saiconnectmedia profile

Search Engine Optimization

Purpose:

To make small modifications to parts of a website – to have a noticeable impact on the site user’s experience and performance in organic search.

To ensure prompt visibility in search engines to the user.

To improve the clients/user’s website.

To affect only organic search results, not paid or sponsored results.

Method:

Indicating page titles by using title tags.  (title tag= tells users & search engines the topic of a particular page.)

Place title tag within the head tag pf the html document.  Create a unique title for each page on the site use brief but descriptive titles.

Purpose – content of title tag appears in the first line of results.

Words are bold: users can easily recognise if the page is relevant to their search.

Accurately describes the page’s content.

Making use of description meta tag.

Purpose: gives a summary to search engines about the page – in a few words or a short paragraph.

This is also placed within the head tag if HTML document.

Search engines use meta tags as snippets of the pages.

Can be used in open directory project by Google.

Words in the snippet are bolded when they appear in the user whether the content on the page matches with the information being searched for.

Accurately summarize page’s content.

Use unique description for each page.

Improve the structure of the urls.

Creation of descriptive categories and filenames for the documents on the website keeps the site better organised and can also lead to better crawling of your document by search engines.

Some users might link to the page the URL of that page as the anchor text.

The URL should have relevant words which will provide more information about the page.

The url is displayed as part of a search result in google, below the document’s title and snippet.

Choose generic page names like page1.html.

Use a directory structure for organising the content well to facilitate users to know where they are on the site.

Focus on using and refering to 1 url in the structure & internal linking of the pages.

Setting 301 redirect from non-prefered url’s to dominant content is accessed through multiple url’s.

Canonical url or rel=”canonical” link element can be used if redirection is unable to be done.

Make your site easier to navigate.

Navigation of a website is helpful to visitors to quickly find the content in need.

Think about how visitors will go from a the root (home) page to a page containing more specific content.

Ensure more convenience with a breadcrumb lists.

Breadcrumb = low of internal links at top or bottom of the page that allows quick navigation to previous section or root page.

Most general page (root page) is first, left most link and more specific sections are listed out to the tight.

Allow for the possibility of a part of the url being removed – prepare the site to show content instead of 404 (page not found error).

Prepare 2 site maps—1 users, 1for search engines.

(SITEMAP = SIMPLE PAGE THAT DISPLAYS STRUCTURE OF WEBSITE, CONSISTING OF A HIERARCHICAL LISTING OF THE PAGES ON THE SITE.)

Visitors visit this page if they have problems finding pages on the site.

XML SITEMAP = can be submitted through Google’s webmaster tools. It makes it easier for Google to discover pages on the site.

Using a SITEMAP is one of the ways to tell Google the version of URL prepared as Canonical.

Sitemap generator script is an open source created by Google to help create a sitemap file for your site.

Create a naturally flowing hierarchy which helps users to go from general content to more specific content needed form the site.

Use mostly text for navigation = navigation from page to page through search engines to crawl and understand your site; since some devices might not handle FLASH or JAVA SCRIPT.

Put an HTML sitemap on your site & use an XML sitemap file.

( A simple site map page with links to all of the pages or most important pages is very useful.) creating an XML sitemap file for the site helps ensure that search engines discover the pages on your site.

Have a useful 404 page which guides users back to a working page on your site.  This greatly improve’s a user’s experience.  404 widget is provided by Google which can be embedded in the 404 page to automatically populate it with many useful features.

Use, google webmaster tools to find sources of urls causing “not found” errors.

OFFER QUALITY CONTENT AND SERVICES.

Write easy to read text since users enjoy content that is well written & easy to follow.

Stay organised around the topic organising the content so that visitors have a good sense of the end of a topic and beginning. If the content is broken into logical chunks or divisors the users are able to find the content more faster.

Create fresh, unique content to keep existing visitor base coming back + bring in new visitors.

Create content primarily for users not search engines.

Design site around visitor’s need while mailing sure the site is easily accessible to search engines to produce positive results.

WRITE BETTER ANCHOR TEST.

Anchor text is the clickable text that users see as a result of a link anchor tag placed within the anchor tag <a href= “…”></a>. and tells user and search engines something about the page being linked into.

Choose descriptive text: which provides a basic idea of what the page linked to is about.

Write concise text: usually a few words or, a short phrase.

Format links to be easily spotted: for users to easily distinguished between regular text and anchor text of your link. If users miss the links or accidently click them, the content becomes less useful.

Think about anchor texts for internal links too: pay more attention to the anchor text used for internal links to help users and search engines to navigate your site better.

OPTIMIZE USE OF IMAGES.

Use brief, but descriptive filenames and alt text. Filenames and alt text (for ascti languages) are best when they’re short, but descriptive.

Supply alt text when using images as links – if an image is being used as a link, filling on its alt text helps the search engine understand more about the page you’re linking to.

Supply an image sitemap file: which provides more information to googlebot about the images found on your site. She structure is similar to XML Sitemap file for the web pages.

USE HEADING TAGS APPROPRIATELY.

Heading tags are used to present structures on the page to users.  Six sizes beginning with <h17, the most impotant and ending with <h6>, the least important.