It is everybody’s desire to run a website with regular traffic for which they do not have to pay anything and that indeed forms the basic premise of SEO or Search Engine Optimisation. The idea is to ensure listing of the website in the top ten results of any of the principal search engines and while there are many things that go into the making of a good SEO campaign, given below are certain simple things that you can do which are not costly and yet will go a long way to make your website popular.
1. The design of the Website
People overlook the fact that search engines rank sites based on the overall presentation of the website and in this regard, making use of text rather than only images and graphics will help a lot. Moreover, if you can consider restricting the usage of JavaScript and Flash and provide smoother navigation to the categories, your website is sure to get the right exposure.
2. Accent on Keywords
It is important to ensure that every web page has its own distinct keywords and for this, you need to use the right ones through constant research. They will be the ones that search engines crawl quickly and push your site up in rankings. This is a continuous process.
3. Importance of a good title to the web page
Besides the appropriate keyword in each of the web pages, the title also plays an important role in telling the search engines what to expect from a particular web page and it is thus imperative to choose appropriate titles as well. Make sure you do not mix your business name as it will not serve the purpose of presenting your website in the right manner.
4. Use Meta Description Tags to lure customers
Though the Meta keywords tags are now being seldom used by major search engines to crawl web pages, the description tags appearing as text just beneath the link leading to your site play a very important role in enticing potential customers to click that link and get directed to your site. Use of appropriate keywords in the description is highly recommended. You may also offer certain freebies to entice customers.
5. Use of Keywords in the heading
The heading of the web page can be another interesting and attractive option to inform customers about the content of the article. Having the right keywords within the heading will make the search engines pick up your site quickly and throw it up before the visitor. Care must be taken to see that the headings are legible and you create distinctions within them like putting them in descending order of importance.
6. Use of Keywords within the Content
Just like the headings, the content must have its share of key words such that they fit the web page logically and seamlessly. Pay attention to keyword density making sure that they do not appear contrived. You can make use of Google’s free key word package to find out similar words matching your key word and use them in your content.
7. Connecting your web pages
This refers to not only search engine connections but also the manner in which your site pages are connected to each other and when you do decide to add pages, whether they have the relevant key words in the anchor text. The visitor on clicking the link must get directed to your site without a problem.
8. Use of Images
Though images enhance the visual appeal of a website, you must ensure that while using them you provide a description tag along with a caption which tells more about the image in question. Resist the temptation of incorporating key words at this place as they will appear out of place.