how to build a search engine friendly site

SEO – INTERMEDIARY

TOC

� SEO Methodology

� Analysis and Consultancy phase� Objective setting

� Selecting keywords

� Competitive benchmarking

� Website Analysis� Website Analysis

� Implementation phase� SEO friendly site-architecture

� How to write content to drive traffic

� Link Building activity� How to create a sitemap

� Submissions

� Reporting and Analysis

SEO METHODOLOGYSEO METHODOLOGY

METHODOLOGY

WebpageOptimization

Analysis & Action points

Phase II - ImplementationPhase I – Analysis and

consultancy phase

Objective Setting

Keyword suggestions

Link Building

Submission

SERPchecks

Keyword suggestions

Competitive Benchmarking

Website Analysis

Recommendation

OBJECTIVE SETTINGOBJECTIVE SETTING

SEO PROCESS

� Objective Setting� Understand the client’s

business needs

� Identifies his pain areas and how SEO can help provide solutions to itprovide solutions to it

� Identify the Search Engines & Directories for indexing

� Google, MSN and Yahoo (80% contributor to traffic) & open directory listing is mandatory

� Depending on client, geography and category special search engines and directories can be suggested

SELECTING KEYWORDSSELECTING KEYWORDS

SELECTING KEYWORDS

� Keyword Selection is the most important activity for proper optimization of the website

� The first step is to simply sit down and write down keywords. Write everything that occurs to the mind and not discard any idea

� Brainstorming sessions can also help to add to the initial list

� Consult internal search logs (the logs on the server) to track where visitors � Consult internal search logs (the logs on the server) to track where visitors came from and if possible, extract more keyword combinations.

� Consult tools which will provide suggestions and also most searched for keywords in the category

� Typo errors are a typical mistake and need to be kept in mind while selecting keywords – include spelling mistakes in list

� Refine with inputs from client and arrive at an optimal number of keywords which will be ideal for the site to be optimized

KEYWORD RESEARCH TOOL

FREE

� Overture Inventory Overture Inventory Overture Inventory Overture Inventory - currently a Yahoo! Search Marketing product -generates a list of related searches that includes the relevant term and also shows how many times the term was searched for during the last month

� Google's Keyword Tool Google's Keyword Tool Google's Keyword Tool Google's Keyword Tool - generates potential keywords for ad campaigns and reports their Google statistics, including search performance and seasonal trendsperformance and seasonal trends

� Google Suggest Google Suggest Google Suggest Google Suggest - suggestions offered by Google as we type words or phrases in it

� SEO Book Keyword Suggestion Tool SEO Book Keyword Suggestion Tool SEO Book Keyword Suggestion Tool SEO Book Keyword Suggestion Tool - shows top keyword phrases from Overture; links to other keyword research tools and links at various vertical databases, blog searches and tagging systems to show the top results from other information sources

� Digital Point Keyword Research Tool Digital Point Keyword Research Tool Digital Point Keyword Research Tool Digital Point Keyword Research Tool - shows the results of query from both Word tracker and Overture for determining which phrases are searched for most often

� Good Keywords Good Keywords Good Keywords Good Keywords - a free Windows software for finding the perfect set of keywords for your web pages

KEYWORD RESEARCH TOOL

PaidPaidPaidPaid

� Word tracker Word tracker Word tracker Word tracker - free trial also available - discover the best keywords to target for

website

� Keyword Discovery Keyword Discovery Keyword Discovery Keyword Discovery - free trial also available - find the best keywords for the website

in question

� Keyword IntelligenceKeyword IntelligenceKeyword IntelligenceKeyword Intelligence - drive high quality customers to website using the top search

terms used successfully by millions of people across all major search engines terms used successfully by millions of people across all major search engines

including Google, Yahoo! and MSN

TOOLS FOR KEYWORD SUGGESTION

COMPETITIVE BENCHMARKINGCOMPETITIVE BENCHMARKING

COMPETITIVE BENCHMARKING

� This is a very important

step for the whole process

� We analyze competition for

the following:the following:

