SEO Expert Blog

Below you find some advice for optimizing your website. Depending on the type of your website, e.g. online shop, news site, blog, business website, personal homepage, etc. some of the tips listed here require more attention than others. The list is meant to be generic but does not claim to be comprehensive.

Register a meaningful domain name that gives users an idea what your website is about.

If you don't want to write HTML code yourself, choose a software that allows for search engine friendly URLs, valid HTML and CSS output, fast processing of requests, modularity and customizations. Some open source examples are Drupal, Wordpress and TYPO3.

Consider professional services like SEOBook Keyword Research, or software like Wordtracker for doing keyword research and identifying niche markets, but don't trust search engine optimizers who promise a number one ranking for organic search engines, such as Google and Yahoo.

Create content that contains your important keywords in titles, headings, emphasized and anchor texts. Use your most important keywords repeatedly, for example once in each paragraph of the corresponding content item, but do not spam your content with excessive repetitions.

Don't use hidden text or non relevant keywords to direct traffic to your website. Users who do not find what the want on your website will leave soon and probably never come back.

Be aware that meta tags for keywords and descriptions do not play that important role anymore they used to a few years ago. If you use meta tags avoid repeating keywords there.

Structure your content using meaningful categories in a flexible manner that allows for additions, link related content and avoid changing internal URLs.

Create a unique and usable design for your website, output valid HTML and CSS code and use friendly URLs for linking content within your website.

If you run a frequently updated website, for example a blog, enable RSS subscriptions, social bookmark links, trackback and ping functionality.

Allow for user interaction, such as commenting on content and rating.

Enable search functionality for your website and create a sitemap. Also setup up a Google Sitemaps account. This service enables you to assign weights for your content items and generates reports on frequent search queries, crawling statistics, diagnostics, and robots.txt analysis.

Use statistics tools for tracking visitors, clicks, and referrers.

Identify related websites with a high page rank, contact theirs webmasters and ask for link exchange. The inbound links to your website play an important role for your page rank.

Submit your website to directories that are visited by your targeted audience. Don't use expensive services that offer to submit your site to hundreds or thousands of search engines. Many search engines simply search the indexes of one of the major search engines. If you have back links to your website Google, Yahoo and MSN will index your site sooner or later without the need for manual submissions.

Showcase your website in relevant forums and request feedback.

Last but not least use offline marketing methods. Print your web address on your businesses card, in letterheads, invoices and so on.