Search Engine Optimization Simplified

Chances are good that at some point in your life you ran a search on an online search engine and instead of one hit you received pages and pages of possible hits. Have you ever wondered if the order the websites appear on search was just a random grouping or if they had been placed in a specific order that just appeared disorderly to you? The answer is that there is a very elaborate system used to determine where a website appears during an internet search. The process is something called search engine optimization.

Search engine optimization is the science and art of making web pages attractive to search engines.

Next time you run an internet search look at the bottom of the page. Chances are good that there will be a list of page numbers (normally written in blue) for you to click if you can’t find exactly what you are looking for on the first page. If you actually look farther then the second page you will part of a minority. Studies and research have shown that the average internet user does not look farther then the second page of potential hits. As you can imagine it’s very important to websites to be listed on the first two pages.

Webmasters use a variety of techniques to improve their search engine ranking.

The first thing most webmasters (or website designers) do is check their meta tags. Meta tags are special HTML tags that provide information about a web page. Search engines can easily read Meta tags but they are written with special type of text that is invisible to internet users. Search engines rely on meta tags to accurately index the web sites. Although meta tags are a critical step in search engine optimization they alone are not enough to have a web site receive top ranking.

Search engines rely on a little device called a web crawler to locate and then catalog websites. Web crawlers are computer programs that browse the World Wide Web in a methodical, automated manner. Web crawlers are also sometimes called automatic indexers, web spiders, bots, web robots, and/or worms. Web crawlers locate and go to a website and “crawl” all over it, reading the algorithms and storing the data. Once they have collected all the information from the website they bring it back to the search engine where it is indexed. In addition to collecting information about a web site some search engines use web crawlers to harvest e-mail addresses and for maintenance tasks. Each search engine has their own individual web crawlers and each search engine has variations on how they gather information.

Most webmasters feel that proper use and placement of keywords helps catch the attention of web crawlers and improve their websites ranking. Most webmaster like to design their websites for ultimate search engine optimization immediately but there aren’t any rules that say you can’t go back to your website at any time and make improvements that will make it more attractive to search engines.

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Social Media Optimization

A Popular New Trend that Breaks from Search Engine Optimization

Social media optimization is similar to search engine media optimization. The goal of social media optimization is to drive huge amounts of people to a specific website. Social media optimization can also be used to determine whether or not a startup website will be successful or whether it will fall flat with the consumers. Social media optimization uses new to encourage traffic to a website.

Social media optimization was a name created by Rohit Bharagava, the vice president of Interactive marketing.

Social media optimization is online tools and platforms that can be used to share opinions, insights, and perspectives. It cant take many forms such as text, images, audio, and video. Popular forms of social media optimization are currently blogs, pod casts, message boards, vlogs, and wikis. Social media optimization is anything that builds a community where people can rendezvous. Social media optimization normally includes websites that can be used as a platform to send out a marketing message.

Social media optimization is not something that can be forced. It is considered a type of pull marketing; it only works if people are drawn to it. Search engine optimization has clear goals. Webmasters who use search engine optimization want to have a website that ranks well with the search engines.

The goals of webmasters who are trying to use social media optimization are; an increase in linkabilty, easy book marking, mash-up, inbound links, and helping content travel.

The rules webmasters who are using social media optimization need to live by are, rewarding valuable (helpful) users, and they need to make sure they are a user resource.

Webmasters who are using a social media optimization technique should make sure they participate with their users. You need to be a part of the blogs and the message boards.

Webmasters that are employing a social media optimization technique must know their target audience. You need to know what appeals to that particular group of people. It is important to remember that not everybody will love you.

Make sure you have created content. One of the words typically associated with social media optimization is mashup. The origins of the word, mashup, gets it start in the pop music world. Mashup is a website of application that works to combine content from more then one source into an integrated experience. A mashup is sometimes created as a way to gather feedback on an existing project or body of work. Most companies use a third party via public interface. Google, Amazon, Yahoos! APIs, eBay, AOL, and Windows Live are some of the companies currently experimenting with mashups.

Despite the fact that social media optimization is a relatively new concept, some people believe that social media optimization will be one of the top seven marketing trends of 20007 along with; sharing corporate personalities, widget marketing, auto tagging, human filtered searches, content casting, and online identity shifting.

Social media optimization is something that encourages a fun social environment. Enjoy it.

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The History of Internet Search Engines

Just a little over ten years ago, if a person needed information they were forced to go to the local library and spend hours entombed amongst shelves of books. Now that the internet is available in almost every home finding information is easier then ever before. Now when someone needs information all they have to do is boot up their computer and type their needs into a search engine

A search engine is an information retrieval system that is designed to help find information stored on a ca computer system.

In 1990 the very first search engine was created by students at McGill University in Montreal. The search engine was called Archie and it was invented to index FTP archives, allowing people to quickly access specific files. FTPs (short for File Transfer Protocol) are used to transfer data from one computer to another ocer the internet, or through a network that supports TCP/IP protocol. In its early days Archie contacted a list of FTP archives approximately once a month with a request for a listing. Once Archie received a listing it was stored in local files and could be searched using a UNIX grep command. In its early days Archie was a local tool but as the kinks got worked out and it became more efficient it became a network wide resource. Archie users could utilize Archie’s services through a variety of methods including e-mail queries, teleneting directly to a server, and eventually through the World Wide Web interfaces. Archie only indexed computer files.

