Website Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

Methodology

We're often asked to describe what we do to increase traffic for a website - specifically SEO or Web Search Engine Optimization. And, I'm not sure we've always done a good job of breaking it down. Not because we're trying to protect the process, it's just there are so many nuances (major components of search engine optimization). I'm not going to get into nuance here - this will be a high-level description of our process for Website Search Engine Optimization.

It always begins with a brainstorm! Obviously, we think about words and phrases that are directly related to the products, services or ideas offered by the website. But, we spend even more time thinking about words that are "off center". So, through brainstorming we generate a seed list. We use that list to identify other words (synonyms) and to create combinations. This often results in 400 to 700 keywords and phrases.

Next, we work to pare down that list into something manageable - somewhere around 40 to 75 keywords. This is where the research happens! We look for three things: Popularity, Market Value and Competition. Popularity is simply the number of times a particular keyword or phrase is searched on a daily basis. Market Value is an estimate for the dollar value of each person searching for a particular keyword or keyphrase. And, competition is the number of websites that have something to do with a keyword or phrase. Frequently, the most popular words are also the most competitive. However, upon examination of the competition, we sometimes find that those websites that rank high on search engines got there by accident. They weren't sophisticated, they just did a few things right! In cases like that, it may be worth the challenge to attack a highly competitive keyword. But, in general, we are looking for keywords and phrases that are popular with a reasonable amount of competition. In terms of numbers, the rule of thumb is a ratio of fewer than 500 websites for every search in a 90 day period. We also find that some words have a low market value, and aren't worth the trouble.

Once we have our keyword list, we begin focusing on the content and structure of the website to be optimized. From a content perspective, we look for quality, brevity and gaps. The keywords that we've decided upon are categorized into themes (2-3 keywords each). Each major theme should have at least one page dedicated to it. Those thematic pages should have reasonable (natural) repetition of its two or three keywords. The word count for these pages should be somewhere between 150 and 250 words. Content makes up about 30% of the formula for search optimization success. Structure is 30% of the game. External links to your content make up the remainder. And, website search engine optimization is a game, not a science. The rules are protected by the search engines and are subject to change from day to day. There are many elements that make up a Web page: navigation, images, tags, text, titles, links, etc. Our job is to make sure that we are doing everything we can with each element that will have the greatest impact to overall visibility without being viewed as abusive by Google, MSN or Yahoo. There are a whole host of techniques that can radically increase the visibility of a website for a particular keyword, but many of them can result in penalties which can prevent a website from showing up at all! That is a bad scene and can spell disaster for any entity that is relying on good search engine placement for success. These techniques are referred to as "Black Hat". There are also some borderline techniques called "Gray Hat". We recommend only "White Hat" techniques - those that fit well within the loose guidelines established by the search engines, explicitly and implicitly. The progress will be slower, but the long-term effect far greater. Web search engine optimization is not an instant gratification play!

Once we have completed the initial optimization for a website, we turn our attention to the search engines and directories. Google is a search engine - categorized by an automated computer program. Directories are categorized by people. Yahoo is a directory. We submit instructions to the search engines and directories to help them understand how the website is organized, what they should pay attention to (e.g. thematic pages) and what to ignore (e.g. privacy policy).

Remember, we are talking about "Optimization". Here are some quick definitions:

• Activity that aims at doing something as well as possible.
• The formal process by which decisions are made under conditions of uncertainty.
• The refinement process used to find the best solution to a problem.
• The process of seeking the most favorable condition or solution to a goal by balancing the trading-off results on more than one criterion.

What these definitions have in common is a recognition that this is a trial and error process that occurs over time. To that end, we assess the visibility of the selected keywords for a website on a monthly basis. We like to think of it as a "Balanced Portfolio". Some words will make bigger gains than others, and some will fall back. In each case, it's important to try an understand why we experienced success or failure for each keyword. We also find that the world is not static. There are always changes which can be additions, modifications and deletions of keywords within our target list to accommodate changes in an industry/marketplace. Every month we re-optimize the content and structure, then we resubmit our instructions to the search engines and directories.

That's it! It's not all that difficult, it's just work!

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