Friday, March 21, 2008

Thinking Like A Search Engine

Search engine optimizers try to understand search engine algorithms in an aim for the much coveted top spot on the search page. Not many humans think like a search engine crawler, but here are some suggested tips that may help in natural optimization.

Each page of online content that gets created should be preceded by:
"What is the objective of this page?"


The creative process then continues with the interactive marketing mantra:

Keywords. Calls to Action. Conversion.
What are the most important keywords a searcher will use to find this page as an answer to their need? Secondly, what action would I like to encourage? And lastly, for this page to be successful, what is the converted response from the user?

The next step in content planning for optimized web pages will follow crawler logic:
  • If the same word appears in the title, meta description, meta tags alt-tags and between 5 – 10% of the body content, then this is probably what this site is about.

  • If this information appears in the headers of pages and paragraphs, it is probably an indication of important content.

  • If this same word or phrase occupies more than 11% of the content, the web site is perhaps using suspect means to trick the search engine into higher page ranking and therefore the site should be “demoted”.

  • If the content contains synonyms that relate to the most frequently used keyword or phrase, this page most likely deserves a higher ranking.

  • The most frequently used words or phrases on the front page of the web site are probably the strongest indicator what this site is about.

  • If other highly ranked sites link to this site, it is likely a site that also deserves a higher ranking.

  • If some of the content changes regularly, it is probably a more important site.

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