A student at the University of Minnesota created a search engine that indexed plain text files in 1991. They named the program Gopher after the University of Minnesota’s mascot.

In 1993 a student at MIT created Wandx, the first Web search engine.

Today, search engines match a user’s keyword query with a list of potential websites that might have the information the users is looking for. The search engine does this by using a software code that is called a crawler to probe web pages that match the user’s keyword. Once the crawler has identified web pages that may be what the user is looking for the search engine uses a variety of statistical techniques to establish each pages importance. Most search engines establish the importance of hits based on the frequency of word distribution. Once the search engine has finished searching web pages it provides a list of web sites to the user.

Today, when an internet user types a word into a search engine they are given a list of websites that might be able to provide them with the information they seek. The typical search engine provides ten potential hits per page. The average internet user never looks farther they the second page the search engine provides. Webmasters are constantly finding themselves forced to use new methods of search engine optimization to be highly ranked by the search engines.

In 2000, a study was done by Lawrence and Giles that suggested internet search engines were only able to index sixteen percent of all available webpage’s.

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How Title and Meta Tags are used for Search Engine Optimization

When it comes to title tags and search engine optimization there are a few question website owners typically ask. Does each individual web page need a different title? Is there a maximum length for title tags? Is there a title tag limit? Are title Meta tags a good idea?

The World Wide Web Consortium requires that every single HTML document must have a title element in the head section. They also state that the title element should be used to identify each individual pages content.

The title tag plays four separate roles on the internet.

The first role the title tag fulfills is what librarians, other webmasters, and directory editors use to link to other websites. A well written title tag is far more likely to get faster reviews then one that is sloppy or incomprehendable.

The title tag is what is displayed on the visitor’s browser. By displaying the title tag in the visitors browser the web user knows exactly where they are if they have to return to the site later on. Internet Explorer typically tires to display the first ninety-five characters of the title tag.

Search engines display the title tag as the most important piece of information available to web searchers.

A good title tag should be able to clearly indicate the webpage’s contents to the web user. A clear title tag is more likely to be placed in the user’s favorites list. The normal length for a good clear title tag is normally under sixty-five characters long. Title tags should be typed in the title case. Headers should also be typed in the title case.

When it comes to search engine optimization, the home page title is normally the first thing the web crawlers look at when they are ranking a webpage. Your website is introduced by your homepage title.
It is important to make sure that your title tag sounds credible.

Every single page of your website must have its very own unique title. A Meta tag is a special HTML tag that provides information about a web page. Meta tags do not affect the display of a webpage. Although Meta tags are placed directly into the HTML code, they are invisible to web users. Search engines use Meta tags to help correctly categorize a page. Meta tags are a critical part of search engine optimization.

It is important to remember that Meta tags are not a magic solution to making your website a raging success. The most valuable feature Meta tags offer to website owners is the ability to control (to a certain degree) how their web pages are described by the search engines. Meta tags can also let website owners prevent having their website indexed at all.

Meta tag keywords are a way to provide extra test for web crawler based search engines to index. While this is great in theory several of the major search engines have crawlers that ignore the HTML and focus entirely on the body of the webpage.

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The Definition of Search Engine Optimization

Too many webpage owners feel that once they submit their page a search engine they are guaranteed success. That’s generally not the case. Simply submitting your web page to a search engine is not always enough to get any hits. Most web pages require search engine optimization to become truly successful.

Search engine optimization is the art and science of making web pages attractive to the search engines. The goal of search engine optimization is to have your website ranked in the top ten internet search hits that appear on the first page. Why is it important to be on the first page? It’s important because the average internet user doesn’t click on any of the sites listed on the second or third page. Out of sight, out of mind. One website owner reported a two hundred and ten percent increase on her e-commerce sight when she had her webpage redesigned for optimal search engine optimization.

You would think that the prospect of a two hundred and ten percent increase in sales would be all the incentive a webmaster would need to redesign their site. That isn’t always the case. There are a variety of reasons people avoid recreating their websites.

Some people believe that search engine optimization is too difficult to understand. The reality is that search engine optimization is fairly simple. All it takes is a little research and most people are ready to rock.

Other people feel that there are simply too many things to learn before they will be ready to optimize their website. Search engine optimization is just like anything else. When you first start out you know nothing. With some homework and a bit of trial and error and you will know exactly what it takes to make your webpage popular with the web crawlers.

Some people believe that search engine optimization will take up lots of their precious time. People with this particular fear should remember that old adage about time and money. If time spent optimizing your website leads to an increase in sales isn’t it time well spent? Besides search engine optimization is easy, once you have the hang of it won’t add much to the time you would already have to devote to updating your website.

You do not have to submit to gobs of search engines to reap the rewards of search engine optimization.

If you have a large site you shouldn’t worry about spending lots of time optimizing it and running the risk of never finishing the process. If you have a large website just take things one step at a time. Focus on optimizing on page per day. Start with your most important pages and then concentrate on the irrelevant pages. By using this one page a day method you won’t run the risk of sitting at your computer until your eyeballs fall out of your head.

It might take some time and some trial and error to optimize your website but you will consider it time well spent when you see an increase in the amount of traffic, the increase in traffic should lead to more sales.

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