A search engine is, among other things, a query server. That means: its job is to return data based on asking it a question. The more specific, relevant and comprehensive the search does this, the better the search engine is. Therefore, search engine programmers strive to understand precisely how the average user thinks in terms of search in order to design the search engine algorithms in such a way as to deliver fast, accurate and thorough results.
Internet search engine marketing is one of the newest and most lucrative emerging industries. Search marketing entails coming up with creative ways to find and gather web surfers from around the world into communities of markets to sell products and services. Think of Internet marketing as the business of discovering a "cyberspace market" for one's products, services, causes and ideas.
There are a growing number of search engine optimization (SEO for short) companies that provide help with search engine placement. However, not very many of them deliver the results that they promise. Unfortunately, there are quite a few self-proclaimed "SEO experts" who really don't deserve the mantle. When looking for a company to provide SEO work, be wary of anyone who "guarantees" rankings, placements or conversions.
A few other excellent SEO organizations include:
Just like Google, Yahoo offers exceptional SEO tools as well. However, they only command about 10 percent of cyberspace markets, compared to nearly 80 percent for Google (MSN gets about 10 percent of the pie as well). As a result, Yahoo can't afford to be a selective in how it indexes URLs, JavaScript, Flash files, and video files as Google can. Though some see this difference as a minus, we see it as plus. In the end, there are pros and cons to both, and most good SEO specialists will tell you that they utilize the best tools of each.
In terms of sheer market share, one has to say Google. However, in terms of measures like functionality, user-friendliness, interactivity, quality of services and esthetics, the answer is less clear. Most SEO experts (if there be such a thing!) use tools from several of the various search engines. As with most anything, there are certain things that one search engine excels in over another. However, of the three top search engines (Google, Yahoo & MSN) I think most would agree that MSN has the least functionality and widespread user appeal.
A robot is the popular name for the mechanisms by which search engines index sites and collect data on various websites. The term "robot" is used to highlight the almost queer way that these programs take on a kind of personality of their own. In reality, robots are likely to be just high-order cookies. But they're cookies that have a kind of autonomy of their own; whereas normal cookies usually only introduce themselves into your files when you go to a particular site, search engine robots can go to a given site, of their own "volition." A robots.txt file is simply a short text file that tells these robots what sites they have permission to go to, what data they are allowed to read, and to a lesser degree, what activities they are allowed to do with that data.
Syntax – the order and patterns of words, phrases and punctuations – is the lifeblood of search engine algorithms. When SEO specialists say that a search engines are reading the content of a site, what they really mean is that the search engine robots are calculating the syntax of a site. That is, the robots are looking at things like:
Understanding search syntax is key to truly optimizing any website. When you know what syntax the search engines find "sexy," then you are in a much better position to design the structure and content of a site to make the engines happy.
An algorithm is a set of rules and/or instructions for solving a specific problem. Search engines do what they do by virtue of the algorithms with which they are programmed. For example, the robots.txt file prescribes a set of rules and regulations that the search engine spiders must follow when they crawl around on a given site. Thus, the robots.txt file can be seen an algorithm in itself. The primary "problem" a search engine is designed to solve is: to answer a question put to it by a user. Thus, all the search engine algorithms are programmed with this end in mind. The servers are programmed to deliver the most accurate, most relevant "answers" to the user – and to do it in the most efficient way.
Since a main goal of the search engine spiders is to read, compile, sort, index and rank websites, it is clear that the quality of the html coding used on a given site has a good deal to do with how well the search engine can perform this monumental task. Websites with tons of coding errors, broken links, redirects and decentralized Javascript make it more difficult for the robots and spiders to roam a site. (Think of how difficult it would be for an elephant to climb a rocky mountain and you'll start to understand what I mean!) Because of this, soundness of html code it is absolutely essential to achieving good SEO results. One of the objectives of any good SEO company should therefore be to correct any major coding errors as soon as possible.
You wouldn't think that the name of your domain should make much difference in terms of SEO results – but it does. Search engine algorithms look for patterns. They look for repetition and relevancy. Since they don't have human brains, the only real way the engine can determine relevancy is by matching up the search terms with the keyword density of the domain. For example, if my site is about cookies, but my URL is www.jackhammers.com, the search engine sees my URL as not relevant to what my site is about. Therefore, when naming URLs, keep in mind what your target market and main products and services will be, and try to match the domain name with one or more of your primary keywords.
Many people use the term "spider" and "robots" interchangeably. Well, that's not problematic, as they do very similar things. Conceptually, however, there is a difference between the two. A spider is a script or cookie that "crawls" across a URL to gather clues about the site's content. A robot, on the other hand, mechanically treks across a site primarily for indexing purposes. Think of it this way: the spiders gather the details of a site, then hand them off to the robots to categorize. The difference is really not extremely important until you start talking about more advanced SEO concepts. But if you understand the difference, then you will begin to understand what's important to search engines; engines look not just at the content of a site (the spiders' job) but also at the structure, syntax and mathematical logic of a site (the robots' job).
