OntoSearch

What really is search engine optimisation? There is confusion in the minds of several, as evidenced by the varied approaches seen within any cross-section of web websites. A lack of understanding is apparent on the component of numerous web designers whose design strategies guarantee that search engines cannot penetrate to any internal content!

SEO is the art of clarification, with a clear emphasis on the principle that “form follows function.” Thus, it is semantic, pedantic, and language-orientated rather than a marvel of technical wizardry. The bottom line is that it does not matter how very good your website looks, if no 1 can find it.

Quite a few designers obsess on form, building sites that serve as monuments to their creative genius. In an ideal world a web site would be designed to fulfil its “function” of attracting clients and making sales, and its “form” would be a supporting element in an overall technique aimed at achieving a “return on investment” for their clients.

SEO is a Moving Target
In the past 2 years the major search engines have developed a habit of revising their relevancy ranking algorithms, amending listing options, changing alliances, altering customer base, changing names and content sources, not to mention buying and selling each other.

There are numerous immutable laws that, if adhered to, will guarantee your website prospers, and delivers the elusive ROI. The objective is generation of “qualified traffic” – defined as those who come to you due to the fact they want what you give, and not by accident.

The Two Approaches to Visitors Generation
The two approaches to raising the profile of a web site, SEO and PPC, are very complimentary. Since it is difficult to optimise a website for a extremely wide range of keyword phrases, PPC advertising can significantly extend your reach. Optimise your website for the major keyword terms, and use PPC to target less obvious, lower volume keyword search terms.

Web site Optimisation
First and foremost in generating visitors is web site optimisation which, after the initial outlay, generates “free” visitors from search engines based on your ranking for specific search terms. This is the “Content is King” approach, and demands us to persuade the search engine that we have the content most relevant to the search. Volume and organisation is essential, and we need to ensure that search engines can index all supporting content.

Pay-Per-Click
This may approach may possibly be chosen when you are very ready to pay to make certain people find your internet site, occasionally since its cheaper than rebuilding it! You “bid” for sponsored listing placement, and pay every time a visitor clicks on a “sponsored link” on a search engine and goes by means of to view your internet site. PPC enables you to generate visitors even if your site is poorly optimised, but is the most costly long term choice.

An advantage is that PPC campaign setup can enable the viewer to go direct to the page with the content most relevant for the term being used, e.g. by-passing splash pages.

The two PPC heavyweights are Google’s Adwords, and Yahoo Search Marketing. Each has a slightly various approach, but both are reasonably priced and have effortless set-up processes for establishing advertising campaigns. Copywriting is the key, as limited title and description space will have you sweating as you try to squeeze a sales pitch into a 35-40 character title!

Search Engines
There have been massive changes in the search engine scene in recent times, from the spectacular rise of Google to the demise of Northern Light as a public search facility. Overture bought AllTheWeb and AltaVista, and in turn was purchased by Yahoo. Google now supplies search results to almost half the lesser search engines – Anzwers, AOL, Netscape, ICQ Search, IWON etc.

From an SEO perspective the changes are more fundamental than that, and relate far more to directory vs spider-based indexing. For a long period of time, an accurate listing in both the human-edited Yahoo Directory and the Open Directory were essential to search engine visitors. Back then, even the spider-based engines such as Google placed wonderful emphasis on directory categories, and if you were not listed in Open Directory, Google might not index you at all!

Both those directories seem now to have passed their “use-by date” in terms of delivering direct visitors but Google and Yahoo still location fantastic emphasis on their links. Listings in the DMOZ and Yahoo directories are of tremendous credibility value to your website, and are the finest links of all to have!

Between them, Google, Yahoo and MSN, account for nearly 90% of all searches performed on the web, and all three of these search engines now derive their bulk content from spider-based indexing processes. Consequently, it is more essential than ever prior to that your site is optimised to allow your content to be indexed by search engine spiders!

Some Immutable Laws
There are some rules to be followed for success to occur…

Form Follows Function
Decide what role your web site must fulfil in your company plan. Construct and maintain it to meet the defined functions. Maintain it simple, make it fast and clean and above all, avoid any technology which impedes functionality. This consists of unnecessary animations or graphics which slow page load times, encouraging visitors to move on to far more responsive web sites.

Databases can be a serious impediment to indexing of internal content and in several instances are total overkill, specially for smaller sites. Generally, they defeat the objective of creating numerous exclusive pages by serving generic Title, Description and Keyword meta-tags. They also generate complex URL’s which search engines can not usually penetrate, and even the creation of Internet site Map pages is rendered overly complex. Any URL with an “&” or a ‘?” in it has the potential to at very best impede or at worst block a search engine spider’s access.

In quite a few instances the use of databases is gratuitous and unnecessary, a quick-fix solution to the designer’s objective of churning out a site at the least achievable cost and the greatest feasible profit. In numerous instances an HTML template approach would have been much better.

Templates, if thoughtlessly implemented, could produce equally serious impediments to exclusive page content. I.e. numerous template implementations do not provide for distinctive, page specific meta-tags. Having 1 generic Title, Description and Keyword meta-tag on every single page of the site is a truly appalling, but frequent, design “feature.”

You Never Get a 2nd Chance to Make a 1st Impression
Splash pages annoy folks! This is a serious tactical mistake when you are trying to convert window-shoppers into clients. Attention spans on the Web are short, and there are a lot of “good” internet sites to choose from. Eliminate every impediment and impel your visitors directly into the “guts” of your site.

The dreadful “Click to Enter Site” splash page with no content expels prospective clients into cyberspace, searching for a “better” web site that delivers immediate gratification to their quest.

Worse, the search engines place primary emphasis on the entry or Residence page. If this page has no content, you can guess where your rankings are going to be! Nowhere, because the search engine cannot come across sufficient content to even categorise the internet site, let alone establish its relevancy to a query.