Archive for the ‘SEO Basics’ Category
published by Dan in SEO | SEO Basics
If you want to be really good at SEO you should make sure that you keep track of the changes going on in the search engines’ algorithms. Why is this?
Since the algorithm is the equation(s) used by the search engines to compute a website’s rank in comparison to other websites then it is obviously important. Simply put it is the algorithm that will determine how your site fares in SERPs.
So what do you need to know about search engine algorithms?
- We do not know exactly what the equation is but if you want your website and your client’s website to do well then you have to understand the factors that impact a website’s ranking as well as the kind of impact these factors result in.
- The algorithm used by each search engine is different, however, the majority of factors they use to compute for a website’s rank is the same. However, they differ in the weight they give to each factor and their approach in solving ranking issues.
- The algorithm used by all search engines changes. This is the reason why it is very important to stay updated if you offer SEO services.
Popularity: 17% [?]
published by Dan in SEO | SEO Basics
The question to this answer depends on whether you already have an existing site or not. If you already have a website and you have determined that you do wish to get more traffic from search engines then the time to start optimising your site is immediately. Of course this means assessing the current state of your website first but this assessment and planning stage is actually already a part of the process called search engine optimisation.
If you do not have a website yet SEO can be started before the website is finished. Factors that affect search engine optimisation should be considered during the planning stage of the design process. Some of these factors would include your website’s hosting, the domain name, layout/positioning of keytext, etc. It is better to integrate search engine optimisation with web design to save on time and effort rather than having to backtrack after the whole design, which is full of holes (at least in the SEO perspective), is already implemented. Because of this it is obviously a good idea to hire a web designer that also knows about SEO or that at least has SEO partners they can work with.
Popularity: 18% [?]
published by Dan in SEO | SEO Basics
Being an SEO blog, Doublespark obviously believes that SEO is beneficial to websites. But what exactly are the benefits that SEO brings? Here are just a few of the benefits that SEO bring.
- Increases the amount of targeted traffic to your site from search engines.
- Increases the amount of traffic to your site from links found in other pages (an effect of your link building campaign, which is an integral part of SEO).
- Leads to adherence in sound web design principles in terms of accessibility.
- Contributes to your site’s usability.
- Targeted incoming traffic results to higher sales as well as a high ROI (return of investment).
- SEO principles can be applied to your online ad campaign particularly to search engine marketing (SEM).
Got any other benefits in mind? Share it and leave a comment.
Popularity: 17% [?]
published by Dan in SEO | SEO Basics
The answer to this question is really short - less than 100. According to Google’s design and content guidelines you should “Keep the links on a given page to a reasonable number (fewer than 100).” Though the actual reason for this is not stated it is logical to assume that this has something to do with the bot’s ability to crawl the links. If you place more than a hundred links in one page chances are that the search engines spiders wouldn’t be able to crawl all those links. Since you cannot say which links will be the ones crawled and which wouldn’t important pages may be left undiscovered.
Use common sense and simply obey Google. Of course this rule doesn’t apply to you if your website is actually a directory or contains listings and you need to pur more than 100 links on a single page. However, it still does make sense to limite the links in a page because cramming all the listings in a single page will make it hard for users to skim through them. By limiting the links in a page it will not only be good for your SEO but will also make your site more usable.
Popularity: 14% [?]
published by Dan in SEO | SEO Basics
One of the biggest stumbling blocks for search engines to access all of a website’s contents is are forms. Often entire pages of submission forms or at least portions of it cannot be crawled by search engines via hyperlinks. This is actually a good thing if you specifically want that form to not be indexed by search engines (like for credit card information forms). However, in certain cases, when the content does not pertain to sensitive information, it makes sense to ensure that the content can still be indexed by search engines. Make sure that these forms can be accesses through a link so that search engines can crawl these pages.
Aside from making sure that the they can be accessed by search engines you should also make sure that they are error free so that users can also access them. There is no point in having the page be indexed by a search engine and showing up in SERPs if the users that find it through search are unable to use the form. Though this falls more of under web design as I have mentioned repeatedly you can only optimise a website if it does not contain too critical errors. Testing and debugging should always be done even before you start optimisation.
Popularity: 15% [?]
published by Dan in SEO Basics
The size of your web page actually matters to search engines. Although the file size of a page does not affect its page rank it matters because search engines have a limit to the size of the page that they cache. Search engines cache all pages regardless of size (unless of course you specify that the page not be cached) however those that are over 150K in size are truncated. This means that keywords and phrases that were cut-off wouldn’t be indexed, which is not a good thing for your SEO.
Having your web pages’ contents fully cached is also desirable for your users desirable because you want them to be able to access all of your site’s contents even when your server is down. If your web page has too much content and there are still important information towards the end of the page it might not show in the end. Note though that the cache limit usually apply only top HTML and text files but PDF files are sually cached in its entirety even when above 150K in size.
