You know the old riddle about whether or not a tree falling in a forest makes a sound if no one’s around to hear it? Well, much the same can be said about websites. Even if you build the most state-of-the-art website around, ultimately it won’t do any good if your customers can’t find it. Luckily, there are several free and effective tools out there that make increasing your website’s visibility a relatively simple process.
What is SEO, anyway?
More than likely, even if you’re completely new to the wonderful world of websites, you’ve heard the term SEO. SEO stands for “search engine optimization” and is a more technical way of referring to how easily the big search engines like Google, Yahoo, and MSN pick up your site.
Search engine optimization is primarily based on how smoothly and prominently the appropriate keywords for your product are placed within your website text and tags. Basically, you want to make sure that when a potential customer Googles property management companies or apartment rentals in your area, your site is as far to the top of Google’s search results as possible.
Keywords are the key to your success.
Helpful (and, even better, free!) tools can help you figure out exactly what those keywords are. Google’s Keyword Tool is a great, easy-to-use resource that will help you easily identify the best words and phrases for drawing traffic to your site. Just enter in a relevant term (for example, “rental listing”) and Google’s program will provide you with a list of related words, showing you how frequently they’re searched both on average and within the past month.
You can also do a Google Keyword search by website. Just type in the name of your website (or a successful competitor’s site) and Google will suggest keywords based on site content. Again, each listing will also include search stats. In addition to Google’s Keyword Tool, you can also try Wordtracker’s keyword program, which provides results for a database of 330 million terms.
Incorporating SEO content on your site.
Now that you have your keywords, it’s time to incorporate them into your site copy. For best results, Million Dollar Website author Lori Culwell recommends including at least one of your top ten most frequently searched keywords in every title, headline, and paragraph of your website. This means you will not only want to keep a list of the keywords you found on Google and Wordtracker close by at all times, but also that you should run these searches every month or so to make sure your website remains up-to-date with web surfers’ searching habits.
A final word of warning on keyword integration: Search engines are trained to pick up on “keyword stuffing,” so haphazardly cramming as many keywords onto your site as possible just won’t cut it. You want to be sure you actually weave keywords into your web content in as natural a manner as possible. If you’re really ambitious, you can up your SEO content by including these keywords not only in your copy, but also in your page title descriptions, links, and tags. To test your site’s keyword density (basically how keyword-friendly it is), run a free site scan at KeyWordDensity.com or Webjectives.com.
Paying for clicks (PPC advertising).
If you want to invest a little bit of money in advertising you site, you may also want to consider signing up for a pay-per-click (PPC program). Essentially PPC advertising means that you pay a designated amount every time a visitor enters your website by clicking on an ad on another site.
The most prominent PPC advertising providers are Google AdWords and Yahoo Search Marketing. A PPC program will either provide an ad link to your company’s site at the top of their search results page (under a heading like “sponsored links” or “sponsored ads”) or place an ad and link for your site on network websites or blogs that contain designated keywords.
It’s critical to note that you determine the keywords that will lead users to your site … yet another reason to be thorough and up-to-date with your keyword research.
Getting on the search engines.
It won’t surprise most to hear that a Google presence can be the difference between your website’s success or failure. Websites do not automatically appear in Google searches—be sure to register your site with Google by clicking here. You should also know that just registering your site doesn’t guarantee it will appear in Google’s search results; they have the right to accept or decline it. With that in mind, as important as Google registration is, you should not submit your site for review until you have done some keyword SEO work on it.
For maximum visibility, you’ll also want to register your site with Yahoo and MSN. If you want the large network of smaller search engines out there to pick up your site, you’ll need to register with them as well. Because this can be an extremely time-consuming process, you may want to consider paying a small fee to GoDaddy.com’s Traffic Blazer program, which will save you time by taking care of these registrations for you.
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