Search Engine Optimization:
The Handbook
About the Author
Scott Eagle started on a Texas Instruments TI-99/4A when he was 4 years old. At this time, the TI-99 was already out for 2 years and getting old. Eagle later switched to a Commodore 64, which was brand new in 1982. Over twenty five years later, Scott now works on multiple computer platforms and operating systems, as well as over fifteen coding languages. In addition to being a programmer, Scott has an extensive history of marketing including everything from personal blogs to large international companies.
Today, he is president of High Level Studios LLC., St. Louis’s premiere Website and Web Application Development Company located in St. Louis, Missouri. Scott graduated with a BA in Digital Interactive Media from Webster University. He has worked on Search Engine Optimization and Search Engine Marketing, as well as design projects for hundreds of successful companies worldwide.
To learn more visit www.highlevelstudios.com
Email the author at scott@highlevelstudios.com
PREFACE
We all want our website to be at the top of the search engine when someone types in something similar to our company or service. I have worked with hundreds of companies to enhance their web presence. The world of SEO, or Search Engine Optimization, is a large task to conquer. As a web designer or internet marketer, you will have many tasks that are requested of you. One of the main questions is, “Can you get me to the top of search engines?” I always tell people that if any person or company tells you they can get you to the top of a Google search to be wary. This is not easy to achieve, and in many situations almost impossible. If the claim is to raise your site within a few days, they are planning techniques to raise your page rank and inbound SERP Page results usually by way of a Link Farms, Cloaking or Doorway Pages. These terms will be explained in detail. These practices are known as “black hat tricks” in the web industry. Once you are blacklisted as using deceptive techniques with search engines, it is hard to have that label reversed.
It can take up to six months for the techniques in this book to take full effect. All techniques listed in the book are “white hat” and do not attempt to deceive search engine bots. In the following chapters, I will discuss the difference between organic vs. paid search. You will also learn how to measure up your competition using a few online tools that allow you to gauge their strategy. In response, you may follow suit with similar, yet more refined, techniques. There are many simple and free things you can do to enhance your website on Google, Yahoo and MSN search. It's just about knowing how to use them. For that reason, I have broken down this book into 10 easy to understand chapters to help you ensure your website is working at its full potential to drive traffic and business to your website!
1. Understanding Search engines
2. Information Architecture
3. Knowing your audience
4. R.O.I
5. Organic Search vs. Paid Search
6. Site Structure
7. Clean Indexing
8. Content is King
9. Free Marketing
10.Utilizing your SEO
1. Understanding Search engines
Search engines are very complex at the root, but very rudimentary by nature. On March 13, 2009, the World Wide Web celebrated only 20 young years of existence, so it is considered to be a relatively new field. Search engines are designed using complex algorithms based on statistical information to determine placement of where your site should be located in the search engine result pages. There are differences within each search provider and they are patented by them individually as well. In this book we will focus on Google, Yahoo and MSN. I choose to focus on these three because they are the currently the most popular search engines. Prior to search engines, there was no way to index information so it could be referenced quickly. We were lucky to have grown up with libraries that utilized the Dewey decimal system, but have advanced greatly from that time. Once databases of information were created and locked together, we were able to quickly and accurately access the information we need for a particular situation or topic.
That is why I am so pleased to live in the current information age. Almost all information can be obtained using a few keystrokes. It is no longer necessary to take a long trip to the library and endure many hours of research. It is now possible to obtain the same amount of information within minutes. Search engines with the ability to index large amounts of information have, and will continue, to advance the education of mankind.
As both attention span shortened and attendance at the library dwindled, the information on the internet continued to grow. Today we are faced with a battleground of companies and marketing personnel trying to understand what they can do to gain more attention and audience market share. They often turn to web experts, such as myself, to tell them what can be done to improve their placement on search engine result pages. The answer has always been the same. It comes down to inbound links, page rank, site structure and content. If there is nothing else you should take from reading this, it should be that content is king. There is nothing more important to the advancement of your website than the content that resides within the site itself.
If you don't have a website with good content, then you don't have anything to begin with. Write about something you have knowledge about and make sure your verbiage is correct. This is very important to the information architecture of the site as well as search engines. Remember, MSN is four times slower to show search results than Google or Yahoo.
When indexing, search engines usually start at a large website. From there, they follow every page and link they find while indexing each page and link they arrive at. They go from page to page and link to link until they hit the site where they began. This is how spiders and robots crawl through the web and read the information on every website to determine how it should appear in someone's search.
From the outside looking in, we have only an idea of how search engines like Google work. There many patents related to search indexing processes, overall it is only known to Google how their system determines the proper search engine result pages. Another important idea to touch on is in regards to submitting your site to search engines. Do not submit your website to search engines! “Don't submit to search engines,” you say? Yes, that is correct. You must remember that search engines automatically spider and crawl in order to index the internet. If you create pages and put them online, they will be indexed unless you tell search engines not to read and index them. In fact, whether you submit your information to Google or not, they will find you if you’re online and optimized. Submitting multiple times to search engines can have a negative effect. Simply put, do not do it. Whether Google puts you in the area you would like to be placed in is related to proper search engine optimization.
Do not build your website in flash because flash cannot be read by search engines. It is acceptable to use flash elements on your website, but if all your text or content resides in the flash movie then search engines will not be able to read it. This may change In the future sometime, but as of now the spiders cannot read movies. Make sure your website designer knows you do not want the site built in flash if your attempt is to gain new customers through the web. Use only elements of flash if you want to rank well on search engine result pages.