Search Engine Optimization

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Search Engine Optimization
Presentation By
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Search Engine Optimization

• What
• Search Engine Optimization - The altering of a
  Web site, Web pages and links to Web sites and
  Web pages to improve visibility, rank and
  relevance in the organic, crawler-based listings
  of search engines.
• Why?
• Brand Visibility Ensure the website is present
  for key phrases relevant to
• Free Traffic Why pay for PPC or CPM advertising
  when you can get the traffic for free? Moreover,
  some recent studies have shown that having a top
  organic ranking along-side a paid listing
  increases conversions by 400!

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Search Engine Optimization

• Who Are the Main Players?

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Search Engine Optimization

• Why Does Google Get So Much Traffic?

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Search Engine Optimization

• Search Engine Personalities
• Google.com
• Goliath sites dominate (e.g. Wikipedia,
  about.com)
• Content is crucial
• One-way Inbound Links only
• Timeline of content and links is key
• Everyone Else (Yahoo, MSN, Ask)
• Targeted Mini sites still work well
• Reciprocal links still work well
• On-page optimization works well

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Search Engine Optimization

• Search Engine Strategies Progression
• Strategies have changes over time as search
  engines and SEO spammers have become most
  sophisticated.

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Search Engine Optimization

• SEO Philosophies
• Black Hat (Aggressive)
• Internet Spam (100s of small sites)
• Extensive Linking Networks
• Cloaking (Server-side or Client-side)
• Keyword stuffing
• Content sequencing bots
• Hyphenated domains and URLs
• White Hat (Conservative)
• Content! Content! Content!
• SEO-Based page design
• One-way Inbound links

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Search Engine Optimization

• Three() Tenants of White-Hat SEO
• On-Site Page Optimization
• Site architecture
• URL structure
• Content positioning
• Proper HTML (lttitle/gt, lth1gt, lta/gt tags most
  critical)
• Link Popularity
• Inbound links from on-topic websites
• Links from authority websites worth more (page
  rank)
• Be careful with reciprocal links!
• Content Is King!
• Lots of content
• Cover all related key-phrases naturally
• Naturally elicit inbound links

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Search Engine Optimization

• Three() Tenants of White-Hat SEO (contd.)
• Natural Patterns (Hilltop Algorithm)
• Dont overdue on-page optimization (keyword
  stuffing, hyphenated URLs)
• Introduce links slowly and consistently
• No reciprocal or link-farm links
• Natural content patterns (keyword density /
  keyword proximity, grammar)

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Search Engine Optimization

• Rich Media Challenges
• Flash
• Presently Flash cannot be crawled by any search
  engine. This may change in the future but for
  now, it is important to limit use of Flash to
  embedded media elements. Do not use it for an
  entire website or the navigation system.
• PDFs
• Like Flash, PDFs could not be crawled by search
  engines until a year ago. Google can crawl them
  now and actually ranks them quite effectively
  now.
• JavaScript / DHTML
• Simple JavaScript routines can be followed now
  by Google but it should be presumed that
  JavaScript-generated content will likely not rank
  well in Google. Yahoo and MSN probably will not
  see it at all. Hidden DHTML layers however can
  be seen and so that method of DHTML should be ok.
  
• Frames
• Framed content can be read and followed by all
  search engines but the framed content is rarely
  treated as well as if it were directly in the
  page. Moreover, the parent page will not retain
  any of the credit for the contents of the frame
  source page.

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Search Engine Optimization

• Defensive Website Design
• Visible Content
• Always ensure important content is visible to
  the search engines. This means, not rasterizing
  content anymore than necessary. Always use
  live text and keep it on the page, not in an
  image or a Flash applet.
• Site architecture
• A site should be architected so that each page
  we well linked into the rest of the page.
  Ideally, no page should require more than 3
  clicks to reach. Good file names and file
  structures are all important. Use keywords and do
  not bury content too deep into a nested file
  structure.
• On-Page optimization
• Ensure content is visible, and have the content
  as close to the upper-left corner as possible.
  The more HTML that must come before a block of
  content, the less important an engine will
  presume that content to be. Moreover, draw out
  important key phrases with proper HTML
  demarcation tags such as lth1/gt or ltstrong/gt to
  indicate when a word is more important.
• Limited Rich-media
• Do not overuse rich media such as Flash or Java
  applets, images, or DHTML. These things may be
  helpful to engage a user but they will repel a
  search engine and reduce the traffic they send
  you. It is important to find a balance between
  human and robot consumption to maximize webpage
  accessibility.

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Search Engine Optimization

• URL Masking For Database-Driven Content
• URL Masking
• Refers to the act of mapping a set of URL
  patterns to actual URLs the web application may
  be expecting. As such, you can limit the impact
  of SEO practices on the application but still
  maximize SEO adaptability.
• Mod_ReWrite
• This Apache module makes it possible to write
  URL mask mappings simply using the .htaccess
  file. Below is an example of such a mapping
• RewriteRule local/(.)/(.)/venue(.).html
  
• /viewResource.do?city1categ2id3
  qsa,L

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Search Engine Optimization

• Research Resources
• Research Websites
• WebmasterWorld.com Premiere SEO and web
  marketing forums
• forums.digitalpoint.com Another popular
  webmaster and SEO forum
• Gurus
• Matt Cutts Blog - http//www.mattcutts.com/blog/
• Oilmans Blog - http//www.oilman.ca/
• Oilman Web Gorilla Radio Show -
  WebmasterRadio.fm
• Jill Whalen - http//www.highrankings.com/
• SEO Tools
• WordTracker.com - Keyword research
• Google Trends (www.google.com/trends/ )
  Research keyword trends
• LinkPopularity.com Quickly find backlinks to a
  website

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Search Engine Optimization

• SEO Model Examples
• Four examples of authority websites that rank
  well for thousands of keyphrases. These websites
  follow the principles enumerated above and have
  amassed so much authority ranking, that they can
  easily outrank another site for just about any
  topic they post about.
• 1. Wikipedia.com
• 2. TripAdvisor.com
• 3. Amazon.com
• 4. About.com