Search Engine Optimisation Basics
Number 1 on Google, if only?
A quick look in to search engine optimisation (SEO), what it means for a website and just how important it actually is…as well as covering some basics.
The figures are changing all of the time, as of late 85% of searchers don’t go past page two on the results pages of Google. Because of this getting on the first page is almost guaranteed to get visitors to your website. What’s interesting is that people associate quality with a high rank on Google too, the higher the rank the more trust you instantly receive. Business owners and bloggers are always asking how they can reach the top, here’s an outline on how.
First all it’s important to know is how search engines work, knowing this is the first step to cracking them. Google doesn’t quickly look through every website then decide which is best everytime you click search, this would take forever and would use a lot of processing power. Instead search engines are constantly downloading website information using crawlers, this information is then stored in a huge database. The search engines have results ready for any query, when you type in some words it just compares them to its database; the results are already decided.
How do you get to number 1 on Google?
It’s all pretty much about content and links. Crawlers scan the entire internet and make a note of every time they see keywords. Keywords are what are typed in to search engines, and include phrases. A website which sells laptops, for example might have:
- 1 mention of laptop in their title
- 1 mention on a header
- 19 mentions in paragraph text
- And 30 mentions in links to the website from other websites (known as backlinks).
Another laptop website might have:
- 3 mention of laptop in their title
- 6 mention on a header
- 76 mentions in paragraph text
- And 104 mentions in links to the website from other websites (known as backlinks).
So the second website would be higher in the results. This is of course a very simple version of an infinitely complex algorithm.
Content is first of all important, the more something is mentioned on a website the better. The second important thing is backlinks, these are links from other websites.
NOTE: Keywords are just what special words and phrases are called with SEO, so here “cheap laptops” is still generally known as a keyword even though it’s a phrase.
So what stops you from just adding a load of invisible text with lots of keywords?
As a user of Google when you look for cheap laptops you want a page appearing with cheap laptops, it’s in Google’s best interest to provide this information; if the results show lots of spammy pages with pop ups you may use a different search engine. To ensure the best results search engines have infinitely complicated algorithms to prevent this, the crawlers spot these dodgy websites and penalise them accordingly (sometimes removing you from results all together).
The way search engines decide who goes higher in the results is in the most part common sense but you can (legally) do a lot of things to make sure what you do to your website is effective with search engines.
Here are the general steps you must take to rank high:
- Select the best keywords (see how to select the best keywords for SEO).
- Place the keywords on to your website properly and effectively.
- Earn in bound links by providing valuable content.
- Update often.
Ideally you need to begin SEO before anything is started with a website, before the domain name is even paid for; it will pay off if done properly.
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