SEO ...er...?

[Marge]

Erm... not being much of a techie 'ahem' I was wondering if anyone could explain what SEO is all about?  I know it is related to website promotion and reciprocal linking but I don't really understand the fundamentals involved.  Are there any good SEO websites worth checking out?  

... or is this SEO malarkey all a load of dancing banana    ?  

[Dom]

In my opinion (and it is just my opinion) SEO is becoming slightly less important as search engines get better at crawling content on websites.

Basically, SEO (search engine optimisation) is all about designing and building your website so that it's as easy (and enticing) as possible for search engines to find and index all of the content on your website. People want to do this because the more easily that search engines can find and index your website, the more likely people are to find it too. And more visitors = more money.

My point of view is that although it certainly helps to code a nice, clean website, with lots of lovely fresh content being added regularly, there are certain aspects of the SEO guidelines that are becoming obsolete. For me, I try to code websites using the minimum amount of code possible, simply to keep things easy to maintain and change if need be. It has the added advantage (SEO experts would have you believe) that it makes it easier for search engines to crawl your site as well. And anything that makes you site easy to find and index will make search engine crawlers happy.

The thing is, search engine crawlers are getting better and better at trawling through all the bad code in many websites that are already out there in order to find the content in them. This means that (maintainability aside) it's not so important to have nice clean code that sticks to the HTML and CSS standards etc, because search engines can cut through all the crap code to get the juicy bits (the content). So to me, some aspects of SEO seem slightly less important than they used to be.

But, ignoring me completely, there are certain guidelines that you should follow when building your website:

- Nice, clean code, that isn't more complicated than it needs to be. This is good to help you maintain the code, and makes it easy for search engines to crawl your site
- Post content regularly. Regular original content means your site will be ranked as a good source for new information, and thus get better search engine results. Similarly, copying content from other sites is seen as bad.
- Don't use link farms to link to your website, or hire any SEO company that claims to be able to get you to the top of the search results pages. NOBODY can guarantee that, and they'll often use tricks that Google will penalise you for when they find out (and they will find out).

There are other, specific things as well, such as:

- Only use one <h1> tag per page
- Keep your document <titles> fairly short, and to the point. Make them descriptive of page content.
- Don't flood your page with thousands of "keywords" in the meta-tags. In fact, you don't really have to use the 'keywords' and 'description' meta-tags at all. If you do use them, keep the description to around 150 characters, and use key phrases rather that individual key words.
- Structure your pages logically with headings and paragraphs
- Stick to the standards of HTML. Make sure you nest elements properly, and use "alt" and "title" attributes properly

There are probably a million other things to do as well, but I'm not exactly an expert.

The one thing I will say is that it's the job of a search engine to provide decent search results to it's users. So anything that you can do to your website to help the end user is going to be smiled upon by the search engines. So if you have lots of useful info, then you get a gold star. Nice clean layout that's easy to read? Gold star. Viewable on multiple devices and platforms? Gold star. Basically anything that benefits the user is seen as a good thing by search engines, and they'll reward you accordingly.

Likewise, try to cheat by putting keywords about sex on your gardening website, for example, and you'll feel the wrath of the search giants.

Hope that helps!

[Marge]

Considering you say are you are not an expert that was excellent info there Dom!   

A friend of mine has a small business and was asking me about SEO and I only had a vague understanding of it, so I appreciate your input.

My mate has also asked me about SEO software such as Link Assisstant and SpyGlass.  I had a look on google for reviews but no one seems very pleased with either.  Is there any SEO software that is any good?

[Dom]

Glad I could help for once!

I don't know of any software myself, so I can't recommend any. The best thing to do is to build a website with SEO in mind from the start though, to be honest. Build it into the way you design and structure the site, right from the word go.

Also, going back to the SEO tips, make sure the structure of the files makes sense too. So if you've got a page about tax credits, for example, it would be worth calling it something like "tax-credits.html" to make it obvious what the page is about. Store similar (related) pages in usefully-named folders, so that the URL of any given web page is concise and meaningful.

[suedenem]

Marge,

Ignore this bit:

In my opinion (and it is just my opinion) SEO is becoming slightly less important as search engines get better at crawling content on websites.

