Popularity contests and algorithms are not just for high school students"¦

What is SEO?

Search engine optimization (SEO) has played a large role in how the internet has developed for a very long time.  Over time search engines have gotten better and smarter in how they figure page placement and rank, making SEO more complex.  SEO changes every few months.    

SEO is an attempt by algorithms to analyze information on a webpage in order to better present the information that is most updated and accurate to the right audience.  SEO is based on key word structures and web data involved in a website that have variable influence on rank. 

How Do I Score?

A page or site is going get a mathematical score.  Think of it like your site is going to take a math test.  There are immeasurable amounts of numerals with several tests and each of them grade on a curve.  The highest scored site with the most qualifications (or tests passed) will be the first link at the top of the page.  So how is your score added up?

1. The URL and Page Names

The number one factor in ranking a page is the name of the site.  That's why the smartest thing anybody can do in order to improve their reputation is to buy www.(Insert-Your-Company-Name-Or-Product).com.  Then consider the name of the pages within the site.  If you post to a news page, you want the name of that press release page to be "www.This-Press-Release-About-Something.html".

2. Description

The meta data, or meta information, is the description of the content in a page that is written into the page's structure.  The most important piece of the meta information is the page description itself.  The page description needs to match the content in the page. 

3. Content

Content is a two-part factor.  The descriptions and keywords in the description field need to match up with the content of the webpage itself.  You could have a single page that's really well written, but the entire website has its own specific score.  The score of the page itself is based off of density.  Choose your keywords wisely and never more than 1-3.  Too many keywords will water down the pages focus significantly.  So what do you want to be; a Jack-of-All-Trades or a definitive source for your product or service?

4. Backlinks

A Backlinks is an incoming links to a website or web page.  The search engines don't care who your partners are, or how cool they are; it is their responsibility to present relevant information.  When linking to another page, you need to find web pages that have information matching the density and keyword phrases to the page it's linking to on your websites.  The search engines use that link as a very high qualification factor in the algorithmic scoring curve. 

5. Growth

These techniques all have a growth factor.  Search engines want to see webpages and websites expand.  In other words, if you've got a 1000 links to your site and the site next to you has 1000 links, but they recently grew from 800 to 1000 links and you've been at 1000 links for two years, the other site is going to outrank you. This is because they're growing in a shorter amount of time and because they're growing continuously.  Are you starting to comprehend the complexity of good SEO? 

6. The Aging Algorithm

Similar to the growth factor is the Aging Algorithm.  The Aging Algorithm limits the amount of SEO techniques you can implement, and it limits them based off of your page rank.  The higher the page rank, the more the search engine trusts your situation and the more they allow you to use your efforts to qualify.

We couldn't hire a huge team and blow up a website overnight with a ton of SEO techniques because the Aging Algorithm rules the school.  A word of caution: offending search engines using any sort of questionable or dishonest techniques will tarnish your site's record.  It's very difficult to work your way up the ranks after your site has been red-flagged by a search engine. 

Have patience in gaining ranking.  Search engines don't care about how fast you want to progress.  They want you to grow as naturally as possible.  However, if you are very interested and very good at following their rules, they will allow you to grow as fast as they allow.

To Sum Up, if You've Got:

1.      A relevant URL name for your website

2.      Relevant page descriptions

3.      Rich and Relevant content

4.      Relevant links similar to your page

5.      Regular growth

6.      Website age

You've just scored a really high rank for your page.