SEO Information |
|
SEO and Google Indexing - Why It Requires A Complex Blend of Skills
If it was easy, everybody would be doing it. Getting a company's name and products, or services, onto the first page of a genuine Google search isn't a trivial piece of work. In fact, there are four distinct skills that a search engine optimiser needs to possess. Most people possess one or maybe two of these skills, very rarely do people posses all four. In truth, to get to all four, people who are good at two of these need to actively develop the other skills. Now, if you are running your own business, do you really have the time to do this? Is this the best use of your time? Specifically the four skills needed for SEO work are:
Many website designers produce more and more eye-catching designs with animations and clever rollover buttons hoping to entice the people onto their sites. This is the first big mistake; using designs like these will actually decrease your chances of a high Google rating. Yes, that's right; all that money you have paid for the website design could be wasted because no-one will ever find your site. The reason for this is that before you get people to your site you need to get the spiderbots to like your site. Spiderbots are pieces of software used by the search engine companies to trawl the Internet looking at all the websites, and then having reviewed the sites, they use complex algorithms to rank the sites. Some of the complex techniques used by web designers cannot be trawled by spiderbots. They come to your site, look at the HTML code and exit stage right, without even bothering to rank your site. So, you will not be found on any meaningful search. I am amazed how many times I look at websites and I immediately know they are a waste of money. The trouble is that both the web designers and the company that paid the money really do not want to know this. In fact, I have stopped playing the messenger of bad news (too many shootings!); I now work round the problem. So, optimising a website to be Google friendly is often a compromise between a visually attractive site and an easy to find site. The second skill is that of optimising the actual HTML code to be spiderbot friendly. I put this as different to the web design because you really do need to be "down and dirty" in the code rather than using an editor like Frontpage, which is OK for website design. This skill takes lots of time and experience to develop, and just when you think you have cracked it, the search engine companies change the algorithms used to calculate how high your site will appear in the search results. This is no place for even the most enthusiastic amateur. Results need to be constantly monitored, pieces of code added or removed, and a check kept on what the competition are doing. Many people who design their own website feel they will get searched because it looks good, and totally miss out this step. Without a strong technical understanding of how spiderbots work, you will always struggle to get your company on the first results page in Google. Thirdly, I suggested that copy writing is a skill in its own right. This is the writing of the actual text that people coming to your site will read. The Googlebot and other spiderbots like Inktomi, love text - but only when written well in proper English. Some people try to stuff their site with keywords, while others put white writing on white space (so spiderbots can see it but humans cannot). Spiderbots are very sophisticated and not only will not fall for these tricks, they may actively penalise your site - in Google terms, this is sandboxing. Google takes new sites and "naughty" sites and effectively sin-bins them for 3-6 months, you can still be found but not until results page 14 - really useful! As well as good English, the spiderbots are also reading the HTML code, so the copy writer also needs an appreciation of the interplay between the two. My recommendation for anyone copy writing their own site is to write normal, well-constructed English sentences that can be read by machine and human alike. The final skill is marketing, after all this is what we are doing - marketing you site and hence company and products/services on the Web. The key here is to set the site up to be accessible to the searches that will provide most business to you. I have seen many sites that can be found as you key in the company name. Others that can be found by keying in "Accountant Manchester North-West England", which is great, except no-one ever actually does that search. So the marketing skill requires knowledge of a company's business, what they are really trying to sell and an understanding of what actual searches may provide dividends. I hope you will see that professional Search Engine Optimisation companies need more than a bit of web design to improve your business. Make sure anyone you choose for SEO work can cover all the bases. John Fowler trained as a Mathematican and has worked in the IT industry for over 30 years, much of the time in sales related functions. He now spends his time between being a partner in SEO Gurus and as a sales and management trainer for ICT companies. John can be contacted via SEO Gurus
