A
beautiful designed website is not enough. At least not if you are
depending on a Search Engine to identify you as a source when someone
institutes a search on a keyword or phrase. For a non-business site you
may not care about Search Engine results. However, for a business
site it can be the difference between success and failure. Following is
a brief discussion on Search Engine Optimization (SEO).
SEO
Overview
The
Search Engines, and there are thousands of them, all have algorithms
they use to give a particular web page a value of importance. This is
called Page Rank (PR). The algorithms are all different and the
content of them are secret. Search Engines use Robots, sometimes
called Bots, Spiders or Web Crawlers, and their only duty is to crawl
all the sites on the Internet and log information into a data base about
each website they visit.
The information is gathered not only from the displayed website pages,
but also from the head section of the source code in your website. The
"head" section is not displayed on your site's pages, but does contain information
in the form of "meta tags", about your website and its
development. The Search Engines then use their algorithms to give
an importance factor on the data gathered and the result is your
PR. To see an example of source code, right click on the white
border of this page and then click on "View Source". You
will notice that only the code after the "<body"
tag is visible on this page.
SEO is a necessary subject of study in designing
successful websites. At this time, Google and their web crawler (called
GoogleBot) processes about 83% of the searches of the billions of
websites on the Internet, with all
the other engines no higher than about 7%. So, the question,
"What affects Google's opinion of a website?" is the basis of
our design tactics. Everyone is sure the following elements
are of importance in terms of high PR, not necessarily in the order
listed. |
Website
Title The
web crawler's first introduction to your identity. Make it
good!
The
title of a website should be the first item in the head section of your
source code and accurately state the purpose and represent the content
of the website's pages. The title should then be followed by text
rich in keywords that you use in your body copy that give more substance
to the title. For example: Tom Smith owns a shoe
store.
The
store's name is Smith Shoes. Tom wants to use that for his
website title.
Following
our own advice, we expand that to Smith Shoes - All Types from
Sneakers to Dress Shoes to Work Boots. Or something similar in
nature. But using this example, we must be sure that keywords like
Types, Sneakers, Dress Shoes, Work Boots all show up in various places
in the body of text on the opening page. We describe the title
then, as being rich in keyword content.
Your
title tag is placed at the top of your source code and would then look
something like this:
<html>
<head>
<title>Smith Shoes - All Types from Sneakers to Dress
Shoes to Work Boots</title>
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Website Description Not only describing the site, but assisting bots
with rich keywords for successful searches.
The Site
Description is the next item in your source code listing. It is
believed that GoogleBot gives a higher measure of importance to what it
perceives first. The same rules apply for the description as it
did for the title. You would want to expand the description with
rich key phrases also found in abundance in the body text. So
again we say, Smith Shoes the store for hard to fit feet. We
carry many styles and colors in all sizes that are sure to fit your feet
well. Or something in this nature that would describe what you
can and will do.
Your source
code will now look like this:
<html>
<head>
<title>Smith Shoes - All Types from Sneakers to Dress
Shoes to Work Boots</title>
<meta name="description" content="smith
shoes the store for hard to fit feet - we carry many styles and
colors in all sizes that are sure to fit your feet well">
<meta name="keywords" content="....
Another issue
is how you write the text and at what level of understanding is your
audience supposed to have. Good newspaper journalism says to write
as if your audience is at a 7th grade level. Do not use many
esoteric words that confound a viewers perception. This last
sentence is a good example of what not to do. Keep it simple. |
Keywords
and Key Phrases
These
play an important part in relaying information to a web crawler.
Keywords
and Key Phrases carry the same type of content and we will lump them
together in our SEO description. Both of these items appear in
"meta tags" like the description tag listed below the title
tag. All these tags in the head section of your source code are
invisible to the general public but is very descriptive to the web
crawlers searching your site. In HTML (Hyper Text Markup Language)
code the first thing that shows on your screen is what is inside the
"body" tag.
Your
keywords should reflect the one or two word combinations that you feel
people would use as a search item looking for the product you have
available and shown on your website. Keywords are shown in your
source code like this:
<meta
name="keywords" content="shoes,
boots, shoe sizes, shoe colors, work boots, etc..">
Key
phrases usually contain a complete phrase of words describing a type
of element of the body text. Key Phrases look like this:
<meta
name="key phrases" content="shoes
for hard to fit feet, shoe sizes from 5 to 13 and widths to EE,
etc..">
Some
people write a bunch of relevant keywords and then try and compose the
body copy text using as many as possible. I personally believe you
should write your text, first, saying what you want to tell your target
audience. This way, your text should flow well and get your
message across easily. If done properly, you will have enough rich
keywords and key phrases to conduct good searches.
