Ok, you get why SEO is invaluable. So what’s in the secret sauce? Performing effective SEO is about implementing web development techniques that make it very clear to search engines what your web pages are about. The purpose of search engines is to help people find relevant content. To this end, search engine algorithms have become increasingly sophisticated. Thrivalytics focuses on your content being relevant and engaging. All the search traffic in the world is not valuable if you’re website isn’t engaging.
There are two main categories of SEO – “on page” and “off page”. “On page” means that you are changing the actual page. The easiest way to describe “off page” SEO is that it is not “on page” SEO. Following are a handful of examples for these two types of SEO techniques.
“On Page” SEO Techniques
Page Title – The page title is what is displayed in the browser window title bar. This technique involves making sure that your desired keyword(s) for that page are properly displayed there.
URL – Having your desired keyword(s) appear in the URL.
Alternate Image Text – With HTML, alternate text may be specified for an image in the event that a visitor has images turned off in their browser. Having your keywords in this HTML is a way of improving your page’s relevancy.
H1 Tag – Now we’re getting technical. The H1 tag is HTML code that is placed around text that you would like to be displayed as the first heading on the page. There is also an H2 tage, and H3 tag and so on. It is important for your main keyword to appear in the H1 tag, your secondary keyword to appear in the H2 tag and so on.
Keyword Density – This amounts to ensuring that your desired keywords appear just enough times on the page to make it clear to the search engines that it is the main topic of that page. The simplified calculation is the number of times your keyword is displayed divided by the number of words on the page. If the percentage is too low, the search engine algorithm won’t consider it to be the main topic of the page. If it is too high, then the search engine algorithm will think that you are trying too hard and lower your ranking. How much valuable information could there be on a page about “fire engine hats” if over half of the words are “fire engine hats”? It all goes back to relevancy!
“Off Page” SEO Techniques
Sitemap – A sitemap is a file that provides information to search engine crawlers about the pages on your site that you would like included in search. For each page you may specify elements such as priority and time of last update. Some search engines allow you to submit your sitemap and view crawling statistics for your site.
Incoming Links – Having other credible website link to yours is a very important way of improving your search rankings. Ensuring that your desired keyword appears in the link text is important as well.