..as he's talking crap.  But the rest of what Dom said is a very valid starting point :-)

For novices, designs/developers and site owners, I'd recommend going through the Big G's guidelines.  There's cute little pictures, and everything:

http://www.google.com/webmasters/docs/search-engine-optimization-starter-guide.pdf

[Dom]

Crap?!?! Why I oughtta.... 

I think you should explain yourself. It makes sense to me that if search engines are getting more capable of trawling through crappy code, then if you write crappy code then what difference does it make? It's the job of search engines to find good content and show it to users, regardless of how difficult that information is to get at. It's not their job to tell people how to use HTML etc. If search engines want to be popular, they'll have to deal with the existing crappy sites out there anyway.

I'm not saying you shouldn't use nice, clean, standard code, mind you. There are a million other reasons why you should, I'm just saying that as far as SEO goes, lots of nested tables aren't going to make much of a difference to a decent search bot.



The opinions stated in this post do not represent the opinions of GlobalCorp or their affiliates. Any similarities to actual events or persons are purly coincidental. All rights reserved. Clicking fingers may not necessarily make food appear.

[Jem]

Dom, I think you're concentrating too much on code. There's a whole lot more to SEO than how a page is coded

[Dom]

True enough! Although I was just using the shoddy code thing as an example of where SEO has lost some of it's importance because search engines can cater better for it.

But yeah, I've gone on long enough. I should actually do some work while at work.

[Jem]

I should actually do some work while at work.

Why not start a revolution while you're at it

[Dom]

It's a thought I guess. But it's mid-week - my enthusiasm these days isn't great, but mid-week it's in minus figures. Plus, they don't pay me enough to start revolutions.


Well, not my kind of revolutions, which involve chainsaws and lots of burning.

[Marge]

I've started a forum argy-bargy! Oh lawks! 

... and small business friend has just asked me about forums and SEO ... it never ends 

[sickpuppy]

... and small business friend

titter

[Dom]

Well I've not dabbled in setting up forums for a while, but the last time I looked, the open-source forum software (while quite good) wasn't exactly designed for SEO. Then again, I imagine that you can get lots of free plugins (just like WordPress) that help optimise standard forum software to make it more SEO-friendly.

But when all is said and done, if it's a popular forum with lots of active members and unique content, then it'll no doubt do quite well for the relevant search terms.

[familychoice]

I've started a forum argy-bargy! Oh lawks! 

... and small business friend has just asked me about forums and SEO ... it never ends 

You want to tell them about social networking too. If they do it right they'll get a whole load of targeted website visitors, cheaper than advertising in a mag or via Google.

[Johnathan]

wasn't exactly designed for SEO

But obviously because search engines are getting that doesn't matter. Eh Dommy boy?

[Dom]

wasn't exactly designed for SEO

But obviously because search engines are getting that doesn't matter. Eh Dommy boy?

Getting what? You accidentally a word.

[neal]

Getting what? You accidentally a word.

He accidentally what a word..?

[Dom]

Yeah, accidentally though.

[suedenem]

Anyway, back on topic, I've actually read Dom's advice this time.  Most is valid enough, but ignore this bit:

- Don't flood your page with thousands of "keywords" in the meta-tags. In fact, you don't really have to use the 'keywords' and 'description' meta-tags at all. If you do use them, keep the description to around 150 characters, and use key phrases rather that individual key words.

Defining a meta description won't give you any ranking advantage, but Google often uses it as your site's search snippet.  A good description can make your listing stand out and increase click throughs.

Your page title is typically used as the listing heading (in blue, at the top), and your URL is displayed in green.  All these count when competing against others on a crowded search engine results page.

Forget about meta keywords, though, unless you're submitting to loads of directories which use them, depend on them for internal search or you want to work your metaphorical bum off to get a 0.0001% improvement in Bing.

[Marge]

I was reading online somewhere that the best kind of reciprocal linking is when you write an article for someone else's blog and that includes a link to your own product or site.  How exactly does this work? 

And on a side note: the sun is out 

[Mike@TheWhippinpost]

The best kind of link is when someone writes an article on their website and includes a link to your own product or site within the content that isn't no-followed.

Reciprocal linking -1
Writing content for another site -1

[Dom]

How important Google et al consider the website that links to you is also important. If a well-respected, high-profile website (that achieves high results in the SERPs) links to you, then Google will look favourably on your website as well. But if you get a load of link farms to link to your site, and Google considers those link farms to be practically worthless, then the links from the farms to your site won't help your website at all.