Google Search Engine Optimization For Top Rankings

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1st Singapore Web Hosting > Web Site Design

Ten Steps To Top Ranking Pages In Google

In my opinion, getting top rankings in search engines (especially Google) is the first priority for all online business operators.

As you can learn in the web site promotion section, there're many ways to market your web site on the Internet such as affiliate marketing, opt-in list marketing, pay per click search engines... However, none of them is comparable with search engine optimization. You will have to get initial traffic to apply those techniques (affiliate programs, mailing list...) or have to spend money and time on it (ppc search engines, forum participation...).

On the contrary, search engine traffic is free, automatic, and targeted.

Of all the search engines, Google is the most important one. Yahoo, AOL, Netscape and HotBot (optional) are also powered by Google. A recent study shows that Google is responsible for 80% of all search engine traffic.

To get high rankings in Google, you have to optimize your pages (on-page factor) and get a high PageRank (non-on-page factor determined by link popularity). This article will give you a quick overview of the process of creating optimized pages.

Step 1: Lots Of Content

Content is the King. Not only for search engines, for visitors as well.

Google loves content. With lots of relevant content, your site will be viewed as a tightly themed information source on your specific subject - where search engines think worth visiting. Keep in mind, the ultimate goal of all search engines is to deliver useful, relevant information to their visitors.

If your site is nothing but a sales copy trying to sell something, how much information do you think you can provide? And why should Google, and other search engines, send their users your way?

It's very hard for a mini web site to get high rankings even if you have tons of inbound links and therefore a decent PageRank.

Forget about doorway pages. Or let me put it this way: I would rather spend time creating real content pages than ugly doorway pages. Some of the doorway pages produced by software are not useful to visitors at all - full of keyword-rich yet meaningless sentences. On the other hand, properly written content pages can serve as "doors" to main page very well.

Don't cheat Google or any other search engines. You will be caught sooner or later.

Step 2: Choose Keywords Wisely

Analyzing keywords, or keyword phrases, is the foundation of everything you will do for your search engine optimization. The principle is to choose the keywords that are searched for most frequently and with least competitors.

Keep in mind that most people search using 2-3 word phrases. Brainstorm with your colleagues or friends and come up with a list of as many phrases as you can. Start by asking these questions:

• What is the ultimate goal of your site? Keep this in mind when choosing keywords.
• Who is your target market?  Try to think like them.
• What keywords might they type in to find your products or services? Always assuming they don't know anything about your business. Be sure to put yourself in their shoes.

Do a search for your primary keywords and visit the sites listed in the top 20, take a look at what keywords your competitors are targeting.

A great way to get more keywords related to your site is to use WordTracker keyword generation service. Type in a keyword or phrase, WordTracker will then give a list of related keywords. Now the best part is that WordTracker will also tell you the number of times these keywords have been searched for in major search engines! You can avoid choosing keywords based on assumption. Make sure your target keywords are actually searched for by real visitors.

Now find out how many people are actually searching these keywords. Go to Yahoo or Google, type in the keywords, the result page will display how many relevant pages are in their database. They are all your competitors.

List down all your keywords with the number of times they have been searched for and the number of competitors. Pick up the ones that are searched for most frequently and with least competitors. Of course, the keywords you are going to optimize your site for have to be applicable to your site in the first place.

Step 3: Optimize Title Tag

Google puts a lot of weight on the text that is found in the TITLE tag. Most search results will show pages that have the searched words in the title tag. Make sure this tag immediately follows the HEAD tag and is not placed after other META tags.

The Title tag looks like:

<TITLE>Google Search Engine Optimization For Top Rankings In 10 Simple Steps</ TITLE>

A common mistake of many web sites is that they have the same title tag on every page of their web site.  Each page should have different title tags, depending on what that specific page has information on.

Note that Google doesn't read Meta Tags the way that some of other search engines do. But it doesn't hurt to include keywords in Description and Keywords Meta tags.

Step 4: Include Keywords In URL

This includes:

• Your domain name
• Directory (folder) name
• File name

As you can see, the URL of this page is:

http://www.1stsingaporewebhosting.com/webdesign/googleoptimization.shtml

Step 5: Use Keywords In Heading Tag

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