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Our
Meta Tag Optimization services are explained below. After reading
this article you might just decide to do it all yourself.
Meta Tag Optimization Services can improve
your search engine rankings. It is important to understand that
there are two mutually supportive broad-based areas you need to think
about in tandem:
1) On-site - Meta Tag Optimization, KeyWords and content i.e. what
our Meta Tag Optimization Services cover
2) Off-site Optimization i.e. finding quality link partners and getting links from them to your site.
This page deals with how you can improve search engine ranking via
our WWWWWH© Meta Tag Optimization
Services. (The article on the Ranking
high on Search Engines deals with off-site optimization).
Meta Tag
Optimization Services Checklist
Assuming a page has well-written and original content here is a checklist to
help you improve the search engine ranking for that page:
a) Put Your
Keywords in Text Links
Whether you are linking to pages within your site, or to external
pages, text links are required. If you must use graphics for your navigation
links, then make sure you have an associated text link as well. And
wherever possible include your keywords in the link text.
b) Put Your Keywords in the Page's Title
Meta Tag
Title tags should appear near the top of EVERY page in your web site
and include the main KeyWord for the page. Title tags look like this:
<title> KeyWords should be included in your
Title</title>
Always make sure your main KeyWord for a page is included in the
Title Tag - and wherever possible make sure your KeyWord (or KeyPhrase)
is at the start of the Title Tag. Every page on your site should have a
Title Tag with its own keyword. Try not to use too many words in the
Title Tag as the more words in the Title Tag, the more the relevance of
your
KeyWord(s) will be 'watered down' as far as the search engines are
concerned - not good when you are trying to improve search engine ranking
:-)
c) Put Your Keyword in Your Description
Meta Tag
The Description Tag for a page is located in the first few lines of
HTML code on a page. This is what a Description Tag looks like:
<meta name="description" content="Include
KeyWord(s) in the Description">
You should have the KeyWord(s) for the page included in the
Description Tags at least once - but do not include it more than twice,
and try not to use too many words in the description. As with the Title
Tag, too many words may reduce the usefulness of your KeyWord (Besides,
search engines typically only display the first 60-65 characters in Search
Results).
d) Put your
KeyWords in a Keywords Meta Tag
The importance of the KeyWords Tag as far as the major Search Engines
are concerned has diminished in the last few years - apparently as a
result of people 'stuffing' the Keywords Tag with the same keyword over
and over again. (In the early days of the Internet Meta Tag
Optimization Services may simply have been a 'keyword stuffing' service).
There are arguments about whether you need capitalized versions of
KeyWords as well as low-case only, but you can safely ignore all of this
rhetoric.
Like the Description Tag the Keywords Tag is located in
the first few lines of HTML code on a page. This is what a Keywords Tag looks like:
<meta name="keywords" content="Keywords List
separated by commas">
To summarise, it won't hurt to put in a few keywords for the
smaller specialized engines that still look at this tag. Include your most important keyword for the page
first ni the list.
e) Put your
Keywords in your Heading Tags
Heading Tags were originally designed to help provide a logical
structure for HTML documents. Heading Tags can appear anywhere within the <body>
</body> tags on a page. This is what a H1 Heading tag looks like:
<H1>keyword in your headline</H1>
Heading Tags range from H1 (largest) to H6
(smallest). Heading Tags are given more weight than normal text by Search Engines
- on the basis that they tend to summarise the major concepts for a
page in a hierarchical way. To preserve the concept of an 'importance'
hierarchy, make sure that your main KeyWord(s) for a page appear in a H1
tag, with supporting or related concepts being contained within an H2 tag, and an H3
and so on. Finally, make sure a H1 tag appears close to the top of the page.
f) Make Keywords Bold Text on the
Page
Traditionally, making a word or phrase bold typically meant that the
word or phrase was important. The same goes for Search Engines -
although the Bold Tag around a KeyWord or phrase has much less important
than if the same word or phrase appeared in the Title Tag. Bold Tags can
appear anywhere within the <body> </body> tags on a page.
This is what a Bold Tag looks like:
<b>Boldface your keywords</b>
Bold text is given slightly more importance than normal text by the search engines, so
use the put your keyword into a boldface phrase once or twice on the page.
g) Underline your
KeyWords on the Page
Like the use of a boldface, underlining a word or phrase typically
means that the word or phrase is important. Underlining provides a small
enhancement, but for a highly competitive KeyWord it might make the
difference. You can underline text anywhere within the <body>
</body> tags on a page. This is what an Underline Tag looks like:
<u>Underline your keywords</u>
h) Use Your Keywords in Alt Tags.
Alt-Text is the text that is displayed in a small 'help bubble' when you move your mouse over an
image. Including your Keywords in Alt-Tags for each image on your web
page is probably overkill - you may even be penalized for
'over-optimizing' your page. You can include Alt Tags anywhere within
the <body> </body> tags on a page. This is what an Alt-Tag
(with an image link) looks like:
<img src="URL" alt="Description
of image containing your Keyword">
Alt-Tags are only really important
for images that link to something else - like another page on your site
or another domain. (As far as we can tell only 'linking' Alt Tags have
any importance for Google - non-linking Alt Tags are for users who are surfing without
graphics switched on, or for accessibility reasons).
i) Use your Keywords
early, often and late.
The visible text on a web page is normally anywhere within the
<body> </body> tags on a page.
Where your Keywords appear
and how often the appear on a page helps improve search engine ranking.
As rule, you should try to put your Keyword(s) at the start of the first
paragraph on a page, use it (and synonyms) throughout the page, and make
sure that your Keyword appears very close to the end of your page.
The
actual 'Keyword Density" (i.e. how many times the phrase appears on
a page as a percentage of the total visible words on a page) can be a
significant factor when it comes to improved search engine ranking.
and there are many schools of thought on what is the 'best' Keyword
Density. Our position is quite simple - if after we have analyzed a
competitive page (using Total
Optimizer Professional) we think KeyWord Density is going to be a
factor, then we tweak pages accordingly.
That's pretty much it as far as Meta Tag Optimization is concerned.
There are some finer points but if you use the techniques we have
outlined, any additional techniques are unlikely to make any significant
difference.
Our WWWWWH© Meta Tag Optimization Services uses each of
the approaches outlined above. As you can see it is not rocket science -
more a checklist. Because Meta Tag Optimization is straightforward we
encourage clients to develop their own content for this part of the
WWWWH© process (if they have the time / inclination) rather
than use our in-house Meta Tag Optimization Services.
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