Skip to main content

Search Engine Optimization - Are There Really "Top Mistakes"?

While researching common search engine mistakes, I was struck by something odd; many sites that profess to present the "Top 5" or "Top 10" search engine mistakes do not agree with each other on what those mistakes really are.

I believe a significant quantity of the search engine information, which is presented as fact, is actually opinion. I can hear you ask the question: Why do you say this? Well, firstly the ranking algorithms are living, dynamic things that change frequently. Secondly, not only do they change, they are also a well kept secret. Thirdly, search algorithms are not simple to reverse engineer.

So my conclusion is that unless the article that proclaims the "Top x mistakes" is written by a Google engineer, I would have to say that it is the author's opinion and would be difficult to substantiate.

Having said that, there are many common pitfalls to avoid, based on solid logical deduction. Try to think like a search engine, your objective being to serve your visitors with relevant and meaningful content. When visiting any site you want to quickly determine what the core purpose of the site and its content is. To do this accurately you need help from the site creators.

So here are some of the things to avoid, in no particular order:

  • Avoid making your site too graphic intensive, with too little text content - search engines struggle with graphics. If you do have a large quantity of graphics, do not forget the ALT tags as these not only aid the visually impaired, but the search engines do pay attention to them.
  • Keywords are important, but avoid "spamming" your document with keywords. If your text reads awkwardly you can bet your bottom dollar that the engines will pick that up.
  • Certain HTML TAGS take precedent and omitting good quality content in these tags is a capital crime in terms of search engines. Make sure you have good, targeted content in the top TAGS. In my view the most important tags are the TITLE tag, the H1, H2 and H3 tags. Also pay attention to what you put in the BOLD tags.
  • Be careful in how you use Tables. Tables can be easy to use to get neat looking layout. I far prefer to use Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) to achieve correct formatting. It keeps your content clean and easy to crawl.
  • Be careful when using dynamic content or dynamic urls. I have come across sites that dynamically create urls for each visitor. This will only lead to Search confusion.
  • Do not believe the hype around search submission tools. Just as is true in life so the adage holds for SEO, "If it seems too good to be true, it usually is!" Take care and submit your site by hand to the major engines or web directories.
  • I have on occasion had to use IFRAMES to include very graphic heavy content. A mistake not to make is to put no content outside the IFRAME. Use the NOFRAMES tag and stick all your search friendly content in there. The chances are that 99% of consumers who view your page will not see this content, but it will give context to the Search Engines.
So the next time you come across an article proclaiming to offer the "Top x" information on search engine mistakes, take a closer look and see if the author offers you any clues as to how they arrived at their findings.

Ken Metcalf is a professional engineer, also holding a business commerce degree. He writes articles in his spare time on technical topics ranging from low level programming to The SEO Blog which deals with search engine optimization. For more information on using Search Engine Technology visit The SEO pages here

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Ken_Metcalf


Technorati Tags : , , , ,

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Credit card debt catches up with Britons

By Cesar G. Soriano, USA TODAY USAToday.com - London : "This Christmas season, the hottest-selling gifts in Europe are pricey American products such as iPods, the Xbox 360 and celebrity-inspired fashions. That kind of shopping has led to a very American problem: credit card debt." Nationwide, 34% of Britons say they will use credit cards or store cards to pay for their holiday purchases this year. And one in five say they are still paying off their gifts from last Christmas, according to a December poll by Zopa, an online lending agency. "The UK has adopted the American habit of credit with vigor, and consequently consumers are rapidly getting in over their heads," says Steve Rhode, president of Myvesta.org, a non-profit, debt-relief group. In August, U.S.-based Myvesta opened an office in Britain to deal with the growing number of Britons in debt. The number of people filing for bankruptcy or insolvency in England and Wales rose 46% from 2004 to 2005 to a record, a
131 comments
Read more

Learn What is Search Engine Optimization & How to Optimize Your Website For Search Engines

SEO is an action from a webmaster/owner of the website to optimize the website for search engines, to receive maximum traffic and increase ranking in the search engine result pages(SERPs). There are different types of SEO. Some are very specific, trying to dominate very targeted audience, and some are for targeting wide and general audience. Search Engine Optimization is quite long process, and it requires from a webmaster constant testing and tracking, to see what works and what doesn't. If you are a webmaster, then it's vital to know SEO, because it's a free, effective and clever way to get traffic to your website. There are many guides available on SEO, so you can read them and learn, if you want to be an expert. Why Does A Website Needs SEO? Most of the websites on the Internet get their main traffic from search engines, like Google, Yahoo & MSN. If you website cannot be located by search engines, or your content is not indexed in their database, then you are missin
90 comments
Read more

Google Trends: Building Links with the Correct Keywords Makes All the Difference

The most important part of SEO is building great links to your content. The most common mistake is targeting the wrong keywords. The question at hand is, how do I choose my keywords? I have a great suggestion that should help you out. Google trends is a great help with choosing what you should target. Google trends will show you how much traffic a search term in Google is getting. The power is not in knowing how much traffic it gets, but how much traffic it gets relative to a similar term. Because you get no hard numbers you must remember to keep everything relative. I like to do a common search with every query so I know how much traffic I get relative to the keyword I learn about. For example, if I want to write an article for an article website, I may try to test Free Content, and Free Articles. To compare these two searches I separate them with a comma and hit search. Then I see that Free Articles is very close to Free Content. I can also choose to add a third keyword if I would li
39 comments
Read more