On-Page Optimization" by Dipen (Part 2)”

Description
       This tag provides a description of your website or web page. When you enter a description for your web page it will show up under the website title in the Google search engine results listing. I like to use my keywords in the description tag twice—yes, two times! This has a direct impact on my SERPs in BING and related search engines. The impact to Google is minimal but does help with your overall optimization efforts. If you can, work your keywords into a description that seems natural and be sure to repeat your keyword phrase. Your description should be compelling and accurately describe what users will find when they click through to your page. This consistency is important to Google and the user experience.
Example of what to do:
“This article can help you improve your Google search results. Read testimonials of those who have already improved their Google search results with these little-known Google secrets.”

Example of what NOT to do:
“Google search results, Google search results, improve Google search results, buy this book to improve Google search results.”
         Overemphasizing your keyword phrase and stuffing your web page description can have a negative impact on your search engine results. Try to use your keyword phrase twice and no more. And be sure to generate a descriptive tag that compels browsers to click through to your website. This can provide a significant increase in the number of browsers who actually click through to your site from the search engine results page.

Keywords
          The keywords tag is another way to educate search engines about your website. There are a variety of thoughts out there today about the importance of keywords and keyword tags. My belief is that keywords themselves don’t carry significant weight in isolation, but analyzed in conjunction with the overall theme of your page, they signal Google as to the legitimacy of your content.
The keyword tag should include your main keywords, those you’ve chosen as the main focus of your website, as well as those associated with the theme of your web page (we’ll be covering keyword research in just a few short pages).
Note: Avoid keyword stuffing. When users place keywords on their web page or within their meta tags over and over again in an effort to improve SERPs—search engines (like Google) actually discredit the value of the web page.
When listing keywords in their meta tags, some sites choose to separate each keyword with a space or comma. I prefer using a comma followed by a space to separate each keyword. Also, I like to make sure that I’m not repeating the same keyword consecutively. For example, if I was listing marketing-related keywords like marketing, marketing resources, and search engine optimization, I would NOT list them in that order because marketing is followed by another instance of marketing when I use the second term marketing resources.
       The right way to list these phrases would be as follows:

<meta name= “Keywords” content=“SEO, search engine optimization, SEO resources”>. This creates a division between like keywords, resulting in a more neutral approach and avoiding potential issues related to keyword stuffing. If you fail to implement this properly, some search engines won’t fully index
your page.

Robots
        The simplest of all meta tags, the robots tag, signals the Googlebot, Google’s search engine spider, to crawl your entire website. In order to index your website properly and include all of your web pages, search engines send their spiders to review and scan your website on a regular basis. Google does this every two or three days.
        When the spiders view your meta tags and see that your robots tag indicates “all,” they simply start crawling. Although some spiders would search the majority of your site without the tag, having it provides the added direction to search engine crawlers.
      Make sure the robots tag is included in your meta tags to improve crawling. There are some Internet marketers or webmasters who recommend submitting each page of your site directly to the search engines via single page submission. This isn’t necessary, especially if you are including the robots tag. Search engine crawlers do the work for you.
      What’s important is that Google indexes your site, and when it does, it can find all of your content. The robots tag can help with that process. Equally, if not more important, is compliance with W3C standards (industry accepted HTML standards) and a sitemap.
      When you combine the robots tag with an easily indexed website, Google and other major search engines can find and index all of the pages on your website or blog.

URLs
       Many people believe that if you have a special URL, one that contains the keyword you’re trying to rank highly for, you’ll be number one on Google. This isn’t always true. The reality is that having your keyword in your URL can help in some instances but is virtually meaningless in the overall Google ranking algorithm unless many other websites are linking to yours.
        Let’s explore this idea a little further. If this URL theory were correct, my blog adsense-d.blogspot.com would never be able to outrank a website like paypal-ebay-d.blogspot.com for the keyword phrase marketing expert. At the time of this writing, my blog was in the first position on Google and the blog paypal-ebay-d.blogspot.com wasn’t even on the first three pages of search results.
        So where does having your keyword phrase in the URL help? It helps with search engines like Yahoo! and BING and when you’re link building for Google. Each search engine has its own ranking algorithm, placing different weights on website criteria like URL, external links, and more. BING is notorious for placing significant weight on the URL itself.
      To see this in action simply go to BING and do a search for marketing expert. You’ll see that the first five results, and those that follow, all have marketing expert in the URL.
        Another way that having your keywords in the URL helps is when it comes to link building for Google. Each time a website links to your website using only your URL, if that URL is comprised of your keywords, it provides a boost to Google search results. As I’ll show you later, all linking coming into your website should contain your keyword phrase, and this can be accomplished without owning a particular URL.
         A great example of this concept is the keyword phrase “click here.” Go to Google and enter the search term, “click here.” If the URL theory was correct—that you have to own the URL that contains only your keywords—you would expect the first search result to be www.clickhere.com. However, the first result is for Adobe® Reader.
       Why? It’s because more sites link to Adobe Reader with the link text of “click here” than any other website. All that said it never hurts to have your keywords in the URL itself. When others link to your site using just your URL, it will include your keywords. This helps when building links from sites that do not allow you to customize the link being placed or include your keywords in the anchor text.
         Another technique that I have found to be particularly useful from an SEO perspective is buying aged domains. An aged domain is one that was established some time ago and may even have some traffic coming to it. You can search for and buy aged domains using GoDaddy or Sedo.com. If you can purchase an aged domain that already has your keyword included, all the better. This can give you a jump start when launching your website because it has been indexed by Google, likely has inbound links, and may currently rank for the keywords for which you’re trying to optimize.