� SERP positions

� Search engine friendliness

of website

� On various parameters such

as PR, Link popularity, in-

depth on-page optimization

elements

WEBSITE ANALYSISWEBSITE ANALYSIS

WEBSITE ANALYSIS

� Analyze the client website for various features like content, technology used, links etc

� Analyze the gap that the sites has versus an ideal Search engine optimized site� Solutions will be provided on a � Solutions will be provided on a

case-to-case basis depending on the site being dynamic, CMS driven, Flash driven etc

� Implementing of On page optimization for the website will accordingly differ based on the technology of the website

SEO FRIENDLY SITE ARCHITECTURESEO FRIENDLY SITE ARCHITECTURE

ON-PAGE OPTIMIZATION

� Title� A relevant 2 to 3 word title tag which will have the targeted

keywords

� Meta Tags� The Meta keywords tag is defunct, but the meta description

tag can be used to facilitate clicks to site as this is displayed in the SERP

� Heading and Bold TagsBold TagsBold TagsBold Tags� Showcasing important keywords in Heading (H1 to H6) tags

or bold tags adds to the relevancy of the keywordor bold tags adds to the relevancy of the keyword

� Anchor Text� Anchor text is the visible text for hyperlinks on the page,

using keywords for the hyperlink would improve the relevancy

� Alt text� Since search engines only understand HTML, all non-text

items need to have Alternate text to make it search engine friendly

� Page Size Limit� Unending long pages are not considered search engine

friendly as search engines read through the first 500 – 600 words of the page, the rest does not get indexed

ON-PAGE OPTIMIZATION

� Number of links on a page� The more the no of links to a page the better, it helps

to increase the link popularity. To make it more useful and search engine friendly it is suggested that links are created from the relevant keywords as the link text

� Site Maps� This is a very important aspect of making a site search

engine friendly. This provides the search engine access to all pages in site. It is recommended that the sitemap be made available on the home page and all inner pages to provide more navigability and accessinner pages to provide more navigability and access

� Coding Standards� Following some coding standards set by the W3C

consortium: such as including titles and relevant tags for all pages. Besides to make the sites search engine friendly keeping non-HTML codes at minimal by calling JavaScript and Style sheets from .js and .css files respectively are some coding standards

� SEO Header and Footer� Search Engine friendly tags inserted in the header and

footer section of the e-com sites. - Optimization that targets the meta tags and bottom navigation of a website for keywords or phrases.

OFF-PAGE OPTIMIZATION

� To increase the link popularity / make the site popular we need to carry out one/many of the following off-page functions� Directory Submission

� Submitting to Directories, which are human edited and hence increase relevance of the links from them to the website questions

� Forum and Blogs� Writing about the site and its features / products � Writing about the site and its features / products

and services on discussion forums and blogs also improves links to the site

� Signatures� Another standard practice is to include the website

URL in the mail, blog comment or any signature

� Press Releases� Press releases both online should include the URL

of the website which will help improve the link popularity of the site

� Link Building� Specific link building activities such as link

exchanges with pages that have higher PR and affiliate programs carried out with prominent sites

OFF-PAGE OPTIMIZATION

� Some other activities that can be carried out are:

� Blog Reviews and Promotion

� Participate in blog reviews and promotions which

will include links to the website

� Social Bookmarking

� Provide for links on social bookmarking sites,

enabling site for such bookmarking helps increase

no of tags to siteno of tags to site

� Article Submission

� Submissions of articles to relevant categories of

directories and special interest directories

� Viral Marketing

� A viral marketing campaign consists of a message

which needs to be sent out to multiple people, the

message will carry links to the website in question

� RSS Feeds

� RSS is a family of Web feed formats used to publish

frequently updated content such as blog entries,

news headlines, and podcasts in a standardized

format

HOW TO WRITE CONTENTHOW TO WRITE CONTENT

SEO CONTENT

� Writing SEO contents - writing reliable data and using a classic structure of

text are the key.

� When you write SEO content, no matter what topic it contains, try to avoid

using false ideas and search for reliable sources. using false ideas and search for reliable sources.

