Does Google find you?

Imagine spending thousands of pounds and countless hours constructing the perfect TV advert for your business, then finding out it was only shown at 3am on the Anglers’ TV channel. Wouldn’t you push the boat out to get it on ITV prime time if you could?

If you’ve invested in a shiny new website, you could be in a similar situation. The fact is, unless your business is easy to fi nd when people search for it on Google, MSN or Yahoo, you might as well not have an online presence at all.

Which is where the concept of ‘search engine optimisation’ (SEO) comes in. SEO increases your site’s visibility on search engines, so can increase your sales and growth potential. But what does it involve? And does it really produce results?

 WHAT DOES SEO DO?

SEO is the process of altering a website so it ranks higher in search engines’ listings. Search engines use algorithms to decide which sites are most ‘relevant’ to the keywords entered by the user. The 10 most relevant sites are shown on the first results page. Your goal is to persuade the search engines your site is relevant to the words potential customers will use to search.

HOW DOES IT WORK?

The main search engines are ‘crawlerbased’. Like a spider, search engines create their listings automatically by ‘crawling’ through the web and reading every site.

Everything the crawler finds goes into a huge index. When you search for a phrase, the search engine software sifts through the millions of pages recorded in the index to find the most relevant. How they decide this is based on highly complex, mathematical algorithms.

This is where SEO veers into the mysterious. These rules are very closely guarded secrets. There’s no way of knowing exactly how to get to the top of the listings, although a fair few people would sell their first born to get hold of Google’s algorithms. Fortunately, there are tricks you can use to optimise your site that have been proven to boost rankings.

1. BE YOUR CUSTOMER 

The best place to start is from your potential customers’ point of view, by working out what they will be searching for. These are your keywords, which will form the basis of your optimisation.

Nick Holmes, from PR recruitment company, Parker, Wayne & Kent, says: “We had a brainstorm to identify all the words that could describe our company. Because we work with clients as well as candidates, we had to ensure we picked up the words that people from both areas might search for.”

If you decided to hire the services of a specialist agency (and there are many), you would start with the same focus.

Jeremy Spiller, MD of online marketing agency White Hat Media, explains: “We discuss with the client what keywords they want to do well with. We take into consideration things like location, USPs and competitiveness of the words. For example, it’s not worth bothering trying to be top with the word ‘houses’ – it’s too generic and competitive.”

Sites such as http://searchmarketing.yahoo.com/rc/srch and www.wordtracker.com will tell you for free how frequently your keywords are entered as search terms and suggest related, more popular phrases. Also try www.seochat.com, which contains an extensive list of free SEO tools.

2. ADD KEY WORDS

Your site’s text will need frequent instances of your keywords to attract the attention of search engines. Look especially at the first paragraph, headings and subheadings.

But be warned: don’t be tempted simply to insert a paragraph flooded with keywords. This is called ‘keyword spamming’. The SEO world has developed its own code of conduct and spamming is viewed unfavourably. Google is especially good at spotting things like this and says that if a site does not meet its quality guidelines (www.google.com/support/webmasters), it may temporarily or permanently remove it from its listings.

A good rule of thumb is never to forget that the site is for its users, not for search engines. Spiller warns: “There’s a danger of getting obsessed with search engines, but the most important thing of all is making a good site – easy to use, with good content – and Google does recognise that.”

There is a wealth of frowned-upon behaviour used by sneaky SEO-obsessed site owners, such as putting white text on white background, so only search engines can see it. Resist such tricks – they will backfire in the long run.

3. DON'T FORGET THE AWKWARD BITS

Almost as important as the body text is your site’s title. This is one of the first things search engines – and users – notice, so it’s vital to have your keywords in the short, descriptive title tag.

Another element is the Meta Description tag. This allows you to describe your site to search engines, so a short description can be beneficial. But be aware that Google now ignores it and generates its own description of the page.

Many people believe the Meta Keywords Tag can help. But the major search engines ignore it, meaning that you can too.

Now your site is woven through with search-engine attracting keywords, have a look at how navigable it is. If it’s easy for users to get around, it is likely to be appealing to search engines too. If your  homepage includes hyperlinks to the major sections of your site, search engines will follow them, finding more of your website as a result.

4. LOOK AT YOUR LINKS

Your site is already more likely to catch the wandering eyes of search engines. But you’re not finished yet. Spiller says:“Wesays:“We: We get lots of calls from people who have done all that and still haven’t moved up the listings much. This is often because of links from other websites. It’s important to get as many good ones as possible.”