Search Engine Optimization (SEO) for Today’s Online World
In today’s ever-evolving business landscape, your potential customers most often begin their searches online. Understanding this, like any successful modern business, you want to attract attention and visits to your website; the question is, how?
Because search engines look for certain features when ranking pages, earning your company or organization a top ranking among relevant searches means looking to Search Engine Optimization, or SEO. While some try to target keywords they feel will register with various search engines, it’s a mistake. In fact, clogging your index and body with unnecessary keywords simply to manipulate internet search rankings can actually have the exact opposite effect. Yes, integrating keywords into the content is important, but ensuring you use them in their natural context, without going overboard, is the first step in getting the results you want.
Google, Yahoo, Bing and similar search engines have the sophistication to understand the scope and quality of a site’s content and can index elements that support page topics, such as images, video and rich media.
However, that’s not the whole story.
To determine a site’s relevance, search engines also measure the quantity and quality of back-links pointing to your domain. These hyperlinks from other sites can be manually created through link and directory submissions, or can grow naturally through social media sharing and industry-related discussion platforms. The essential component for growth, then, is interesting content: the more interesting your content, the more likely it is people will share it, naturally creating these back-links to your website.