� Use a classic structure, don't write a cumbersome text instead start with an

introduction, continue with deep structure (the main content) and finish with

summary of the article. Appropriate heading and paragraphing will further

add to the structure of the page

CONTENT

RELEVANT CONTENT

Search for SAP consultant, first result page

LINK BUILDING ACTIVITYLINK BUILDING ACTIVITY

LINK POPULARITY

� Link popularity is a measure of the quantity and quality of other web sites that link to a specific

site on the World Wide Web. It is an example of the move by search engines towards off-the-

page-criteria to determine quality content. In theory, off-the-page-criteria adds the aspect of

impartiality to search engine rankings. Link popularity plays an important role in the visibility of

a web site in the top positions of the search results. Some search engines require a minimum

number of links to a website to include it in their else they are dropped

Search engines such as Google use a special link analysis system to rank web pages such as: � Search engines such as Google use a special link analysis system to rank web pages such as:

� Citations from other WWW authors help to define a site's reputation.

� Important sites that attract many links due to richer content than content-poor sites

� Quality of link - an inbound link from a major directory carries more weight than an inbound link from an

obscure personal home page

IMPORTANCE OF LINK POPULARITY

� Because good link popularity can dramatically increase traffic to a web site

� Well placed links are an excellent source of consistent and targeted traffic

� As per latest developments, they can influence additional search engine traffic

to site

� Most of the major search engines now factor Link Popularity into their

relevancy algorithmsrelevancy algorithms

� As a result, increasing the number of quality, relevant sites which link to

your site can actually improve your search engine rankings

� There is still no one "secret trick" to getting good rankings, but boosting your

site's popularity may give it the edge it needs

LINK POPULARITY TOOLS

There are few tools (free) available to measure the links of the website.

Marketleap Visibility IndexMarketleap Visibility IndexMarketleap Visibility IndexMarketleap Visibility Index

� http://www.marketleap.com/publinkpop/

� Enter URL, along with up to three comparison URLs, will display at a glance how the site

measures up in terms of sheer numbers of links to some major sites on the web. Free, easy to

understand and use. It also displays report on the link count listings from the major search

engines that are queried.engines that are queried.

LinkPopularityLinkPopularityLinkPopularityLinkPopularity

� http://www.linkpopularity.com/

� Free and simple service that helps generate link lists from three major search engines. Results

can also be emailed each month.

Compute Your Own Web Traffic RankCompute Your Own Web Traffic RankCompute Your Own Web Traffic RankCompute Your Own Web Traffic Rank

� http://www.useit.com/alertbox/relativeranking.html

� This isn't really about measuring link popularity, but it is an interesting method of determining

the overall popularity of your site.

LINK BUILDING ACTIVITY

Link exchange � The process of exchange textual links between sites to improve the link popularity is

called link exchange. Activities for a Link building program are as follows:

� IdentifyIdentifyIdentifyIdentify – When the potential websites which can be approached for reciprocal links are identified

� InteractInteractInteractInteract ¬– Once the potential websites have been identified, they have to be contacted by mailers requesting for one-way or two-way links to the site. They have contacted by mailers requesting for one-way or two-way links to the site. They have be followed up with mailers or calls till approvals are received

� Implement Implement Implement Implement – Incases where two-way links are agreed upon site changes to accommodate the links have to be carried out, which is ideally done in phases. Simultaneously there is a need to monitor the implementation of links on the respective websites that have agreed for the link program

� MonitorMonitorMonitorMonitor – On a regular basis the progress on total number of inward links added to the website and see that the links all function rightly. Obsolete or change of link positions will be monitored and rectified (if necessary)

SITEMAP

� A site map is a separate HTML page that acts as a directory of the pages on

the website.

� Each page listed in the site map is hyperlinked.

� Use keywords in the link anchor text� Use keywords in the link anchor text

� Since search engines seem to place more weight on text contained in a

bulleted or numbered list, put the links in lists.