Aside from ensuring that search engines can fully cache the contents of your page a smaller file size is beneficial to your users because it will result in a faster download speed, which is always a good thing. If you have too much content then do not cram it all into one page. Break it up into sections and alot one page per section. That way it will make your content not only more readable but also limit the file size so that it can be fully cached by search engines.
Popularity: 21% [?]
published by Dan in SEO | SEO Basics
Accessibility is often associated with website design and rightly so since it is a critical aspect of web design. A website that has lots of accessibility issues, no matter how professionally designed, will not get the amount of traffic targeted. Users will opt to simply visit other sites instead of waiting around for a site that’s always down to go up again. In the same way, search engines will also skip a site that’s down. For this reason accessibility is just as critical for SEO.
In my next few posts I will be discussing several accessibility problems that should be addressed to ensure that search engines (as well as users) won’t have a hard time reading your website’s content.
As mentioned earlier one of the most common accessibility issue is the performance of your site’s server. If your server is down frequently and/or it takes sometime for the servers to go up again after going down it will have a noticeably negative effect on not only the amount of traffic you get but also on your rank in ALL search engines. The reason for this is very simple, the more frequent and the longer your downtime is the greater the chance of having both users and bots visiting your site when it is down. If bots find your site down several times it will reflect on your site’s performance and will result in lower rankings. Aside from this it will obviously be unable to crawl new content so that even if you provide fresh content regularly you won’t be able to benefit much from your effort.
The solution to this problem is very simple and obvious - invest in a good hosting service. In the end though it might cost a bit more the return of investment will be worth it.
Popularity: 16% [?]
published by Dan in SEO Basics
I was going to do a series on link optimisation again but I realised that I have posted several times on link optimisation. So instead of giving a really in depth analysis of each strategy I decided to just summarise or give a list of link optimisation strategies that I have mentioned before. In case I fail to mention something feel free to leave a comment so I can take note of it.
The most basic thing remember before even thinking about optimising your links is to make sure that you do not have any dead links and that you use the right syntax. As much as possible adhere to W3C standards so that you won’t have any (or at least minimise) problems regarding accessibility. To make sure all the links in your site is working do a regular checkup of your links. You don’t have to do this manually because there are plenty of applications you can use. Two pretty good link checkers are the W3C Link Checker and Link Checker by Kevin Freitas (a Firefox Add-on).
Note that checking your links is important to increase usability. As I have mentioned before, “If you do not have the basics covered then you are prone to overlook seemingly trivial but potentially important factors that will affect your optimisation efforts.”
Popularity: 15% [?]
published by Dan in SEO Basics
As a web designer or web master before actually checking to make sure the links on the website your are maintaining are optimised the very first thing you ought to do is check whether all the links are working. Do a regular check to see whether there are links pointing to incorrect pages, dead pages (404 Errors), and other possible errors. In short check for the most basic link errors.
Next, if you weren’t the one to build and design the original site check whether the links comply with W3C standards. If you are not very familiar with W3C standards as a web designer/SEO specialist you should start educating yourself regarding correct practices. You can find the the complete syntax compendium of the A and LINK elements for HTML and XHTML on the W3C site.
For those who want an in depth tutorial on the Anatomy and Deployment of Links you would do well to start reading this online resource. Note though that the guide hasn’t been updated since Septmeber of 2005. However, the linking basics are still the same and the guide is still very useful indeed.
Remember in SEO, you always start with the very basic. If you do not have the basics covered then you are prone to overlook seemingly trivial but potentially important factors that will affect your optimisation efforts.
Popularity: 14% [?]
published by Dan in SEO Basics
Before I continue my series of posts on link optimisation let me discuss something I overlooked during series on search engine basics. In my post entitled “Back to Search Engine Basics: Determining Relevance and Popularity” I explained how search engines use keywords to determine the relevance of a website’s content and how inbound links are used to determine the popularity of the site. Another factor search engines use to choose the results displayed in SERPs I neglected to mention is authority.
Authority is the bridge that connects the other two factors - relevance and popularity. The authority of a page is determined by looking at the keywords used in the anchor text as well as the actual content of the pages that those links lead to. The authority of a webpage is analysed with both inbound and outgoing links considered. What this means is that if two different webpage both have a lot of inbound links by analysing the relevance of the contents of the webpages linking to each page, the page that has more pages relevant to its own theme/topic linking back to it will be seen as having greater authority and so will rank better in SERPs.
For example, if a website on SEO has only 10 incoming links but all from other reputable SEO websites these 10 links will be more valuable than 20 inbound links from sites with topics like gardening or beauty. The page with more links is more popular but the one with lots of relevant links will be more authoritative.
Popularity: 11% [?]
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