MORE RESOURCES: Exclusive: Forbes, CNN, and More Lose Millions as New Google Policy Tanks Affiliate Businesses Adweek SEO reality check: 13 hard-hitting truths you need to hear Search Engine Land Microsoft’s AI SEO Tips: New Guidance For AI Search Optimization Search Engine Journal Term Drift In SEO - Why It Matters Search Engine Roundtable How to do audience research for SEO Search Engine Land How managed WordPress hosting can level up your SEO Search Engine Land SEO Trends For 2025 Search Engine Journal [Losing Traffic?] 4 Easy Steps To See How Google’s AIO Is Affecting Your SEO - Search Engine Journal [Losing Traffic?] 4 Easy Steps To See How Google’s AIO Is Affecting Your SEO Search Engine Journal Canonicalization and SEO: A guide for 2025 Search Engine Land Sustainability Expert Danny Seo Talks Conscientious Living Philadelphia Style | Modern Luxury SEO Advice On Version History Pages From Google Search Engine Roundtable Locafy Ltd. Eyes Growth Amid SEO Innovations Yahoo Finance 15 Reasons Why Your Business Absolutely Needs SEO Search Engine Journal 10 Best SEO Services Of 2024 Forbes Server access logs and SEO: Everything you need to know in 2025 Search Engine Land Honest Digital Wins 'Best Large SEO Agency' at US Search Awards - The First in Automotive Leader-Telegram Trend Micro and Japanese Partners Reveal Hidden Connections Among SEO Malware Operations Trend Micro Latest Google AIO Updates May Impact SEO Search Engine Journal Google’s Updated Machine Learning Courses Build SEO Understanding Search Engine Journal 198 Top SEO Experts You Should Be Following Search Engine Journal Google November 2024 core update rolling out now Search Engine Land The Trunk: Here’s what to expect from Seo Hyun-jin and Gong Yoo's upcoming Netflix drama Sportskeeda Digital Marketers See Schema Structured Data Shifting Beyond SEO Search Engine Journal 5 SEO trends for 2025 Search Engine Land Bring More Shoppers to Your Site with These SEO Tips for the Holliday Season Miami's Community Newspapers The latest jobs in search marketing Search Engine Land Google: Some SEOs Over Focus On URL Structure Search Engine Roundtable Google’s srsltid= parameter: What it means for SEO and attribution Search Engine Land Best SEO tool of 2024 TechRadar Google November Core Update: 6 Insights From Millions of Queries Search Engine Journal Phono Sounds uk – Front and Back end WordPress Developer and SEO (uk) Music Business Worldwide Google launches new core update two weeks before Black Friday: SEO uncertainty at a key time Marketing 4 eCommerce 12 SEO Best Practices For 2024 DesignRush ChatGPT Search makes Microsoft Bing an SEO priority Search Engine Land Writing and SEO Word Soup Marketoonist Seo Hyun Jin issues dramatic apology to BTS fans; here's why The Times of India Meet The 7 Most Popular Search Engines In The World Search Engine Journal The Infamous SEO Retainer Model: A Dubious Expense for Businesses and a Cash Cow for Agencies Tech Business News Google Rolls Out November 2024 Core Algorithm Update Search Engine Journal Best SEO companies for lawyers or law firms of 2025 Forbes India Google Warns Against Over-Reliance On SEO Tool Metrics Search Engine Journal Want to improve rankings and traffic? Stop blindly following SEO tool recommendations Search Engine Land The Best SEO Conferences For 2024-2025 (Virtual And In-Person) Search Engine Journal How to gain visibility in generative AI answers: GEO for Perplexity and ChatGPT - Search Engine Land Top 10 JavaScript SEO Tricks Every Developer Should Know The New Stack 10 Best AI SEO Tools (November 2024) Unite.AI There Is More To Seo In Guk’s Story Men's Folio 4 of the best technical SEO tools Search Engine Land 13 Essential On-Page SEO Factors You Need To Know Search Engine Journal Google November 2024 Core Update Rolling Out Search Engine Roundtable SEO Poisoning Threat Hits Australia—Don’t Google This! The Cyber Express Celebrating faculty: Seo-Hyun Park Lafayette College - News Content length, depth and SEO: Everything you need to know in 2025 Search Engine Land About Kinsta Search Engine Land Woo Hyun, Kim Kang Hyun, Jeon Seo Jin, And More Bring Diverse Charms To Upcoming Drama "Marry YOU" soompi LinkedIn SEO: 7 Tips to Optimize Your Company Page Sprout Social |
RELATED ARTICLES
