While mystery surrounds what’s search engines such as Google use to rank websites there are fundamentals. If you have ever played a sport you have learned the fundamentals and hopefully used them to play your sport of choice. Search Engine Optimization has such fundamentals, not clearly stated in guidelines for webmasters that search engines include.
I want to make it clear that search engine optimization is not "magic", nor is it tricking search engines, it's the practice of following the fundamentals within a logical and "ethical" manner. Before considering the leap into search engine optimization you have to understand there is going to be allot of reading involved. Your duty as an SEO is to stay on top of the industry and looking for those hidden gems that can increase traffic and popularity in search engines.
This article is meant for the absolute beginner. If you have been optimizing websites for awhile then this is not for you, but you are more than welcome to read on if interested.
The art of SEO is more complex but there are the main aspects. I will go over each one to give you an entry level idea of what you have in store for you.
Designing a search engine friendly website is the most crucial aspect of SEO. First you have to consider the fact search engines are not people. They are computer programs designed to mimic human behavior. There are two core technologies search engines have a hard time with and why you should use them as little as possible.
JavaScript is a client side coding platform. Google's algorithms have a hard time see JavaScript, but improve their techniques daily. The basic rule of thumb is to avoid using JavaScript if possible. If not avoid using it for navigation, because there's a change that search engine can follow the links to your internal pages.
Flash is a program used to create animations. You'll notice a large number of video streaming websites use this technology to display videos or you've noticed a few flashing banners when you visit websites. You can display text and even embed hyperlinks within Flash. The problem is search engines can't see the content embedded within flash or interpret the animation.
Search Engines cannot interpret images. The thing is images are usually interpreted by the web visitor. Search Engines such as Google use the content surrounding an image along with other factors to determine what the image is.
Now that we've briefly covered the technology search engine have a hard time viewing you must be asking yourself, "What can I do to make my website search engine friendly"?
The Title and Description tag can help a search engine determine the theme of the website. You include title and description Meta tags within the code of the website. You can view the title tag, by visiting a website and viewing the very top of your browser window (ex. Internet Explorer). It's important that you take great care in choosing your title tag. Keep it short and sweet. If you're selling apples your title tag should state, "Apples for sale" or "buy Apples". Make sure that you keep the title tag short and stay away from stating the phrase over and over again. Tactics such as those will likely hurt you more than help you.
Content is the most crucial to any website. It's important that the content includes the same subject matter that you've included within the "title tag". Make sure that your content reads like you are speaking to the website visitor, not a computer. Most websites lose visitors that way because they feel that their content should include "big words" to wow their audience when it actually has the adverse effects.
Following these simple fundamentals will help your website in search engines but is not the end all to search engine optimization.