What is SEO: how does it works

SEO or Search Engine Optimization is a technique used by web masters to improve and increase the visibility and traffic to a particular website on search engines like Google, Yahoo and Bing amongst others. This unique internet marketing strategy is designed to improve the rankings of a website on search engines. There are many ways to increase the visibility of a website on search engines. Here are some of the methods.

The Basics

When you enter a search query in any search engine, you get a list of web results. The search results that you get contain the query term. Users generally visit those websites which are ranked at the top of the list as they perceive those to be much more relevant to the search query. Now if you are wondering why a few websites rank better than the rest others then you should know that it is mainly because of the powerful web marketing method known as search engine optimization (SEO).

If you are new to the planet of search engine optimization, you might be having some questions in mind like what is seo, how seo works and the different in the ranking criteria of most major search engines. This article will provide some essential information that you require to know about search engine optimization.

The very first basic truth about SEO or search engine optimization is that 'search engines are not humans'. There is a difference between how search engines and humans view web pages. The search engines are basically text driven unlike the humans. The search engines crawl the website seeking at the particular website items especially the text to get a fair idea about the website is all about.

The search engines perform a lot of activities in order to provide search results. The job of the search engines are the following crawling, indexing, calculating relevancy, processing, and retrieving. First and foremost, search engines crawls the website in order to see and find what is there. This particular task is performed by a spider or crawler or Googlebot as in Google. A crawler is basically a type of software.

The spiders follow the links from one page to another in order to index everything that it finds on its way. Keeping in mind that the web has more than twenty billion pages on the web it is rather impossible for the spider to visit the website daily just to check whether a new page has appeared or if an existing page has been modified.

Sometimes the search bots may not visit your website for a month or two. In such a situation, you can check what the crawler sees from your website. As mentioned earlier, crawlers are not humans and hence they cannot see images, javascript, flash movies, directories, password protected pages etc. Now if you have all of these on your website, then your website will not be viewable and they will never be indexed, spidered or processed etc. In simple words they are nonexistent for the search engines.

The search engines processes the requests and it compares the search string in the search request with that of the indexed pages in its database. It calculates the relevancy of each of the web pages in its index with the search string. Usually there are several algorithms to calculate the relevancy. Now all algorithms have diverse relative weights for the most common factors including links, keyword density and meta tags. This is the reason why different search engines offer diverse search result pages for the same search string.

Methods used in SEO:

Some of the most popular methods used to improve the visibility and ranking of a website on search engines are:

·        Only quality and unique content creation;

·        Relevant structure, nice on-site optimization (relevant and unique meta descriptions, meta titles);

·        Removing barriers to search engine indexing;

·        Site promotion to increase back links and inbound links;

·        No pages with spam, spinned content;

·        No unnatural links, spam links, etc;

Right semantic core

The basis task of an SEO expert is to analyze the target audience of a particular website that needs to be optimized. The SEO expert needs to find out the keywords related to the content of the website which are most searched by the target audience on the internet and then incorporate the same in the contents of the website as well as the HTML and other coding. Search engines like Google provide a number of webmaster tools to their customers to help them analyze and carry out SEO activities for their website. Tools like Google Analytics are best for analyzing the target audience and competition of a particular website to form a good internet strategy to increase site rankings on search engines.

Types of Searches:

Search engines

All SEO activities are aimed to meet the requirements of the searches made by people browsing on the internet. The different kinds of searches that people conduct on the internet are:

1) Local search

2) Image search

3) Video search

4) Academic search

5) News search

6) Industry specific search

The art of optimizing websites to improvise on its traffic and attract customers did not commence till the mid 1990’s. Search algorithms in the earlier days were totally dependent on the tools used by webmasters to optimize them. These were tools like keyword Meta tags and file indexing. However with the advancement of the internet, these techniques have become almost obsolete. The previous method was also not worthy as many webmasters controlled websites through keyword stuffing activities, which did more harm to the websites than gain.

Now, SEO activities are based more on the content of the website. Rather than stuffing it with keywords, the perfect internet strategy should involve producing quality content for a website rather than stuffing it with keywords. More and more people browsing the internet are becoming content specific and will come to your website only if they find the content appropriate. All activities on a search engine are driven by website content, which is perhaps why SEO’s consider website content so vital these days.

How does a search engine work?

Whenever something is typed on the search box of a search engine, the search engines uses crawlers to detect the typed word or words on websites listed in the search engine. If a website is well optimized through SEO tools and techniques, it is most likely to be picked up by the crawling web spiders released by the search engines. This will automatically results in showing these websites right on top of every search result. This explains why some websites rank better than others with a specific keyword search.

