Search Engine Ranking Basics - Part 2	Visited: 721 Not rated Rate: Select 1 - Terrible 2 - Poor 3 - Average 4 - Good 5 - Outstanding
by Jose Nunez February 19, 2007

In the last part of this article, I will explain the last 5 areas that relate to solid Search Engine Ranking for a given number of key phrases. Again, this will apply to any type of website, on any industry you are targeting.

Provide a road map of your web site, and search engines will follow it.

Called the "sitemap", this very simple page contains links to every page on a web site and serves one very important purpose. That is to get your sub pages crawled, and into a search engine's index.

Search Engines look for the robots.txt file, so make sure you have it.

As its name implies, this is a text file that tells robots what to and what not to index. Its content consists of so-called records. Only mention files and directories that you don't want to be indexed. All other files will be indexed normally if they are linked on your site. Having a proper robots.txt file gives your pages the rankings they deserve. If search engines know what to do with them, then they can rank.

Submit your site to related categories in niche directories.

Internet directories have become very important because they represent an easy path for inbound links creation. Now, when you submit your site to related categories in your industry you get that extra link factor, quality. Links from these categories can have a very positive effect on the ranking of your web site.

Writing articles about your site, a great way to get new content.

This will help you get good positioning on search engines and quality incoming links as well. Always keep your articles as informative as possible. Other web sites will link back to your articles if you do. Write about the topics that your visitors are interested in, and don’t forget to send them to syndicate sites. They will in turn offer them to others. Just make sure that you always have a link back to your web site so that all sites who publish your article will automatically link to you.

Become an authority in your field. Visit relevant forums and blogs.

Only join forum and blogs that are relevant to your industry. Use your expertise as a site owner in your industry to give information and advice. Of course, put your URL into the signature of your posts. Being the authority is simply knowing your industry, and giving people the info they need to trust you and your site.

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