There are a myriad of tools out in cyberspace to help promote your website to the public. Such tools include blogs, forums and syndicated press releases. These resources have become more popular as the World Wide Web has transitioned into a Web 2.0 platform. The Web 2.0 platform recognizes that today's Internet user is more technologically sophisticated that ever before. This trend is reflected in the upsurge of "social bookmarking communities" like Technorati and Digg. If you want to have an online presence, you must familiarize yourself with companies like these.
Choosing the right keywords and key phrases is extremely important to establish your online presence. Without the right keywords, you'll miss the majority of the traffic you would have received had you picked the right ones. Additionally, the search engine bots and spiders will take much longer to find your site (and may not even find it at all). There are several great keyword selection tools out there. Google has its own, and it's pretty good. A few other keyword selector tools can be found at:
One way to help the search engine spiders and bots find and index your sites is to submit selected URLs directly to them. All the major search engines have applications which allow a user to submit a site for indexing. And most of them are free. This is one relatively quick and easy way to promote your website to the cyber community.
You'll often hear SEO folks talk about link baiting. Link baiting refers to methods and strategies to persuade web users to put a link to your site on their own. Lately, though, I've been toying around with the concept of search baiting. In my conception, search baiting would refer to strategies to lure web searchers away from their intended search targets to yours. These would be web searchers who are searching for products, services, markets or ideas that are more or less loosely associated with your own. For example, say you're searching for Gel pens. I sell BIC pens. Through the use of certain techniques, I try to lure you from your original search target (Gel pens) to my search target (BIC pens).
This refers to using creative, unconventional methods to get back links to your sites. For instance, I was browsing around on some blog sites one day, and I came across a guy who had software that created a link exchange widget to place on his site. Advanced link building also refers to leveraging .edu and .gov sites to obtain back links. These Top Level Domains (TLDs) are granted a higher degree of trust and authority by the search engines. As a result, back links from these TLDs can greatly improve your SEO Quality Score and boost your rankings – sometimes even overnight!
A "stunt" in football is a play that combines the trickery and efforts of two offensive linemen. By combining their efforts in very specific ways, the sum of what the linemen accomplish together exceeds what they could accomplish individually. A search engine "stunt" works the same way. It is using two independent sites together in such a way to gain an advantage over the search engine that your competitors don't have. Make no mistake: This is advanced SEO stuff here, folks!
A link from an accredited college, university or institution of higher learning is like gold when it comes to increasing your website authority and presence. This is because Search Engines place more weight on .edu .gov incoming links. These links are extremely hard to get and carry a greater degree of trust. Search engines such as Google, Yahoo & MSN automatically grant trust, legitimacy and relevancy to .edu URLs. Therefore, search engine algorithms are designed to give extra brownie points to a site back-linked from an .edu website. Search engines know that such a site is distinguished in some special way from the .nets and .coms.
Blogging is fast becoming a cult phenomenon of the Internet-generation. To be a successful blogger requires a distinct form of writing and creative organization. Although some may think that blogging is a waste of time, professional bloggers around the world are using their blogging skills to position themselves as self-styled freelancers, entrepreneurs and published authors. University professors around the nation are finding that blogs enrich their teaching methods and classroom discussions. In fact, blogging is fast becoming a staple in the arenas of higher education, communications, marketing, business, computer science and advertising. When used correctly, blogs can drive an enormous amount of web traffic.
There is no simple answer to this question. However, it's worth noting that search engine spiders and bots have a difficult time reading any text embedded within flash files. Conventional SEO wisdom says, 'If it ain't spiderable, it's not worth having it on your site." Furthermore, video sharing applications like You Tube and Flickr don't accept video uploads in Flash format. Notwithstanding, there are video optimization techniques that can make Flash files a bit more palatable to the search spiders' tongue. These techniques include appropriately naming the file, appropriately tagging the file, and .swf to .avi conversion. Then these videos can be uploaded into sites that can index and crawl the video contents a little better.
Dynamic Keyword Insertion (DKI) refers to using a code in a search engine advertisement that enables the title of the ad to change fluidly with the user's search query. It can be a very effective tool in Pay-Per-Click Ad campaigns to attract more visitors as well as decrease the bounce rate. Ad economy refers to the methods of increasing the number of ad impressions while reducing the ad Cost Per Click (CPC). Google AdWords Tip: The key to better ad placement is to utilize keywords that you can spend more on than the average CPC rate for those keywords.
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