Search Engine Optimization Articles >> 10 Basic Search Engine Preparation Tips

While many people think it is enough to have web site to earn hundreds or thousands of dollars within a few weeks, it is much harder in reality to get people to your web site and then it is another thing to get them to buy something from you.

How do you get targeted prospects? First of all, you must know your potential customers. Who are they? What are they looking for? So the first thing, even before you have built your web site, is to know which keywords your prospects would search for.

It is not as hard as you might think. But if you have a general topic like Internet Marketing, it might be a much better idea to concentrate just on one aspect of Internet Marketing.

You ask why? Did you ever perform a search on AltaVista for the term "Internet Marketing"? Yes? Then you will certainly know that there about 6 million web sites competing for the top position on "Internet Marketing".

It is very hard, but not impossible to reach a rank in the top 10 or even the top 30 for such a general term. But if you concentrate on,then there are a lot less pages that deal with this topic.

1) Choosing your domain name

This means, when you order your domain name, be sure to include your keywords in your domain name.

2) Frames/no-frames

Web pages which use frames have one big disadvantage: Some search engines are not able to index them correctly. They cannot follow the links that are included on these pages and that means that they won't be able to show the results of your pages. If you want to be on the safe side, create your web pages without using frames. There are some tricks to enable a correct indexing but this would lead too far for this time.

3) The title of your homepage

It almost goes without saying that your title should have your keywords included as well. You should choose a title that includes your four most important keywords.

4) Meta tag: description

Meta tags are additional pieces of information which are placed within the HTML - code. Your description reflects the most important part of your homepage since this is the description that is shown when someone searches for your site on a search engine. You should clearly state the benefits of visiting your site. It should be a like a little ad for your site. You should include your keywords once again but not more than twice. 

5) Meta tag: keywords

The Meta tag keywords should be used to put in all your keywords that are relevant for your site. It is crucial to put your 4 most important keywords at the beginning. You can include 15 further keywords and even more.

6) Meta tag: robots

You create a little robots.txt to let the search engine optimization which links it should follow. If you want to exclude certain directories, you can use special commands which forbid the search engine optimization to follow a complete path.
This can be necessary to avoid that the search engines link to your download page where you have the articles you want to sell.

7)  Keyword density

Your main keyword should be mentioned within the first 8 words of your body text and can be mentioned 3 times more. The other keywords should not be forgotten, too. Try to use them at least 3 times in your text.

8) Alt-tags for your images

Alt-tags are alternative descriptions for your pictures. If you move your mouse-cursor over your pictures, you can see this alternative text. This text is also shown if a picture is not loaded correctly. Use your keywords to describe your pictures.

9) No tricks like white text on white background!

Some people consider themselves to be very smart and they want to outwit the search engines by putting a lot of their keywords with a font in the background color on their pages to make it more relevant to the engines.
But times have changed: The search engines recognize these tricks and as a result your pages are banned from their index. Try just to do what is necessary but don't use tricks, it won't do you no good.

10) Link-Popularity

Many search engines like AltaVista have a new ranking concept which includes link-popularity. This means, the more pages have a link to your site, the better your site gets ranked.
Some of them have also made special deals with pay- per-click search engines. Those sites which rank on the top 3 will also get a high rank at "normal" search engines.