourselves, without the help of a SEO (Search Engine Optimization Company).

These rankings did not just appear overnight or by accident. It took concerted effort and planning. It also requires monitoring and attention to detail to ensure that we maintain these positions.

So, what's the secret?

There are several things that can and should be done to get your site listed. This requires a collaborative effort between you, the client and us, the web designers.

The Client

Research the competition! Go to your favorite search engine and look for yourself (if your site isn't up yet, pretend). Who comes up first? Are they relevant to the search? Are they your competition? Send us the urls.

Popularity helps push sites to the top. This means that a site that has links from other sites will be high up in the rankings. There is a fine line here. The sites linking to your site should be relevant to your business. You can see who links to who in Google:

1. You found your competition listed, now it's time to see who links to them. In Google, type in their url: competioncompany.com. Click on the link that says: Find web pages that link to...
2. You will see all the sites that link to them. Just look at the search results number to get an idea of how many there are. The number of results may not be accurate. It may include multiple pages linking from the same site.
3. Now that you have this information, you an approach these companies and see if they will link to your site, too. It can't hurt to ask!
4. You can find out who is already linking to you in Google. Do a search that looks like this: link:yourdomain.com.

Refine Your Keywords

Really think about how people will search to find you. One or 2 words will be very difficult to implement. Three or more will achieve greater results. For example, I don't expect cyberelement.com to come up with a search on "web design". The words need adjectives, clarifiers. A simple search for the word "shoe" isn't very clear. Add the word "cowboy" to the search string; am I looking for horse shoes or cowboy boots or people shoes? You get the idea.

A simple way to get your key words – look at the high ranking competitions' Meta Tags. Your browser (Internet Explorer) has a drop down menu at the top labeled "view". Click on "View Source". You will see the HTML of the web page. Somewhere close to the top of the page you will find see: meta name="keywords". These should be very useful to you. Pass them on to us to include in your web site.

Content Is King

The search engines can only rank your website based on the written content on the individual pages. Write your content with your keywords in mind. The more you use them throughout the site, the more relevant the search. This will improve your rankings. Things that don't work:

• Images with no text
• Dynamic Sites (pages created out of a database) search.html
• Flash
• Frames

We can help you with your content. It will save you time and money to use the services of a professional writer for your content. This will minimize tweaking and guessing with the site later.

The Web Designer

As mentioned above, we can guide you and advise you to produce quality content for your site. This is extremely important.

We design your site to exploit it's full potential. This includes:

1. Naming your pages properly. Look at the name of this page. I want to get listed under web design, and that is the first part of the page name.
2. Adding appropriate Meta Tags to your pages. We will work with you to come up with the best tags.
3. Including Alt tags for your images. This isn't proven to work, but it does help visually impaired people to view your site.
4. Submit your site to the search engines to be spidered. This means that we ask them to send their robots to your site and list you.
5. We can add text to your pages to help your rankings. This includes information at the top and bottom of your pages that reinforces what your site is about.
6. Link you up with others. We place your site on popular sites that will help the search engines find you faster. This causes your site to jump up on the first page right away. Staying there requires all the other pieces to be in place. We happen to own several popular sites that have been around for years. They are well connected – many sites link to them.

The Bottom Line

You have choices. You can hire a SEO, we can outsource one for you or you can take our advice. We will not guarantee success. SEO's will. They also cost money. Some, the good ones, cost lots of money.

You need to decide if the RIO (return on investment) is worth the expense of a SEO. If you are selling expensive items to a large audience and depend on the search engines, perhaps it's worth it to you. If you are selling a few less expensive items, it's probably not.

A Good SEO

Bruce Clay, a premier SEO has tons of useful information on his site. He also comes up number 1 on all the search engines. Take a look at this informative article: The Emperors New Clothes.

To Quote Bruce, for those of you who don't want to read the article"

"The moral of the story is that if the SEO practitioner isn't well ranked themselves for major industry keywords (search engine optimization, search engine ranking,...), Then they probably can't get you into the top results no matter how much you spend or time you allow. But those that are well ranked will probably do well for any customer given time and resources. Be patient, plan on the expense, and choose well. "

Alternatives

An alternative to all of this hit and miss and trial and error is advertising. Real world advertising is best, but we can get you set up with less expensive, online advertising. My personal choice is Google Adwords. For as little as $30 per month, you can purchase the key words you want and be listed every time a search is done on those words. You will come up in a little box on the right hand side. We can set this up and manage it for you, or you can do it yourself.

Search Engine Resources

searchenginewatch.com
searchenginewriting.com
dmoz.org