Domain name:
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If you are building your site from scratch and haven't decided on a domain
name yet, give it careful consideration. Why?
Because the search engines do, and so do most users.
Have you ever noticed that when you enter a keyword into the search box the top
results are usually going to contain that keyword as a part of their domain name.
Type in "auto" and you come up with www.auto.com, www.autotrader.com,
www.autoweb.com, etc., the top 5-10 results have "auto" as a part of
their domain name.
Of course we've all heard that all of the good dot-com names are already taken
(probably by some now bankrupt company), but actually there are still
some good domain names out there.
(Search for a good domain name)
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Titles:
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Each page of the web site should be given a unique title. The
title tag is the first item a search engine reads and some
believe that next to site content is the most important
element used in determining your site’s relevancy.
Failure to put strategic keywords in the page title
is the main reason why perfectly relevant web pages
may be poorly ranked.
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Meta Tags:
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There are several meta tags, but the most important for search engine indexing
are the description and keywords tags.
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Description:
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The description meta tag should be added to every page of your site. The description tag
returns a description of the page in place of the summary the search
engine would ordinarily create. Your description should be 25 words or less.
When your site appears in the results of
a search, the description is what differentiates your site from
the rest. It is the description that will entice the prospective
visitor to click and visit - or pass and go to a more exciting site.
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Keywords:
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The keywords meta tag provides keywords for the search engine to associate with
your page. How do you think people will search for your web page? The words you
imagine them typing into the search box are your strategic keywords.
Your strategic keywords should always be at least two or more words long.
Usually, too many sites will be relevant for a single word, this
"competition" means your odds of success are lower. Don't waste your time
fighting the odds. Pick phrases of two or more words, and you'll have a better
shot at success.
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Comment Tags:
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Comment tags are tags that are read by some spiders.
Repeat your title, description and keywords in <!-- comment tags --> and
robots will be more likely to use them.
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Keyword relevancy:
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Changing your page titles and adding meta tags is not necessarily going to help
your page do well for your strategic keywords if the page has nothing to do with
the topic. Your keywords need to be reflected in the page's content. Have your keywords
also appear in the first paragraphs of your web page.
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Alt tags:
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Sometimes sites present large sections of copy with graphics.
It looks pretty, but search engines can't read those graphics.
That means they miss out on text that might make your
site more relevant. Most search engines will index ALT text
and count it towards your relevancy.
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Heading tags:
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Use your strategic keywords for your page headline, if possible. Search engines add weight
to keyword relevancy when they are included in "H" tags.
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Text links:
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A search engine that can't follow image map links won't be able to get "inside"
the site if your site uses image map links. Unfortunately, the most relevant pages
are often "inside" pages rather than the home page.
Solve this problem by adding HTML hyperlinks to all of your pages linking to all other
major pages or sections of your web site, this will help your human visitors, too.
Put them down at the bottom of the pages and the search engines will find them and follow them.
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Site map:
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Also consider making a site map page with text links to everything in your web
site. You can submit this page, which will help the search engines locate pages
within your web site.
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Link Popularity
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How often your site is linked to from other sites is another factor that search engines
take into account. Link exchanges, banner exchanges, reciprocal links and FFA directories
are all good ways to increase your popularity.
Check your sites popularity.
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