What is SEO?

From an SEO companies perspective; there are two elements, the in-site and the off-site SEO. However, before an SEO company can begin, there are usually a few performance checks done, to make sure your website is ready for SEO. These can include ~

• Is there enough page copy on the most important pages?
• Does the website rely to heavily on graphics or photos?
• Is the source code messy?
• Are the URL's short and keyword rich, are they data-base driven or are they incredibly long?

There are lots of other items we also investigate to assess if your website is ready for SEO, prior to 'shaking hands'. In most cases, the website owner can fix any problems themselves, once we make them aware of any shortcomings. Now your website is ready for the in-site SEO.

The in-site SEO is essentially a process where the web page or blog post is edited so it contains keywords that are mostly likely to assist the page to appear in the search result you are targeting. Both visible and invisible elements of the page are edited to introduce keywords or phrases into page copy, text links, title and Meta tags and other elements of the page so it will appear in any related searches.

The major search engines frown upon obvious keyword stuffing, however If you use them in moderation in a natural way, the page will usually perform better. Now your website is ready for the off-site SEO.

The off-site SEO is devoted to building your websites authority so it matches your competitors who appear in the top 5 for searches relating to your page content. Usually, around 80% of the time required to achieve a top ranking, is devoted to the off-site SEO.

The most common techniques include submission to directory sites, posts on forums or blog's, article writing/submission to article directories, link exchanges, social bookmarking, and building links from on-theme websites.

Most of these techniques are considered Spam by the search engines, therefore some link building techniques are a lot more effective than others. This is one reason why the end result can vary greatly from one SEO company to another.

Most clients are normally focused on increasing the amount of visitors, which equates to more inquiries from their website or blog. If the website is running ads for affiliates, an increase in visitors generally creates more commission income. If the client is marketing a product or service, SEO delivers increased sales as soon as they appear in the top 5 or higher for a related search.

Over the next few pages of our search engine optimization tips we discuss common problems and offer some solutions.

We do not advocate or provide spam techniques about how to improve your rankings in our SEO Tips pages.

We are often asked, "What is Spam" or "How do you achieve a top 20 ranking long-term?"

Our standard reply is "build your web pages so they comply with search engine guidelines and only employ best practice methods to promote your site externally".

Internet Marketing Guide

Common Internet Marketing terms and abbreviations.

Search Engine - A web site that keeps an up to date record of web sites on the Internet within its own database which can then be searched user's search query and importance placed on the site by the search engine.

Search Engine Marketing - A service offered by specialized internet marketing companies which includes increasing visitor traffic, via search engine optimisation, PPC marketing, and monitoring of ROI. Also known as Search Marketing.

SEM -is the acronym for Search Engine Marketing. SEM encompasses SEO and search engine paid advertising options (banners, PPC or CPC).

Search Engine Optimisation - Also known as web site optimisation or search engine optimization in the US, this is a generic term relating to search engine specialists that assist web site owners to improve rankings and as a result, visitor numbers which equate to more sales in a given period.

SEO -is the acronym for Search Engine Optimization.

Search Engine Placement - A generic term used to describe a search engine position or ranking of a given keyword or keyword phrase in the search engines.

Search Engine Positioning - Also a generic term, often used by folks hoping to improve their search engine position under specific keywords in the search engines.

Search Engine Promotion - This is a generic term that describes the services offered by most search engine marketing companies. Search engine promotion is the process of improving rankings, visitor numbers and utilizing search engines to promote brand awareness.

SEO Analysis - is the method of analysis used by search engine optimisation specialists to examine the internal and external components of a website in their current format from which the SEO can then provide scenarios to improve current performance, estimates on costs and projections on the likely outcomes.