The 4 Main Things You Need to Know about SEO

Learning about all the different SEO (Search Engine Optimization) tactics and strategies can sometimes be very overwhelming. The truth of the matter is there are many ways to achieve search engine ranking. There are good ways, bad ways, fast ways, slow ways, easy ways, and hard ways. What I'm about to share with you is "The Best Way to implement SEO!". Follow these four steps so your website can finally come out from hiding under that rock and be seen by the world!

1. Submit your URL and Site map to all the main Search Engines. This should be the first thing you do. Sometimes it takes days, if not weeks, for a URL to show up on some search engines. Google is usually pretty quick (within 5-10 days). Also, It's a solid practice to submit your site map to at least Google. This will enable the search engine to quickly navigate and index your websites content. Without a site map your website will surely fail in the rankings.

2. Research the Websites that are Ranking in the top 10 for your Prospective Keywords. Only research the Organic Search Listings (not the sponsored links). Find out how many times they used those keywords in their Title, Meta Tags, and in the Body. Once you gather this information try to implement those keywords as many times as your competitors do in the same parts of your website. Be careful with the Meta Tags. Search engines don't like too many words stuffed in your keyword meta tags. This worked back in the day, but in 2011 it will hurt your rankings. Try to have no more than 15 keyword meta tags. Also, you must make sure that the keywords that you use (in your meta tags) are actually in your content.

3. Make sure you have Solid Content. Search engines don't look at how pretty or flashy your site is. They search for relevant keywords within the content on your website. You must be able to write content that not only makes sense to the reader, but also has a sufficient number of keywords within it to be competitive in the search engine rankings. Creating a website with full and well written content is very challenging, however it is well worth the work.

4. Backlinks are an essential SEO element. Ranking on a search engine is a lot like a popularity contest. The search engines are not only searching for the keywords, they are also searching for links that point back to your website. For the best results these links must come from websites that also have relative content to what's on your website. For example, if you offer Printing Services than you should not have a back link from a website that sells Flowers. When you have a relative link pointing back to your website the search engine sees that as another site that is virtually voting for your site instead of another. Generate as many relative back links as possible and your rankings will steadily move toward the top.