Search engine optimization (SEO) is very complex subject. It’s about getting your site more traffic through search engines. This is also called “free traffic” or “organic traffic”.
Organic vs. Paid search results
(Click to enlarge)
This picture shows the main organic listings below the ads. The top couple of results and the results in the sidebar are paid listings via Google Adsense. (It’s nice to be listed in the paid ads as well as organic – you’re sort of getting in people’s faces in two different ways, which is really nice. But more on that later.)
There have been a series of trendy tricks done in order to game the search engines but Google and Bing keep getting better at making sure these tactics don’t work. They continually improve their algorithms to reward the “good” sites.
Just what are the “good” sites, you ask, and what is is about them that allows them to rank well?
Well that’s the main question that we aim to answer, although it might take a while to get there! (And a series of blog posts as well….)
Basically though it boils down to this:
- Keyword Research
- On-site optimization (the way your site is built)
- Great content (content marketing)
- Link Building
- Analytics
We’ll go into each of these in more detail, but for now let’s leave it at this:
- You research some great keywords to target, building a list of them as you go.
- You update your site (or better, create your site with the keywords in mind) with those keywords sprinkled throughout.
- You create awesome content related to those keywords
- This allows you to do excellent link building
- Lastly you look at the results of your SEO campaign and adjust based on them
That is the gist of SEO, or at least a solid overview from the 10,000 foot view. We’ll get deeper in future posts!