� Site map is not only good for getting search engine spiders to follow the

page links and easily crawl the entire site, it's a useful tool for the visitors

because it helps them find the content page they are looking for

TYPES OF SITEMAPS

� Yahoo sitemaps� Simple text file sitemaps. Yahoo now also accepts RSS and ROR

sitemaps, but the original format was a text-only file using one URL per line. The typical naming for this file, as suggested by Yahoo, is urllist.txt which pretty much describes what it is and what it does for them.

� Google sitemaps � Built as an XML file using special tags that describe your web content to � Built as an XML file using special tags that describe your web content to

Google. Webmasters can use this service to tell Google which pages are updated regularly and which pages are most important to the webmaster. Google can then use this information to decide which URLs get visited if they aren't going to be able to visit all of them that day.

� OPML site maps � Can be read in an OPML reader called an outliner. They are also

supported by some blog software as the blogroll.

TYPES OF SITEMAPS

� HTML site maps � The most reliable format and are spider-ed by every search engines'

crawler. They will also be the most likely for a human to use when they visit your site. One common pitfall of the HTML sitemap is to list all links on a single page no matter how long

� ROR sitemaps � They combine the detail of Google site maps and the simplicity of RSS � They combine the detail of Google site maps and the simplicity of RSS

sitemaps. It is based on RSS and XML, but goes beyond the typical RSS or XML feed. The ROR format allows you to describe items such as your web pages in greater detail to more search engines than ever before.

� RSS sitemaps � These are handled by Google and Yahoo among many others. Their

website submission forms both tell you that an RSS file is acceptable, but did you know that RSS goes beyond the search engines?. Most RSS readers will report your newest pages at the top if the RSS feed is built correctly

REPRESENTATION OF SITEMAPS

� Outline - A list of your sites pages in classic outline format. Each page is

listed along with the "deeper" pages that are linked off that page. This is the

default type of Site Map.

� Table - A series of tables of your sites primary pages and the "deeper" links

off them. Each table starts with the title of the primary page, then has a bar,

then has a list of pages linked off the primary page. Only pages with sub then has a list of pages linked off the primary page. Only pages with sub

links have tables generated for them.

� List - A simple list of the pages in your site, arranged in depth order. Bars

visually separate pages of different depth.

BAD EXAMPLE OF SITEMAP

GOOD EXAMPLE OF SITEMAP

SUBMISSIONSSUBMISSIONS

SUBMISSIONS

� Manual submission of website to identified list

of search engines / directories

� Submission of home page

� Submission of sitemap page� Submission of sitemap page

� Submission of tailor made sitemap pages for some

major search engines such as:

�Sitemap in XML format for Google

�Sitemap in ROR or RSS format for Yahoo

REPORTING AND ANALYSISREPORTING AND ANALYSIS

SERP REPORT FORMAT

Search Search Search Search

Engine 1Engine 1Engine 1Engine 1









Keyword1 XX XX XX XX XX



Keyword4 XX XX XX XX XXKeyword4 XX XX XX XX XX







XX – denotes positions within top 50

TRAFFIC REPORT SAMPLE

Page ViewPage ViewPage ViewPage View

(month 1)(month 1)(month 1)(month 1)

Page ViewPage ViewPage ViewPage View

(month 2)(month 2)(month 2)(month 2)

% change% change% change% change

Google

Keyword 1 PV1 PV2 %

Keyword 2 PV3 PV4 %

Keyword 3 PV5 PV6 %

Keyword 4 PV7 PV8 %Keyword 4 PV7 PV8 %

Keyword 5 PV9 PV10 %

Yahoo

Keyword 1 PV1 PV2 %

Keyword 2 PV3 PV4 %

Keyword 3 PV5 PV6 %

Keyword 4 PV7 PV8 %

Keyword 5 PV9 PV10 %

Pv1 to PV10 – denotes Pageviews / month

for each of the keywords

MEASURABILITY

SEO campaigns can be measured on two accounts:� Top positions

� The appearance of the clients websites within top 10 Search results on a Search engine for the agreed list of keywords. This is not a very stable measure because positions keep varying on search engines due to the continuous change of the indexes and routine changes in search engine algorithms and hence guarantees cannot be made.

