• Tweet
  • Sharebar
  • Tweet
SEO (Search Engine Optimization) is not a game, folklore, or interesting entry in Wikipedia.
.
Those who want a high ranking must choose the right keywords or keyword phrases to use for headings and text. These keywords or phrases help dictate where you show up on a search engine’s ranking. Why do rankings matter? Give a damn about rankings, because most websites are storefronts for individuals peddling services or companies acquiring clients. If an individual can’t find you online, they choose another company. Furthermore, a company low on the totem pole of rankings loses some of its validity. A high ranking helps validate your company.
.
Wow, that’s simple! No. It’s not. You can screw it up by choosing the wrong keywords or keyword phrases. For example, you are a real estate agent and the first heading on your webpage reads, “Buying Advice”. The text underneath the headline pertains to the best neighborhoods to look for houses. A search engine “magically” reads your website and determines that this is a national real estate website. Now, you have to compete with everyone in the United States selling houses. You don’t sell houses in Florida. You’re located in Austin, Texas. You need a good keyword phrase. That’s a phrase that is used throughout headlines and text. Maybe you can use a keyword phrase like “Austin Real Estate” or “Buying Austin Houses”. When someone needs a house in Austin, they will type in “Austin real estate” into their Google or Yahoo and find you.
.
Again, that sounds easy. No. It’s not. You may decide to use the phrase “Austin real estate” in every other sentence to make it real clear who you are to search engines. That’s called keyword stuffing. While this practice may seem like a great way to raise your website ranking, you’ll wake up one day to find your website was banned from a search engine like Google. Yikes.
.
Another way to screw up the SEO on your website is to write content that doesn’t flow with your keywords. Website content must be engaging to the reader in order for them to hang out on your web page. Don’t throw in a keyword phrase whenever you think about it. Plan where it should go within the content, so the keyword phrase naturally works. How much of the text should consist of the keyword phrase? Roughly, 1% to 5% percent of all the text on a page should be your keyword phrase.
.
Sounds easy. No. It’s not. It takes practice as a writer to create content that effectively uses keywords within engaging text. How do I learn? You don’t learn by crossing your fingers and hoping for the best when writing text. In fact, you waste time. Take a class, mentor under someone or at least read other articles about SEO. You’ll be able to find them by typing in keywords relating to SEO in a search engine.
Faith McGee
Contributing Writer for Hat Trick Associates