SEO guidelines as of 11/2013

part two

Try to get your keyword phrase inside incoming links (HIGH PRIORITY)

Inbound links are a great way to improve your page rank. But you can’t really control how people link to your pages. Chances are they won’t use a phrase that has anything even remotely close to your keyword phrase. Remember that they are doing you a favor by linking to you. If it makes sense, you can ask them to change the text of the link, but be careful, as people can be very touchy, and you might just get your link removed.

Another way to get your keyword phrase in inbound links is to provide your customers with the link text ready-made. For example:

Please link to this page: <a href=”http://webdesign.about.com/od/seo/tp/seo_tips_and_tricks.htm”>SEO Tips and Tricks</a>

Try to get links from reputable sites (HIGH PRIORITY)

Reputable sites that link to you will increase your reputation. After all, if a reputable site feels that your site is valuable enough to link to, that means that your page has more value. You can tell if a site is considered reputable both by how high it appears in search engines and it’s Google PageRank. Also, .edu sites have a higher reputation because they represent schools and universities.

Try to get links from similar sites (HIGH PRIORITY)

Inbound links from sites similar to your own are important as well. This indicates that your site does have content related to that topic. Plus, it indicates that your competition finds your site valuable, and that gives your site more credibility.

Try to get links from .edu, and .gov sites (HIGH PRIORITY)

Sites that are on .edu and .gov top-level domains have a large amount of credibility because they are very difficult to get. So if you can get the designers of those sites to link to you, that gives your site more credibility as well.

 Create as much content as you can (MEDIUM PRIORITY)

Content is king. The more content you have on your site, the more there is to be indexed and appear in search engines.

Keep your site content inside one theme (MEDIUM PRIORITY)

The theme or topic of your entire site is important as well. If you have a lot of pages all around one basic theme, that will lend more credibility to each page that follows that same theme.

Keep your site live as long as possible (MEDIUM PRIORITY)

Older pages (at the same domain) will rank higher than newer ones.

Create a sitemap (MEDIUM PRIORITY)

Search engines love sitemaps – not necessarily for ranking, but for finding links on your site. It’s not critical that you create an XML sitemap or Google sitemap, plain HTML sitemaps work just as well.

Put your keyword phrase in the first paragraph (MEDIUM PRIORITY)

Repetition of your keyword phrase is important in your content. But it’s especially important in the first one or two paragraphs of text. And if you can repeat it once in the first paragraph that will help up it’s priority.

Increase the font size of your keyword phrase (MEDIUM PRIORITY)

Search engines understand that fonts that are larger than the standard font size on the page indicate text that is more important. Use CSS or the font tag. Apply font size changes toheadline tags as well.

Use 302 redirects only for long or ugly URLs (MEDIUM PRIORITY)

HTTP 302 redirects are for temporary redirects. The only time you should use them is for redirecting ugly URLs to more user-friendly ones. This tells the search engine that the ugly URL should not be removed from the index, because the user-friendly URL is just to make the URL palatable. Keep in mind that many spammers use 302 redirects to fool search engines. So be judicious in your use of them.

Get as many inbound links as you can (MEDIUM PRIORITY)

Links are important, especially from sites other than your own. These are called inbound links. And if you get a lot of inbound links, that will help your page ranking. Remember that 1-2 links from high-reputation sites are better than 10 links from link farms.

Put your keyword phrase in the first paragraph (MEDIUM PRIORITY)

Repetition of your keyword phrase is important in your content. But it’s especially important in the first one or two paragraphs of text. And if you can repeat it once in the first paragraph that will help up it’s priorit

Put your keyword phrase in alternative text (MEDIUM PRIORITY)

Images are a great place to put your keyword phrase – in the alternate text. This is a way to add your keyword phrase into your document without being repetitive to your readers. But be careful not to overdo it – as you don’t want to appear to be keyword stuffing. That could get your site banned.

 

Format your keyword phrases to stand out (MEDIUM PRIORITY)

Use <strong> and <em> where appropriate to make your keyword phrases stand out. Search engines can read those tags, and will recognize that text that is emphasized is often more important than the surrounding text.

Write a descriptive meta description (MEDIUM PRIORITY)

Search engines use the description meta tag as the description in their index. So it’s important to describe your pages accurately. This helps customers find your pages, and search engines to index them.

Link to your page from within your site (MEDIUM PRIORITY)

Links are important, and linking from one page to another on your own site is a very easy way to get links. They aren’t as important in search engine ranking as links from external sites, but they do help. If nothing else, they help the search engine spider find all the pages on your site.

Put up links that flow within the text (MEDIUM PRIORITY)

Links that make sense within the context of the document (whether from external or your own site) will rank higher than lists of links or other forms of artificial links. This is because search engines value content and links that make sense within the context of the content are more definitely related to that content than links that are inside lists.

Keep asking for inbound links (MEDIUM PRIORITY)

The older the links are the better. If you get 100 links added all at once, it appears to the search engines that you are buying link placement, and that can be construed as spamming.

Get linked in DMOZ and Yahoo! (MEDIUM PRIORITY)

DMOZ and Yahoo! and other directories show that your page is related to the contentin that section of the directory.

Periodically check your outbound links for pagerank (MEDIUM PRIORITY)

Whenever you add an external link on your site, you run the risk that it changes from the site you linked to into a link farm or “bad neighborhood”. By periodically checking the PageRank of the external sites you link to, you can remove links that have gotten bad. This will help you make sure that your page’s credibility is not reduced by who you are linking to.

Link all major images (MEDIUM PRIORITY)

It’s important to always link images because people click on images. And search engines value content that has been linked. The key is to always include alternative text, so that the search engine has text to rank. Any image that your customer can see on the page should be linked.

Keep your pages up-to-date (MEDIUM PRIORITY)

Pages that are regularly updated are given priority over pages that are older and ignored. But you should do more than simply fix typos or make small changes, regular, extensive updates are more effective than minor updates.

If you must use frames, always use the noframes tag (MEDIUM PRIORITY)

Frames and search engines don’t mix well. But if you must use frames, then you should always include an extensive noframes version of your site. And by extensive, the best way to get your site indexed in search engines is to completely rewrite it in your noframes version.

If you must use Flash, always include alternative text (MEDIUM PRIORITY)

Flash and search engines don’t mix well, but if you must use flash you should include alternate text that describes exactly what the Flash element includes. And if you use Flash for your entire site, you should always do an alternate version of the complete site in HTML so that search engines and non-Flash browsers can view it as well.