� Traffic � The web analytical files have the referral information which provides information on the source of

the website traffic. This can give in depth information as to how many people came from which the website traffic. This can give in depth information as to how many people came from which website and also the name of the websites. Similarly it can also tell you the search engines from which traffic has come to your site. The web analytical files also provide a list of words/phrases which people used to land on your website. We can do a direct match of this to the keywords we have targeted and the traffic been driven to the websites due to it.

� When we do Search Engine optimization we should keep in mind that a search for singulars and plurals of a search word or phrase and also different tenses of the phrase will all return different results. Hence in the optimization phase while we agree on certain set of keywords we make provisions for the other variations. Hence we can take credit for traffic driven to the site using these variations.

THANK YOUTHANK YOU

Q & A

1. Set the steps in logically order

1. Objective setting

2. Reporting and Analysis

3. How to write content to drive traffic

4. Website Analysis4. Website Analysis

5. SEO friendly site-architecture

6. Competitive benchmarking

7. Link Building activity

8. How to create a sitemap

9. Selecting keywords

10. Submissions

Q & A

1. Paid keyword selection tools

2. Free keyword selection tools

3. Link popularity tool

4. On-page Optimization

A. Outline, table and list

B. Marketleap, linkpopularity

C. Word tracker, keyword intelligence

D. Citation of other sites to the site in question

Match the following

4. On-page Optimization

5. Off-page optimization

6. link popularity

7. Link building activity

8. Types of sitemaps

9. Representation of Sitemaps

site in question

E. XML, RSS, ROS, TXT and HTML

F. Title, meta tags, content, sitemap

G. Link building, viral marketing, blogs

H. Overture keywords, Good keywords

I. Identify – Interact – Implement – Monitor

TRAINING EVALUATION

� Does the presentation meet the training objective?

� Relevance of the course content

� Presentation flow structure

� Clarity on the information content� Clarity on the information content

� Usage of Diagram

Rating on a scale of 1 to 5

1–Very poor, 2–poor, 3–average, 4–Good, 5–Excellent

SEO PROCESS

Analysis and consultancy phaseAnalysis and consultancy phaseAnalysis and consultancy phaseAnalysis and consultancy phase

� Understand the client business

� Analyze the client website for various features like content, technology used, links etc

� Analyze competitions websites for their SEO friendliness

� Inputs from client regarding current website traffic

� Analyze the gap that the sites has versus an ideal Search engine optimized site

� Solutions will provided on a case-to-case basis depending on the site being dynamic, CMS driven,

Flash driven etc.

� Implementing of On page optimization for the website will accordingly differ based on the technology Implementing of On page optimization for the website will accordingly differ based on the technology

of the website.

� Identify the Search Engines & Directories for indexing

� Google, MSN and Yahoo (80% contributor to traffic) & open directory listing is mandatory

� Depending on client, geography and category special search engines and directories can be suggested

� Identify the keywords for which we undertake Search Engine Optimization

� Suggested list will be shared with client of which additions / deletions will be made

� Based on client inputs the final list will be drawn up

� Develop Link Building strategies

� Identify the categories and directories where listing can be done to increase link popularity

SEO PROCESS

Implementation phaseImplementation phaseImplementation phaseImplementation phase

� Website Optimization� Changes suggested as a part of the analysis phase are carried out for the website

� Submission� Manual submissions are done to Directories and Search Engines

� Submissions to some search engines (e.g.: Yahoo) and directories are at cost and they have to be borne by the client and are susceptible to change anytime

� Submissions are generally started after all the changes for the website are carried out

� SERP checks� Positions (within 50) for the keywords across the search engines are provided

Search engines and directories typically take 4 – 6 weeks from submission to index the

Positions (within 50) for the keywords across the search engines are provided

� Search engines and directories typically take 4 – 6 weeks from submission to index the WebPages so reporting starts in the 3rd month

� Analysis and Action points� Starting the 3rd month we will review our efforts and identify changes to strategies if required

� Web analytical files of the client will be analyzed to substantiate our efforts in terms of rise in traffic to site as a result of our SEO

� At the end of this phase the client can opt for a maintenance phase which can be renewed on a monthly basis or for a period of 3 months

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