Web Design and SEO Blog
SEO Tip: Creating Quality Links
Sun, Jun 19, 2011Google considers the number of links to your website as well as the quality of the links as part of the ranking process.
Having a link to your website placed on a page with hundreds of other links to unrelated websites is unlikely to help your search engine rankings. However, having a link to your website in an appropriate category of a well-respected human edited web content directory can help your rankings with search engines. Likewise, having your website publicized in a reputable business directory, along with a valid local phone number and address, can also benefit your search engine rankings.
SEO Tip: Avoid Splash Pages
Fri, Apr 22, 2011Even in 2011 some new website owners are still insisting on having a splash page for their website.
Splash pages are the large graphics or animations that "greet" you when you visit a website. They had their day, several years ago, but for the most part splash pages should be avoided. Why? The two main reasons for avoiding splash pages are they annoy human visitors and they can prevent search engines from indexing your website.
A splash page might be interesting to someone the first time they visit a website but even if that happens to be the case it won't be true on repeat visits. Think how you would react if you ran to the grocery store to purchase some milk and someone jumped out in front of you when you tried to enter the store and proceeded to present a 1 to 2 minute presentation on the store. Or worse yet, held up a large poster of the store's logo and twirled it around in front of you. You probably wouldn't be thrilled. What would happen if you got home and realized you forgot to buy some bread (probably because you were so agitated at the presentation)? You return to the store and it happens all over again - same presentation - same delay. How would you feel about the store and would you return again?
SEO Tip: Search Engine Friendly Page Names
Wed, Mar 23, 2011Have you ever been on a web page and noticed question marks or ampersands in the page name? Maybe something like "mysite.com/index.html?p=4" or worse "mysite.com/index.html?p=4&w;=0001&h=1010". These are examples of pages name that are NOT search engine friendly.
Page names are an important part of SEO and should contain keywords related to the page.
SEO Tip: Effective Use of the ALT Attribute
Sun, Feb 27, 2011Images on your web page can help your SEO if you use the ALT Attribute correctly.
The ALT attribute is used to supply text to describe an image on a web page. This is helpful for visually impaired people using screen readers and it can also be helpful to search engines.
When you view the source of a web page that contains an image, you will see code that looks something like <img src="pic.jpg" alt="abc" /> The "img" and " src" must always be included but sometimes the "alt" gets left off, has a blank value, or has text that isn't really helpful for screen readers or search engines.
SEO Tip: Effective Use of Header Tags
Fri, Feb 11, 2011Header tags or heading elements are important to both the people viewing a web page and the search engines indexing the web page. The tags are intended for describing the structure and organization of a web page.
Header tags range from <h1> to <h6> with <h1> being the most important and <h6> being the least important. Only one <h1> tag should be used per page but the other header tags can be used multiple times.
SEO Tip: Updating Websites with Keywords
Wed, Feb 2, 2011To add keywords to your website you need to know how your website is updated.
Static HTML websites can be updated with simple text editors, such as Notepad or Textpad, or with a WYSIWYG editor such as Dreamweaver. Dynamic websites can usually be updated using the Content Management System in which they were built such Joomla!, Drupal, WordPress, or DotNetNuke. If you are not familiar with how to update your website you might want to consider using a professional webmaster to perform the updates for you.
One of the most important places to add keywords is the Page Title. The Page Title is controlled using the HTML <title> tag and is usually displayed in the upper left corner of your browser. Within the page code, the Page Title appears near the top of code. It starts with the <title> and ends with </title>.
SEO Tip: Identifying Keywords
Tue, Jan 11, 2011It used to be that when you wanted your web pages indexed for certain words you would add them to the Keyword Meta Tag within your web pages. Example: meta name="keywords" content="blue cheese, green eggs". Unfortunately the tag became an easy way to mislead search engines.
As search engines became more sophisticated they started placing less value on the Keyword Meta Tag. Today's major search engines, such as Google, either no longer use the Keyword Meta Tag or, in the case of Yahoo, place less value on the tag.
Search engines identify Keywords used throughout the text of pages, in the page title, in the alt tags of images, in links pointing to the web page, in header tags, and in other ways, both on-page and off-page.
SEO Tip: See How Google Sees Your Website
Tue, Jan 4, 2011You don't have to wonder how or if Google sees your website. Google provides a free service for this - appropriately called Webmaster Tools.
Google Webmaster Tools allows website owners to:
SEO Tip: Validate Your Website Code
Wed, Dec 29, 2010If you have a website that's been live for more than a few months but is nowhere to be found in the search engine results pages (SERPs), there might be code errors that are keeping the search engines from indexing your site.
Even if you know nothing about HTML you can validate your website code - for free. The W3C has a great validation service that will check your website pages and report any warnings or errors.