Once the crawling is over, the search engine will index all the contents of the website. The search string helps to index the pages according to the content searched. So if your website has the correct keywords, only then will it be indexed properly. Remember, algorithms are altered by search engines on a regular basis, so you need to be updated with the different changes made by search engines. If this adaptation is not made search engines will fail to index your website. Once a website is indexed the data is stored in the search engine servers and then retrieved according to the relevancy.

Today, SEO techniques are used by web marketing professionals worldwide to optimize and increase traffic to websites. The rate of conversion of websites is generally improved through search engine optimization. A good SEO technique in Digital Marketing strategy is one that is not just designed to put your website on top rankings on search engines but to also retain visitors and convert them into potential regular customers who will keep coming back to your website.

Types of SEO activities:

Basically, SEO activities have been split into two divisions. These are:

1. White hat SEO techniques. Techniques that adhere completely to the website policies and guidelines set for website optimization. A natural technique or route is taken by search engines to crawl and index the pages based on keywords and rank sites accordingly on search engines. No form of deceptive techniques like keyword stuffing is used in white hat SEO activities. Websites that adhere to white hat techniques are created keeping in mind their target audience and are thus very user content specific rather than being created to rank on search engines.

2. Black hat SEO techniques. Techniques that do not adhere to the search engine guidelines for search engine optimization are termed as black hat SEO techniques. The techniques used here are deceptive like keyword and Meta tag stuffing as well as alteration of the websites algorithms to rank on top of search engines. Incorporating hidden texts and cloaking are some of the other black hat techniques used by websites to rank themselves on top. Remember, one should not adhere to such black hat techniques for SEO as they can lead to a complete site ban if the search engine realizes it. Big search engines like Google take drastic steps to penalize a website using black hat SEO techniques to rank their websites which includes banning the website and its content for life on the search engine.

Websites should opt for white hat SEO techniques like proper and appropriate user driven content creation along with proper SEO activities like generating crosslink’s, back links, meta tags, keyword oriented page descriptions and generating content that is related to the keyword searched rather than stuffing the content with keywords.

Black hat and white hat seo techniques

The role of keywords in SEO:

Keywords play an important but not the main role where SEO activities are concerned. All keywords used in the content of a website should be related and created depending on the most typed or searched keywords on that particular topic. The content of a website as well as its keywords should also be upgraded and modified occasionally to adhere to the changing algorithms of websites. Also add relevant keywords to the Meta data of the website.

URL normalization is another technique that is also used to rank your websites, so keywords used on website URL's too must be specific to the content to drive in more traffic to the websites. Always use keywords with relevance. Use synonyms but do not stuff your page with the same keywords as this will result in stuffing.

Remember: Never supersaturate your content with seo-keywords. It will cause the ban of your site!

SEO has established itself to be one of the best Internet marketing strategies used on the Internet. There are paid as well as non paid optimization methods. Most SEO activities are conducted free of charge. The best websites are those that have used SEO activities to rank on the top 10 websites on search engines. SEO along with SEM or Search Engine Marketing, SMM or Social Media Marketing and Affiliate Marketing has become some of the best strategies applied by internet marketers to promote a website.

If you have a website of your own, you can either do its SEO activities yourself if you are experienced to handle the same or employ an SEO executive or Internet Marketing Company to do it for you. Your end result should be to drive more traffic to your website. The best SEO driven website is one which utilizes multiple SEO techniques to get better search engine rankings and visitors to its website. When you are applying SEO techniques to your website you need to be very patient to view the results as they take time to show their effectiveness. However do not solely depend on SEO activities to put your website on the top of search engines. Instead, develop a website that will appeal to your target audience. The content of your website should be interesting, appropriate and interactive to initiate maximum user interaction. Pictures used should be as appealing as the content.

Tips to build a SEO friendly website:

·        Insert appropriate and interesting content pages.

·        Include a site map for easy navigation.

·        Make URL's that are simple and SEO friendly.

·        Research on appropriate keywords and make nice on-site optimization.

·        Use relevant titles, Meta tags and Meta descriptions.

·        Build links – crosslink's and inbound links as well as backlinks.

·        Build blogs for your website, discussion forums and conduct social media marketing.

·        Take local search into account.

·        Use search engine tools for optimization like Google Webmaster tools.

·        Always aim to diversify your traffic.

·        Decrease the Bounce Rate of your site and try to increase the time user spend on your site.

If you keep these tips on top of your mind the SEO activities you use for your website will be far more effective and will give you the best results. You will see your website rank amongst the top performing websites across search engines and the conversion rate of your website will improve too. Using SEO techniques is a must for your website if you are truly interested in gaining returns from its online presence and performance.