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Meta Tags: The next important task
Once you have determined which keywords and keyword phrases you will be focusing on, Meta Tags become the next order of business. Properly filled out Meta Tags still has some importance to most search engines but for different reasons from search engine to search engine. Some of the smaller directories use Meta Tags for a great deal of their indexing information while the bigger search engines only use portions of them. For example the Google bot will look for the site language, audience rating, robot permissions and site description Meta Tags. Most will utilize some portion of the site description Meta Tag in returned search results. If nothing else the use of properly filled out Meta Tags allows you some control over how your web site is described to web searchers.
The Basics of their use: Meta Tags are placed just after the HTML title tag within the head section of your web page. They cannot be seen by web surfers but only by search engine spiders. A good Meta Tag utility with articles and other resources can be found here: Online Meta Tag Creator
How to Optimize Your Web Pages:
As mentioned on the previous page, there are several places that a search engine spider will find your chosen keywords and keyword phrases. They will find your web site intially as they are routinely crawling higher ranked web sites, where they will come across your carefully placed text links incorporating your keywords as the text. They may also find your web site via a domain name incorporating your keywords. However they find you; the web page must be ready for them. The title of the web page should be a no brainer, this is the first thing a search engine spider sees upon landing on your website. Followed by the Meta Tags, then followed by the first content title designated by the "H1" HTML tag. They then crawl through your site content reading all information left for them in both web surfer visible content and all other HTML tags. These secondary HTML tags include image "alt" tags and link "title" tags. Then they scurry away from your web page by following links to your other pages where they go through the same exploratory process, to eventually find a link that takes them off site to any web pages you may be linked to. Do not give them a reason to leave, or worse; bar the door before entry. The worst cases of barring the door to search engine spiders are; poorly constructed Robots Text files in your web root or non search engine friendly page redirect methods. If these things are botched, the search engine spiders will never visit your site. If the web pages are poorly constructed, they will leave your site without collecting the information they are after.
About optimizing web content: Once you have chosen your keywords and keyword phrases, you get to play the old primary school game: "use this word (or words) in a sentence" over and over again. The phrasing of the content however must make sense, do not attempt to "keyword stuff" but instead attempt to construct intelligent and meaningful sentences using your keywords. If you are using images as part of your content, be certain to fill out the alt tags for each image. Considering that the only portion of an image that a search engine spider can see is the alt tag, this too should be a no brainer. So far it must sound like a lot of work, unfortunately it is, there is no escaping this reality. The amount of work that is necessary to optimize your web pages speaks directly to why we do not guarantee that this strategy will work for everyone, many people do not complete the work properly. In an instant gratification world many people are simply too lazy to do the necessary diligence. You can be certain about one thing pertaining to these people however; You will never see their websites ranking high in organic search unless by accident. Every web page that comes up at the top of the major search engine rankings has been optimized in the manner we are describing in this eBook report.
Getting Organized:
On the next page of this eBook report we will be explaining website optimizing strategies in greater detail but first we must get organized. The website description that you have filled into your Meta Tags should be copied to a text file so that it is handy for copying and pasting into search engine and web directory description fields. You will be doing a lot of this as you submit your web site URL to as many higher ranked sites than your own as possible. Some search engines require an email address that is found on the web site and specifially in the Meta Tags to validate your web site URL for inclusion. Most directories will email you with an inclusion validation link, many will follow up email you as part of their marketing efforts. Be careful here. The best and safest practice is to set up a catch all forwarding email address on your web space which uses the extension of your domain name and channel all of your increased email traffic from your optimization efforts through it. This allows you to close off or delete the entire email address if necessary in the event that the wrong people get ahold of it . . . hey it happens and this brings us to our next topic.
Things to Avoid:
You will see countless promotions on the internet promising vast amounts of web traffic for very little effort, possibly for a small fee. Some of the promises made are laughable, "Have your web site listed on 10,000 search engines for only $19.95" as an example. First off there are not 10,000 true search engines existing on the internet, there are but 40 or so that any one web site may be relevant to. Where there are many other search engines, a good number of them share databases and will reflect identical search results because of this. There are also a number of web directories (as opposed to search engines) where inclusion is important, many of these will be niche or regional directories specific to your location or type of business, a good number of them will be small in size. Be very careful to avoid any type of free for all site (FFA). The following article explains why it is important to take heed: Reasons to Avoid FFA Sites
Other things to avoid: Any practice that runs any type of risk that could possibly have your site blacklisted by the major search engines must be avoided like the plague. This means that you must also be aware of the company you keep. Avoid any link swapping strategies involving automated link exchanges or link swapping software. Keep your web site URL out of bad neighbourhoods. All adult rated sites are considered bad neighbourhoods by the major search engines in enough of a degree that it is wise to avoid them as well. If you accidently end up with inbound links from adult rated sites you will effectively reduce your potential internet market by 75% instantly. This is so because your web site will now light up internet security filters like a Holiday Season pine. Reading the following article is worth investing a bit of time in: SEO Practices to Avoid
 
Internal Link Directory
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