Page positioning is an art and a job all-its' own. It is a tedious and
boring, yet equally justifiable. Page positioning is a necessity for any web
site that needs to be noticed. And vital for search engine ranking.
Search Engines
Ranking high / scoring high / getting a good placement, all mean the same
thing. All search engines judge the pages submitted to them based on their
own criteria. Even with all of the variation, many principles seem to hold
true. Most search engines use software to quickly scan the pages it receives.
With the information gathered it tries to categorize your site according to
the search engines data bank. When a person searches for specific words, the
system "pulls-up" from its' data bank the most relevant sites that
corresponds to these words. It does this by matching the same words used in
the search to the words on a page. The sites that contain these words with
most frequency, and in the correct places, are favored over other pages.
But What is the "right frequency" & "correct places"
By frequency we do not intend for you to go and make your site read every
other word the same. What we meant in the previous paragraph, was that you
should include the words you think most frequently will be used to search out
your page, AND that of your competitors. Use these words as "Key Words" to
insert into the image text, body, Meta Tags, Title and various places of your
web-site.
"Key Words"
Key words may well be the most important factor behind any determined web
site. They get the attention of the viewer, keep them reading, help place
your site in search engine searches, and bring you the added traffic you
desire. It is important that you choose your Key Words with care. They are
not to be treated lightly. It is better that you not use them at all, than to
underestimate them.
Key words can be chosen in many ways. However I strongly recommend using
the method that follows.
1) First, take some time to carefully compile a list a words you feel
strongly represent your business / web site. They should reflect what you
believe are words most likely searched by your current / future clients,
prospective clients, the general public, and even skeptics or bashers of your
trade. Include all of the words and phrases you think these same people would
use to seek out your competitors, and likely employed tradesmen or trades
women. 2) Narrow this list down to approximately 20 entries of 2 - 3 word
phrases that use as many of the words you chose as possible. For instance a
cookie baker with a list containing words such as chocolate chip, raisin
oatmeal, batter, dough, experts, cookie, gourmet, dozens, etc., etc., can
maximize the potency of his "Key Words" by using them together to make catchy
and reusable phrases. Like "Gourmet cookie dough" or "Cookies buy the dozen."
If kept even shorter between 2-3 words you can use them all the time when
submitting your page manually to the engines. They will usually ask for
additional descriptive words, or key words. 3) Check them "Key Words" out
with a key word generator that counts search frequency / popularity of "Key
Words." They can help you determine just how often people actually search
these words. Keep only the most popular or highly searched words. 4) Search
the "Key Words" yourself. There is no point in trying to tweak your page out
to one word only to find that soooooo many other people have too there is no
way for you to compete with 1 billion other sites generated in that search.
Look for the miracle phrase. The break in the clouds. The one no body has
thought of... but everyone is searching. How? Well, every time you search
and it is truly a good and popular key word, or phrase, but the results
returned contained mostly unrelated sites... this is the perfect "key Word"
choice. Use this and any like it to place into your Title, Header, Meta Tags
and the like. They should however be tailored to each individual pages needs.
Meta Tags, Header etc.
Meta Tags, the Header, Title, Key Word, Descriptive Tags and such can be
found at the top of a page, when viewed in Raw or Naked HTML code. This chunk
of input is invisible on the viewers side, and is only viewable in pure HTML
source. This is the reason for the magic behind it. Search engines are
capable of reading this information, and do. This top section of a page
largely determines how a page will be placed in a search.
To find where to place you Key Words, open up your page in an HTML editor.
Open the page as HTML only. It should have no pictures and many colored text.
At the top you will see input that says <"META NAME"> , <"HEADER"> ,
<"TITLE"> or something like this. If you can see that, then you've found
them! In the space that follows you will see another site of words which may
resemble this <"DESCRIPTIVE WORDS"> or <"DESCRIPTION">. this is where you
substitute the input with your key words.
The words you use for this section should be formulated using the Key Word
you chose earlier. Key words should also be placed in the "Key Word" Tag of
your page. Key Words should be used in the Header, Title etc. Use the Key
Words in the body text of your page to begin paragraphs whenever possible. Do
not flood your page, however. Search engines prefer about 7 repetitions of
Key Words, in the body, on the average.
Specialize each page in your web.
Different pages in your domain cover different topics. Use that to its'
fullest potential. If you carefully choose descriptive Key Words, that are
highly searched, for individual pages, you can turn each page into its own
high ranking, viewer magnet. Capture the essence of each separate page.
For example: Say the individual page is for a product, use the name, uses /
its' trendiness to describe your product in the Key word, Meta Tag, Title,
etc., of your page, with words specific to this particular page. The results?
When people search virtually any aspect of your domain, they will find you.
They will also be able to find you through more searches. And this means more
chances of getting hits. This is especially good for large domains. But even
the smallest site can get extra needed attention by making their pages search
engine ready.
A good source for key words can be your highest ranking competitor. To see
their key words, simply goto the page (of theirs) that you want to know the
keywords to. Go to the top of your browser where you will find a button
called View. Click View, from the drop-down menu choose View Source, Or
Source Code, or something to this effect. The page displayed will be in Raw
HTML. Look towards the top where you will see name like Meta Tag, or Meta
Name, etc. And there they are. For you to see.
Links
Make sure all of your pages are somehow linked to one another. This is
vital for search engines to encompass the entire domain. Any unlinked pages
will not be indexed (as good as never making it know to the engine). You can
even add invisible GIFs with all the links, or written small in the color of
you background, what ever. Just put it there.
Submitting
Now you can submit your pages. I would go here to do it. But if not, try to
find a free service / low cost service that either manually submits each
page, or has a method which make pages appear manually submitted. Search
engines prefer manual submissions.
To keep your page scoring well with the engines, submit often once or twice
a month should be enough. Over submitting can cause your page to be dropped
or penalized for Spamming.
About the Author
Janette Moran of "http://www.eichost.com"