For my debut post I would like to present a brief summary of search engine optimization industry practices and standards. These are the things we focus on specifically when creating an agent website from scratch. If you enjoy this information please keep an eye out for later posts as we tackle each individual topic in-depth. If there is something you want to know more about specifically, send me a email request or post a comment with your question. I will do my best to answer. 

Search Engine Optimization (SEO):

Flash Intro~

            This is a no-no in the realm of SEO. Let’s face it… flash looks pretty, it is engaging, and it shows professionalism. That can’t be ignored. But because Google/Yahoo/MSN cannot read the code of a Flash movie there is effectively no content on that page, which is the index page. The index page is the first page that Google will “crawl” looking for content. There are also no links on that page to the main content areas of your site. If you MUST go with a flash intro then you should have a bottom navigation bar that has links to other content rich areas of your website.

            You can see that we have integrated flash movies on some of our sites. We do this in a way that preserves content and still maintains a high degree of search engine accessibility.

 http://www.ausitnmusicrealty.com http://www.tridentrealtygroup.com

Flash Navigation Bars~

          As mentioned before, Google and other search engines can’t read flash code. What this means is that Google can’t follow those links to see the other pages of your site. Google can only read HTML/CSS coding, so wherever flash is used it would appear like a big blank to Google. Alternatively, some of your customers will not have flash enabled on their machines. This results in them not being able to navigate your website. These reasons are why we recommend keeping all navigation links coded purely in HTML/CSS.

Meta Keywords, Description, and Title~

            These meta fields are a great place to stash keywords that you are focusing on. They should be UNIQUE on a page by page basis. Additionally they should also relate to each other. For instance, the keywords should be part of the description and the title.

Content~

            Your content needs to be abundant and unique. We help you write content for your site and at the very least help to enrich it with keywords. This is the meat of your site. It is the reason why people are there. There should be a great deal of effort in generating a lot of content for your site, and this should generally happen before the site ever goes live.

Sitemap~

            We create a sitemap page that does not only have links to all the pages on your site, but also is enriched with keywords that can give you a boost with search engines. Not to mention will help you with internal link building.

Link Building~

            This is the number one way to help raise your Google ranking. You need to build relationships with outside partners that will link to you using keywords that your provide. For example, if I wanted to rank higher in “Bryan College Station Web Design” I would ask my link partner to link to me like so: “Other Side Marketing: a Bryan College Station Web Design Company”

            However, even if you don’t have specific links that target keywords coming in… the sheer amount of links going to your site from “related and professional” sites will increase your rank in Google.

            There are professional link building services that can help on this aspect of campaigning. However, it should be noted that these services can sometimes be considered “black hat” SEO and are frowned upon by Google. Here is a link to one that is well used. http://www.linkbuilderspro.com/.

Social Networking~

            Create profiles on social networking sites like Facebook, MySpace, ActiveRain, LinkedIn, etc… And link back to your main website. This will help you build link popularity and help you advertise for your website to various groups.

Blogging~

            Welcome to the modern age. Blogging is the latest trend in SEO practices. It provides an excellent way to actively update your content to keep it fresh and interesting. Your blog posts should be full of keywords that you are targeting and relevant information to you customers.

Pay-Per-Click Campaigns~

           Basically a PPC campaign is a great way to jump start traffic on your site. You are guaranteed page one and do not get charged until someone clicks on the link to your site. You start out by setting your PPC budget and seeing what kind of competition there is in the area. You then target keywords with your PPC campaign and donate the budget to those keywords. Generally speaking it costs 87 cents to $1.50 per click. So if you have a $300 budget, you will at least get 200 people accessing your site from that ad campaign.