Formatting
       The manner in which you organize and format your web page can have a huge impact on your SERPs. I’m going to show you how to make sure that Google and other major search engines are reading the text of your page prior to reading “other” page elements such as navigational items. Additionally, I’ll show you where on your web pages to place your keywords and in what format.
Did you know?
       You can see what elements of your page are viewed as text by leading search engines simply by visiting your website and pressing Ctrl-a on your keyboard.
       There are a few basic things to keep in mind when formatting your website for top Google placement. The most important elements include content first, clean code (W3C, no Flash), heading tags, alt tags, proper keyword placement, no Flash and JavaScript external, and sitemaps. If you get these elements correct, you can move on to address additional optimization factors.

Content First
        When I originally designed my website or blogs, I came to learn that the layout was completely wrong. Even though I had my meta tags in place at the top of my coded page, search engine spiders had to sift through my navigational items (which were JavaScript, not HTML) before they could reach my keyword-rich content.
       A great way to ensure that search engine spiders read your text first is to lay out your site with the appropriate content at the top. Search engines read from left to right and top to bottom. Many websites have a left-hand column that contains navigation links. As a result, Google will read all of the text in the left-hand column before the main content area of your site. The preferred method is to have Google read the text from the main section of your page first so that keywords and other optimization factors are recognized.
       In order to force Google to read the main content of your web page before the left-hand column, you need to structure your site appropriately.
       By laying out your page in the format noted above, Google will read your body content before your navigational items. Navigational items often are constructed with excess code and, as a result, search engines are prohibited from reaching your optimized content.
      Proper formatting is essential for top placement in Google search engine results. If your site is set up incorrectly, the search engines will read your navigational items first, followed by your website content. As we discuss page elements and the importance of onpage items like <h1> tags and text formatting, you will better understand why we want the Google spiders to read your website content before all other page items.

Clean Code (W3C, no Flash)
       As mentioned previously, I’m not a programmer, and, in fact, I know little or nothing about web development. But I do know there is a right way and a wrong way to design a website. How do I know? I learned my lesson the hard way—through trial and error. Once I made the appropriate changes, my SERPs began to climb. That’s how I discovered the importance of proper formatting and coding.
        If you work for a company or have ever made a call to a customer support representative, you know that businesses operate according to specific standards and service levels. The same is true when it comes to web programming. When dealing with website code, these standards are referred to as W3C. The acronym W3C stands for the World Wide Web Consortium. You can learn more about the consortium by visiting their website at http://www.w3c.org.
        For implementation of proper SEO techniques, you should verify that your website meets these industry standards. When visiting the W3C website you can learn more about W3C and even check to see if your site code meets W3C standards by using their free validation tool at http://validator.w3.org. I recommend using this free tool that provides specific feedback as to which area(s) of your code meet standards and which do not. Run each key page of your website through the validator.
        Any errors you encounter will need to be fixed by someone who knows the code in which your website was written. It is important for you to resolve the coding errors noted for a variety of reasons—not the least of which is that Google will have an even easier time evaluating your website.
Note: Be sure to use cascading style sheets (CSS) when developing your pages. This helps keep your code very clean. Instead of placing formatting code on the page itself, make a call to your CSS, which will allow you to reference all of the design-related elements you need across your website. Don’t be too concerned if you’re not familiar with cascading style sheets. Anyone who
works in the area of web design has used them and can provide guidance when designing your site.

Heading Tags (<h1>, <h2>, and <h3>)
       Heading tags (sometimes referred to as headers) are used to emphasize text on a web page. Search engines love to see these header tags because pages with large headings indicate the substance and importance of the content. Use the tag—either <h1>, <h2>, or <h3>—that’s appropriate for your page and be sure to include your keywords in the tag.
For example: <h1>free marketing articles</h1>.
         Using the <h1> tag will display your text in a rather large format unless altered via CSS. The <h2> tag displays text slightly smaller than an <h1>. The <h3> tag displays text smaller than <h2> and so on. Try to use at least one <h1> tag on the page you are trying to optimize.
         Don’t overdo it on your heading tags. One to three is sufficient. The key is to make it flow well with your page and appear natural. Placing tags that make your text appear unnatural will only hurt your website’s readability and click-through rate.

Alt Tags
        Do you use graphics or images on your website? If you do, each image should contain an alt tag. An alt tag is simply the practice of naming a photo, image, or icon. You can check to see if your website images already have alt tags associated with them by running your mouse over the image. If an alt tag is in place, text should display. If text does not display, an alt tag is not present and needs to be added.
      The literal benefit of an alt tag is that the text displays while your website images are loading, giving users information about the content included on your page. The primary purpose for alt text is to ensure people with disabilities can read the page. Blind users who use a page reader cannot see an image. The alt text tells them what the image is. The secondary benefit (or primary SEO benefit) is that Google takes these keyword phrases into account when evaluating your website.
      The best way to tag your images is with your keyword phrase followed by the word image. For multiple images, use slightly different wording. For example, if you’re selling widgets and optimizing for discount widgets, you would include an <alt> image tag for your widget using the alt text discount widgets graphic.
      The code that would be used to insert an image tag in this example:
<img src=“widgets1.jpg” width=“125” height=“60” border=“0” alt=“discount widgets graphic”>
      As with any optimization effort, don’t overdo it with images or alt tags. Too many images can result in a slow loading website which is a key ranking factor. Images that contain a number of alt tags, all with your keywords, can signal keyword stuffing.