If you have a site that you have probably heard of SEO. If you're not, you'll want to read a few articles in the past before you continue here. If you've done all the reading on the subject, you may have noticed that people seem to constantly contradict each other. That is precisely why SEO is a favorite part of my job, it is never a dull moment!
I must confess that I lied to you in the title. If you're looking for how to plan to get a top position in Google or Yahoo you can not find it here, or anywhere for that matter. There is no formula. It is not possible to manipulate Google, if they had not want to be down.
Why do you constantly change the algorithm? Prevent us from finding a formula of high rankings. Think about it. If you did not have an easy way to get the Top 5 rankings in Google, would you still AdWords account? Most of Google's revenue comes from paid search, and you can be sure that they are going to do everything possible to pay for the search worthwhile. (and judging by the Google stock, it certainly is)
Although it may not be a guaranteed formula, there are some solid SEO rules that if followed, will help run the site out of the competition.
Rule # 1: The correlation is not causation. I can not stress this enough. Just because two things are related does not mean that one caused the other.
Before I talk about correlation, and the reason I say this, however, is clear and simple: Your site's rankings vary, regardless of what changes you make. Why? The Web is constantly evolving. Addition of new sites and old sites are changed. Keep in mind that
My favorite example of this relates to research I read a book saying that in 1000 the elderly interviewees who frequented casinos were healthier than those who do not. The magazine article stated that the chance of gambling is healthy. Although gambling and health can be positively correlated with one certainly does not present any other. A little reasoning shows that people who are in poor health do not leave the house so much, and because they often have casinos.
Ok so if you're going to this? I wanted to make sure we are on the same page, because now I'm about to send shocking: PageRank is not as important as it is up to you. While it is true that a high-ranking sites are often higher PageRanks, nor can any one direct cause of the other.
Help you better understand, we can discuss how the PageRank works. PageRank is based off of what computer scientists call a wandering drunk algorithm, but I will try to use a more appropriate example.
Suppose that you have given your computer a random website. From there, select 1 random link. From there you can click on another link at random, and so on. Do this for about a month straight, clicking on the link for the various intervals of 5 seconds.
Now count how many times you have visited each site. If you've found widgets.com 10 times and sprockets.com 4 times, widgets.com would be higher than the PageRank sprockets.com
This is a fundamental principle of PageRank. In fact, what Google founder Larry Page did his program. He referred to the Stanford home page and let it go.
Now the real PageRank formula is changed considerably, but the basic theory is still the same. What causes a higher PageRank? Links! Not only how many links, PageRank, but combined with the site is also taken into account.
An important concept to remember this: PageRank does not define the location in Google, links, and content.
This brings me to 2 rule: no bad connections. I am sure that you've heard about the connection between the premises and off topic links, and perhaps even decreased reciprocal link request or two. Do not. Many of you are likely to be a curse over the breathing space and links to Google's forbidden, but let's be reasonable.
Site owners can not control who links to them and if they are related. If I know, Google knows this. If the connection could damage the site's ranking, it would be very easy for me to sabotage all of my competitors by combining them as "bad sites". Ranking system can be manipulated, and Google would be lost.
Link building is important, and this is where the SEO firm can help you develop a strategy.
This brings me to my 3rd and final rule. Since this is a long article, you can pause for a moment and go to the bathroom or grab some more coffee before continuing (other than to get back to work right?).
If you only remember one thing in this article, remember this: the website visitors come first. No exceptions. Your pages would make sense to the reader.
Make text flow, in fact I recommend hiring a professional copywriter to write it for you. You can rent one magazine and print ads, and are reaching fewer people than the site.
Although the keyword-rich content is the meat and potatoes of SEO, it does not mean placing keywords in all possible locations. People can find your site, but if it sounds like it was written by 5 class of English as a second language, you can be sure that they will not buy anything.
If the SEO company will make a proposal, which endangers the user's experience, you should re-evaluate the company. Certainly may be some minor compromises, such as using text instead of images or remove the links to Flash content, but if the SEO technology turns off the site, a user-mix, or make the site visually unpleasant, it should not be enforced by.
Keep in mind that the site is designed for customers, and the search engine spiders. Web Util served up as XML and interpreted differently by each user, your site is aesthetically pleasing and, above all, it needs to flow.
And that's it! Follow these 3 rules, and your site is great. You may be the top 5 in Google all the criteria that you want, but you do not do bad for those who really relate to your site.
That all is not it? Well, many other factors, such as coding style, layout, keyword selection, linking campaigns, and content management, all of which can affect the rankings, but most of them in the following result of my 3 rules.
If I had to give 4th rule, I do not want to say is to concentrate all its forces SEO. Search is only one way potential customers find your site. Paid search, advertising, high-traffic sites, direct mail, email and print all the other effective methods, which all too often get overlooked. Seriously, it really makes sense to use 80% of your time in the medium that only 40% of your customers to find?