Search Engine Optimization

Search Engine Optimization

It’s celebration time. After ten months of hard work, you and your team are launching your new corporate web site. Ties are getting loosen up, Champaign is served and everybody is giving high fives….except one person, the IT guy, sitting alone pensively in a corner of the room.

You walk up to him and ask him what’s wrong. His answer catches you by surprise:

“Sure, this is all nice, but did someone thought about search engine optimization? »

The room suddenly goes quiet and people look to one another: What is search engine optimization?

Search engine optimization (SEO) is the art behind creating and designing a web site that will rank in the first results of a specific search term, on the top search engines and directories. With over 80 billions of web sites out there, the advantage of ranking first in your field is undeniable.

Investing in SEO, whether through time or finance, is hands down the best return on investment your can make. If you sell tomatoes and your site comes up first every time someone searches for tomatoes, you are improving your chances of closing the deal. Will your prospect find your site first…or will he find your competitor’s?


The science behind SEO


The key to having a web site that ranks high on the top search engine is content. If you offer the quality and quantity of content people are looking for, the search engine will reward you by sending masses of qualified traffic to your doorstep.

The search engine will list your site and many others when someone searches for one of your keyword. That’s why it is important to find the relevant keywords that should represent your website. You have to ask yourself the following question: What is your target audience likely to type when searching for your product if he was ignoring your business’s existence?

After you rank the keywords depending on their difficulty (using Search guild difficulty tool), you can incorporate theses words in your page’s copy and in your HTML codes, such as in the titles, Meta keyword and description.


How to find the proper SEO expert

So who should be managing your SEO campaign? Well, if you have the time and want to save a few bucks, you can try it yourself. It would be easier and more effective to hire a professional SEO firm to run your campaign. Since there are many self-proclaimed experts on the Internet, ask to see their portfolio and results of their past clients. The last thing you want is to hire an unethical SEO firm that will get you banned from the search engines.

As a final note, remember that search engine’s goals are to rank the best, most usable and informative site first. Having a web site that people will be happy to come back is the key for a top ranking.

Search Engine Marketing