SEO – If you are not being found, you ARE losing money!

Search Engine Optimisation

Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) is the process of improving the volume and quality of traffic to a web site from search engines via the "natural" or "algorithmic" search results. How do search engines decide which websites appear at the top?

Search engine rankings are the result of complex algorithms consisting of scores, if not hundreds, or factors.

The actual algorithms are a closely guarded secret, and their aim is to place the most useful and close-matching websites at the top.

On-site SEO

There are many things a website owner can do to make their websites "search engine friendly". There is a list of 20 or so criteria that have been proved to help ranking, for example:

  • appropriate keywords in the “important” places – titles, headings, links and so on
  • keyword research – what are people actually searching for when looking for your product or service?
  • keyword density – some repetition of important keywords helps, but too much hinders. Do you know the right balance?
  • quality of underlying computer code – W3C compliance is essential to be sure that search engines can read your site properly
  • content development – search engines love content, even more so if it changes regularly. An unloved website can fall down the rankings it its content becomes stale

Off-site SEO

Perhaps the most important factor in search engine ranking is the quantity and quality of inbound links to your site from other websites.

An inbound link development strategy is absolutely vital to success. It is hard work, demands commitment, and does not happen overnight, but developing your content and forming partnerships with other quality websites does pay off!

Google PageRank

Of particular significance and interest is a website's "Google Page Rank" – an indicator of a website’s quality and positively influenced by successful off-site SEO. Based on the quality and quantity of inbound links, Google assigns a "score out of ten" to every site (and all its pages) on the world wide web. Typically, the higher a site's PageRank the earlier it comes in the search results list and the more visitors it will receive.

A brand new website starts with PageRank 0/10. By increasing the quantity and quality of inbound links, the PageRank rises. 4/10 is a reasonable medium term aim, with 6/10 being a longer term aim. PageRanks of 7/10 or more might take you into .com entrepreneur territory!

What's my site's PageRank then?

Get in touch and we’ll let you know! We can also discuss how we can help you develop a search engine optimisation strategy to outperform your competitors.

Back to Articles index