Chapter 1. An Introduction to Search Engine Optimization

This chapter lays the foundation for what's to come later in the book. It introduces the basic concepts, terms, and fundamental information needed to understand the rationale behind the techniques discussed in the subsequent chapters. While some of the content in this chapter will be known to experienced users, it will be essential content for newbies and those who are not SEO specialists.

The topics covered in this chapter include:

• An introduction to the SEO process

• An SEO vocabulary

• An explanation of how search engines view your site

What is SEO?

At the most basic level, SEO is an acronym that stands for Search Engine Optimization. More importantly, for the purposes of the philosophy espoused in this text, SEO is a process: a series of planning and executing steps that lead to a website being optimized to perform its best on the search engines.

Notice the emphasis on process; SEO is not something you do once and then forget about. While an intensive period of attention to your site's optimization factors can lay a solid foundation and get you off to a proper start, if you do not continue to make efforts to improve your optimization and respond to market conditions, your rankings will erode over time. Moreover, your efforts do not exist in isolation; there are others out there competing for rankings and traffic.

In order to succeed, you need to do your best to stay ahead of the others fighting for ranking for their sites.

Note

When we talk about search engines in this text, we mean Google, Bing, Baidu, or other similar sites focused on allowing the general public to search for and find information on the web. Typically, what works for one search engine will work for others. Though there are peculiarities and optimization strategies that can be applied to target specific engines, most SEO techniques are search engine agnostic.

The competition for online attention should never be underestimated. If you are in a competitive business vertical, ­ be it travel, finance, gambling, web design, property, or any number of others, ­ the fight for traffic from the search engines is cut-throat. Never forget that the major players out there have dedicated SEO teams that do nothing every day but tweak, optimize, build links, create content, and generally do their best to out-compete all other similar businesses vying for the top spots on the search engines.

In this book, we put forward a methodology for search engine optimization. The process we advocate can be viewed broadly as having two parts: foundations and on-going efforts. We start by looking at how to lay a great foundation for your site, that is, the basics of creating a search engine-friendly site. In later chapters, we turn our attention to on-going techniques for maintaining and improving your rankings over time. Along the way, we look at how to formulate and implement a coherent search engine strategy.

Note

Never forget, for most site owners the actual goal is traffic generation, not pure search engine ranking.

While many of the issues in SEO relate to technical aspects of the site, there is much more to SEO than just getting the tech right. One of the fundamental principles advocated in this book is to focus on the creation of useful, unique content. There is a strong positive correlation between high quality content and high site ranking. This is one of the few areas where the search engines provide specific guidance about what they are looking for in a site. On the subject of quality, Google provides the following guidance:

• Make pages primarily for users, not for search engines. Don't deceive your users or present different content to search engines than you display to users, which is commonly referred to as "cloaking."

• Avoid tricks intended to improve search engine rankings. A good rule of thumb is whether you'd feel comfortable explaining what you've done to a website that competes with you. Another useful test is to ask, "Does this help my users? Would I do this if search engines didn't exist?"

Note

For more insights from Google, visit http://support.google.com/webmasters/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=35769.

Bing also emphasizes the importance of content and advises as follows:

• Ensure content is built based on keyword research to match content to what users are searching for

• Produce deep, content rich pages; be an authority for users by producing excellent content

• Set a schedule and produce new content frequently

• Be sure content is unique — don't reuse content from other sources

Note

Don't try to outsmart Google — it's not going to work. Even if you find a way to artificially manipulate your rankings, there will come a day, very soon, when Google will pick up on it and make adjustments to their algorithms. When that happens, your site rankings will plummet and you will go from being a hero to zero.

While content is critical, it should not be your only concern. SEO practitioners often disagree about the relative importance of various factors in site rankings, but there is general agreement on which factors play a part. The search engine business is very competitive, and companies like Google and Bing do not disclose details of how their algorithms work. Fortunately for us, there is a considerable body of third party research focused on discerning trends and patterns in search engine ranking. One of the best sources of information on this topic is SeoMoz's Search Ranking Factors, a report they publish free of charge and update annually. The data in the report comes from interviews of more than 130 SEO specialists and from a large data set that seeks to identify correlations between site variables and search engine rank.

Note

View the report online by visiting http://www.seomoz.org/article/search-ranking-factors.

Among the factors that are agreed to be significant are the following:

• Keywords in the domain name

• Keywords in a page's URL

• Keywords in the content title

• Keyword placement on a page

• Keyword repetition on a page

• Uniqueness of content

• Freshness of content

• Facebook activity

• Twitter activity, including influence of account tweeting

• Google+ activity

• Social media up votes and comments

• Click-through rate for the site

• Bounce rate for the site

• Number, quality, and content of links to this site

• Number of internal links

• Number of errors on site

• Speed of site

In sum, the SEO process requires a multifaceted approach. At the most fundamental level, you need to create a site that is search engine-friendly, but in order to excel, you must do more. SEO requires concerted effort across time and you must also focus on the creation of unique, quality content.

Note

The future of SEO

SEO is a moving target. The search engines are constantly adjusting their algorithms and practitioners are constantly trying new strategies and modifying their approach. While it is impossible to predict with any accuracy what the future of SEO will bring, there is some consensus among experts about which direction it is moving in. Generally speaking, we believe the future will see a continued emphasis on determining the perceived value of each site. This will be done by looking at not only the quality of the site's content, but also social media signals and site traffic patterns. Site performance will also continue to be a factor, with faster, better built sites being preferred over slow, badly engineered sites.

These factors are consistent with what we know about the general goals the search engines aspire to, that is, to be able to perceive sites more like users perceive them, rather than as a purely mathematical exercise.