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- The 10 Do's and Don'ts of Search Engine Optimization
- What to do and what to avoid in SEO by Serge Thibodeau
Here’s something that is fast to read and does the job! The 10 do’s and don’ts of SEO. Five
techniques you should always do to push your site to the top of the search engine results pages
(SERPs) and keep it there, and five things which you should always avoid, to protect your site from
a possible penalty or risk it from being banned altogether.
List of the 5 Do’s
Do No. 1
Take all the time that it takes to do a careful research of all your keywords and key phrases for
your site, on the products or services you are trying to sell. Proper keyword research can only be
done using Wordtracker, the industry standard when it comes to professional keyword research.
Trying to optimize a site without knowing your real keywords is like driving a car at night without
headlights! Some will tell you they use Overture’s free suggestion tool. Although that tool can help
you to a limited degree, you should always use Wordtracker for the best results.
Do No. 2
Make sure you write a short descriptive title tag of what each page of your site is all about, and
make sure they are all different. Search engines use the information contained in that title tag,
compare them to the text on that page and rank it accordingly. The short description in your title
tags will also help your users. The idea here is to keep it as short and descriptive as possible. If
you are creating a new page about “durable red widgets” then call that page “durable red widgets.”
Avoid the temptation of creating title tags that are longer than 30 characters maximum, since they
might have a dilution effect in your rankings of certain search engines.
Do No. 3
Write the main text on your page using the same keywords contained in your title tag. If you are
working on a page with a title called “New houses in Baltimore” then be sure that those important
keywords are repeated at least two or three times in the main body of your text, without sounding
repetitive. A well-designed and carefully written page will “read write” and will not sound like you
are repeating yourself. Search engines will rank your page higher if they see a keyword repeated a
few times on a page, and will help them “build a theme” throughout your site.
Do No. 4
Make a complete sitemap of your site, which will help both your users and the search engines at
the same time. Having a well-designed sitemap will ensure that each page of your site gets
properly indexed by Google and the other search engines. It is important to call that file sitemap.
html and not site-map.html or other variations. Additionally, make sure that your sitemap.html file
is directly accessible from your homepage and that it uses link text. Link text is always a lot better
than a picture or graphic, since search engines won’t be able to read them.
Do No. 5
To increase your link popularity, participate in a link exchange program. Even in the aftermath of
“Update Florida,” link popularity in Google today is even more important than ever. All else being
equal, the higher your PageRank, the higher your rankings. Increasing the number of links that
point to your site will help you in the results pages. You should only link to sites that are in the
same field as your site, and stay away from bad “neighborhoods” or from so-called link farms or
“free-for-alls.”
List of the Five Don'ts
Don’t No. 1
Don’t ever use cloaking mechanisms or software that need to know the IP address of a search
engine spider or anything similar. Cloaking is based on the idea of serving a unique, optimized
page for the search engines, while serving a completely different page to your real users. Today,
most major search engines prohibit the use of such techniques and you risk your site being
penalized or banned altogether. Always play it safe and the search engines will treat you right.
Don’t No. 2
Don’t deal with so-called SEO experts that promise you No. 1 or first-page rankings in some
engines. There is no such thing as guaranteed No. 1 placement. Ask for referrals and don’t be
afraid to ask exactly what techniques your would-be SEO firm uses to achieve a good positioning
for your site. Additionally, ask them to put everything in writing, before you sign on the dotted line,
and before you give them some of your hard-earned cash.
Don’t No. 3
Submit your website once to the search engines and then wait for at least 6 weeks! Don’t use
software that automatically submits your sites on a weekly or monthly basis, since it might
penalize you in the long run. Today’s modern search engines use automated crawlers or spiders to
regularly index your site, so you don’t need to submit more than once. In the case of DMOZ (the
Open Directory Project or ODP), you should always wait 8 to 12 weeks, since DMOZ relies only on
volunteers to review and index your site. If your site still isn’t listed after 12 weeks, write them a
friendly email explaining your problem and that should do it in most cases.
Don’t No. 4
Don’t entrust your site to people that will submit it to “thousands of engines.” There isn’t that
many search engines in the first place. There are only a handful of serious search properties you
should submit too, and they are used by 99% of the people looking for information. Don’t waste
your time or your money and only work with the serious search engines everybody uses.
Don’t No. 5
Don’t develop your site using Flash technology or similar techniques that the search engines
cannot read. As far as your rankings in the search engines go, the best way to develop a site is in
using standard technology, such as HTML. Text written in the HTML format is proven technology
that all search engines have long recognized and approved, since the beginning of the Internet.
Using the right technology will always help your site attain a good position in the SERPs.
