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Skipton Web Design & Development

Search Engine Optimisation

How to get to Number 1 on Google

Search engine optimisation (SEO) is the process of improving the volume and quality of traffic to your site from search engines such as Google, Yahoo and MSN.

Four Golden Rules
  1. First things first, don't listen to anyone who tells you they can guarantee to put you on the first page of a search engine. They can't and it's a big con. Search engines don't publish the formulas they use to determine rankings so nobody knows exactly what factors put one company in the top position and another on page twenty. We have a good idea but nothing is certain.

  2. Secondly, there are goodies and baddies in the SEO world. Getting to the top of Google is so extremely valuable that there are people who will go to extraordinary lengths to get there. They employ unethical techniques - known as 'black hat' SEO. Beware - search engines have become infinitely more sophisticated in recent years and spend a lot of time and money detecting companies employing black hat techniques. If they catch you, you will be completely removed from their listings.

  3. 'White hat' SEO (the good kind) takes time, patience, work and constant monitoring. It doesn't happen overnight. And if you do make it to number one, there's nothing to guarantee you'll still be there next week.

  4. Being top of Google doesn't automatically mean getting the most sales. You need to direct your target market to your site - people who are likely to buy your products or services. You could put a neat game on your site that attracts lots of links to your site and pushes you up the ratings. But you could end up with loads of teenagers visiting to play the game - not much use if you're an estate agent! And if your site is confusing and complicated, all that SEO work will be wasted.
Factors we Know Affect Search Engine Ratings
  • the design, structure, layout, usability and accessibility of the site
  • the underlying code - does your website pass the W3C validation check?
  • implementation of technologies such as Flash, JavaScript, WordPress & AJAX
  • keyword rich, relevant page titles, headings, content, links and image tags
  • domain name, the age of the domain name & the length of registration
  • the location of your web server and other sites hosted on the server
  • the URLs you choose for your pages
  • the number, quality and relevance of links from external sites and the rate at which external links are acquired
  • duplicate meta tags, duplicate content & 'keyword stuffing'
  • the search engines and directories to which a site is submitted
  • the presence and format of an XML sitemap
  • the use of social bookmarking tools such as StumbleUpon, Digg and Twitter
  • how often a site is updated and maintained
  • whether you're using news feeds, blogs and 'link bait'
  • the size of your market and the number & quality of competitors
  • prevention of 'black hat' SEO attacks from competitor sites.

There's a lot to think about! If you need a hand, why not ask us to conduct a free, no-obligation SEO review of your site and see what we can do for you?

What to Know More?

The free SEOmoz Beginner’s Guide to Search Engine Optimization gives an excellent overview.

For a more detailed, technical guide, try Professional Search Engine Optimization with PHP: A Developer’s Guide to SEO.










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