Do-It-Yourself Search Engine Optimization Search engine optimization, or SEO, is big business. If you rely on search engines to bring visitors to your business website, you need to rely on more than luck. Your PC can Contribute with Google Compute Have you heard of the SETI Project? SETI stands for Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence, and the project is operated by the University of California at Berkeley. SETI monitors and processes radio signals from space, looking for possible signs of intelligent extraterrestrial life. 10 Costly Search Engine Mistakes to Avoid If you have a website then you already know the importance of traffic. Traffic is to Internet marketing as location is to real estate. The Power of Search Engine Friendly URLs I recently invested quite some time into generating search engine friendly URLs for several of my websites to increase my ranking and to have more pages indexed. I can highly recommend to look into this if your own website does not have se-friendly URLs. 21 Search Engine Terms Every Web Marketer Should Know Part 1 1. Search Engine - Is a database of web sites that is ranked according to the computerized criteria that the programmers decide upon called an algorithm. One Way Link Building Secures Long Term Ranking Results One-way link building is a great way to improve your link popularity and ranking in the search engines. One-way links are more difficult to obtain than traditional reciprocal links, but pay off in securing solid long-term search engine ranking results. Google Slavery...Old Habits Die Hard For the first few months after Yahoo decided to go their own way with natural search (and MSN decided to get serious about the search business), the search results provided by those two could only be described as bizarre. Enough time has now passed that the dust has somewhat settled and there are three main (from a traffic standpoint) sites for quality natural searches. Why SEO Will Make or Break You, Part 1 Today's article is about the wonders of SEO. SEO is short for Search Engine Optimization. Top Search Engine Ranks- The Only Secret You Need- Explained: Part 1 The top three search pages- the only place you'll be noticed they say. Unfortunately, they are correct. One Way Linking Campaigns II There is a way to generate links with the content that you have not as yet created. For this contact the established authorities (writers, publishers ) in your domain area & let them know that you are available as a resource for researching & writing on any topic from the chosen domain. Search Engine Indexing - 3 Strategies Guaranteed to Skyrocket Your Success In order to design a website that performs well with the search engines, it is very important to give the search engines what they want. You'll want to find out what search engines index and what they do not in order to have your pages returned as a result. Page Rank - A Quick Overview for Beginners Page Rank (PR) is a specific value for a website page given by Google. It is Google's measure of the importance of a certain site page. What is Search Engine Optimization? It is no secret that search engines are the number one traffic generating method for driving visitors to the different web sites. Search engines are very useful in helping people find the relevant information they seek on the Internet. All About Google If you read The Search Engine Showdown, you know Google is my favourite search engine. Why? Google always offers the most results for any given search (they currently have over 8 billion pages indexed), it's faster than the Audi Quattro we test drove this morning, and 9 times out of ten, in my experience, all the front page results are relevant to my search. Getting Specific With Local Search Engine Optimization Localized search engine optimization is often overlooked as an excellent tool to bring in local traffic to your website. By including local information in your tags and web pages, you help prospective customers find specific information on the area and business they are searching for. Five Tips to Improve Your Chances with Google et al. "Dear David: I just created a website on baby toy safety. What should I do to make sure gazillions of people find me through the search engines?"I can't promise you gazillions, but there are a few things you should do to make it easy for search engines to find you. Google - PR & Backlinks Here are some observations that I have made recently:1. On several of my own sites, I have some pages with zero page rank despite having links pointing to them PR 5 pages on the same site. Do You Submit Your Website To All The Search Engines? There is really only one search engine to worry about submitting too and that is Google and you should only submit one page your main once and maybe a sitemap a week later but never more than once a week. If you have a link coming to your new site from a site that is currently listed in Google then Google will find you quicker. Is a High Search Engine Ranking Important for YOU? In the process of designing a website for clients the question inevitibly arises "How do I get a good search engine ranking?". This is a very good point and the answer is not as clear cut as you may think. How Do I Submit My Site To Search Engines? You've built up a good site, put in a lot of content, but none of the search engines lists your site? If you'd like to know how to go ahead with Search Engine Submission the right way, read on.How do I get my site to be included in search-engines? That's a question a lot of people ask me. |
home | site map |
© 2006 |