Below is a list of the basic SEO suggestions to keep in mind when developing a website and its pages.
1. Have a specific title for each page.
The title tag, <title> , is a must have. This is the first thing that “searchers” see when they come across their search engine results. You don’t want people to see this:
You don’t know how many times I’ve come across a relevant page that has no title. Across the top of the browser it will read “Untitled Document”. Big Mistake. Or, the page will have a title but it will be very vague, with no specifics.Having the right title makes all the difference when some does a search. The right title will attract more clicks. For example, here is a search result for “web design blog”:
As you can see, the title tag gives you a glimpse of what the website is about (if done correctly).
The first result doesn’t provide a good preview right off the bat, done poorly.
The second result tells you it’s a blog site that provides web design tips.
The third result tells you it’s a web design company providing blog design services.
2. Have efficient meta tags.
Meta tags are the key to having search engines index your site…correctly. There are hundreds of different types of meta tags. There are a few that are essential to have in order to have your site indexed.
Description
<meta name="description" content="This is a web design blog..." />
Keywords
<meta name="keywords" content="web, design, blog," />
These tags tell the search engine what your web page contains. The more accurate the tags the better chances of having your site indexed higher on search results.
3. Have content.
This sounds simple doesn’t it? By content I mean text. The worst type of website, when it comes to SEO, is a flash based site or strictly image based site. See here.
The more text you have the more the search engines can see and gauge your site’s relevance. Without any text, the search engine can’t determine what your site has to offer, and therefore can’t tell the “searcher” what your site has to offer.
4. Keywords
it’s not just important to have content on your site but also relevant content. Make sure your site’s text has popular keywords that people would use to search. You want to be as specific as you can when describing what your site is about.
For example, if you create ice sculptures, you could have:
“Our Company creates ice sculptures for any occasion and size.“
It’s better to have the following:
“Our Company can create custom ice sculpture designs for small and large sizes. We provide sculptures for weddings, parties, logos, holidays, luges, centerpieces and special events.”
The relevant keywords, that someone would use to search, are highlighted. The difference from the first option and the second option is huge. The difference can equate to a listing difference from page 2 to page 52 on the major search engines.
5. Link Building
Link building is making your website link popular. The best way to make your website popular is to have its link appear as much as possible throughout the entire web.
You can do this by posting your link on as many sites as you can.
You could start out by putting your link on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Digg, Delicious, Buzz, and all the other popular social networking and bookmarking sites. You can also do link exchanges with other sites, these sites can be related to your site or not, it doesn’t matter. The more your web link is out there the better!