I
don't believe it is necessary to separate keywords and key phrases, but
some Search Engines may wish to see them as separate items. And
after all, it's only one more line of code. |
Body
Text - Copywriting
The
art of composing text that will give a clear and concise understanding
of your products.
Text on your home page plays a
very important part in holding the interest of your site visitors. The structure of sentences should be geared towards the visitor, not
yourself. Try not to use words like I, me, mine, etc. 'You'
and 'yours' are good attention-getting words. More text means
higher page ranking from Search Engines.
Bullets are
another tool that play a very important part in design content. Copywriters don't always realize this. Bullets ( )
attract attention and
if the bullet 'points' are brief, they'll make excellent Meta Tag Key
Phrases.
Another great
word that viewers like is
FREE . Highlight the word so it draws
attention to itself. That word says, "No obligation!
Read some more!" Give away something that will be of value to
the reader. Trust me. You won't go broke doing this. If you mention that the free item changes periodically, there is an
incentive for the viewer to return. Repeated visits generate
customers. Try offering something that is of value, but not
related to the items you are trying to sell. A free bonus item of
some worth is invaluable as a sales tool.
Be brief. It is important that statements can be read without having to scan
several lines. Too much copy says, "Time to go somewhere
else" but remember that descriptive phrases are what Search Engines
show when your Website is displayed on their page. This may sound
like a Catch-22, but make your statements as descriptive and as brief as
possible.
The level of
language used should apply to the audience you are trying to capture. Let a seventh grade reader understand what you are saying.
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Design
- Layout
Use photos, graphics, text, colors and positioning that pleasing to the
eye and attract attention.
When
looking randomly at a page, the eye first travels to the area that
contrasts the most with the rest of the page. For example; if
everything is generally dark on a page, the eye will immediately seek an
area of light. Other things being equal, points of interest are
usually in the center of one of the four quadrants in a page. If
you divide the page in half, both horizontally and vertically, you will
have four rectangles. Good composition would place your key stuff
in the center of any of those rectangles.
Pictures
of people and your business or office are important to display on your
entry page. Your site now becomes more personal to visitors and
will generate a degree of trust that is instilled in them when they can
see your face or business. The use of graphics can play a big part
in creating an attractive web page, but there is a downside to
them.
First,
they load slowly and if there are a large amount of graphics, even small
in size, it may take a long time for the complete page to be
displayed. With that in mind, always save your files in the format
that will give you the smallest file size. Usually that is a .jpg
or .gif. Whenever possible, I would recommend using photos
in a 'thumbnail' size and let the viewer click on the picture for a full
size view.
Secondly,
GoogleBot does not recognize any type or text embedded in a
graphic. So, if your logo, for example is a .jpg you must
complete the alt tag with a good description of the graphic. Many
viewers, especially those on a dial-up connection will turn off graphics
so the pages will load faster. They read the alt tags for the
information needed.
Navigation
is another issue. Your internal links to other pages on your site
should always be located in the same physical space on each page. Usually at the top of the page or along the left border of the
page. Try to make your links from text rather than graphics for
the reason explained above. Links commonly are colored in
blue. A mouse-over effect that changes the color is alright to
use. We do that on these pages.
When
naming the various pages on your website, do not run the words in the
name together. Break up the words with hyphens or underscores. Also add a brief description to the page name. Ex:
"portfolio-website-content.htm". Bots will read those words
and understand them. When you run the words together, the
Bot sees it as a new word. The name then acts like a 'key phrase'
and is helpful in the Search Engine descriptions of your site.
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Link
Exchange
Links
may be the most important item for good PR
We
strongly recommend that every page of your website should have links to
all the other pages. GoogleBot needs to be able to navigate and
crawl your site easily. Links to external sites, many times are
embedded in the text on the page. The color of the link (usually
blue) should be different than the normal text color, so link
identification is easy. Search Engines believe that the quantity
of websites on the Internet that link to you is an indication of the
importance of your website. As a result of this, Link Exchange
programs were started where you can send a message to another website
that says you will publish their link if they publish yours.
Links
to other sites may raise your Page Ranking with many Search Engines,
however, the links should be useful to you and your target audience. Don't publish a lot of links just to improve your page ranking.
Look for other websites that might be of interest to your target
audience. And beware of 'Link Farms'. Your PR may plummet to
zero with the wrong links on your site. The accepted practice is
to only link with site that have a Google PR greater than zero, or as
high or higher than you own PR. This means that you will probably
have to build a positive PR before attempting any link exchanges. That means careful study using all the above criteria as guidelines for
your website development. |
Marketing
Overview
There
are many ways to market a product. Websites, Phone book yellow
pages, Newspaper ads, Direct Mail pieces, E-mail and of course Phone
Calls are great ways to spread the word about your business. The
website and marketing hints are the focus of our attention on this page. We will
discuss using other media with elements of your website as a means of
communication.
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Advertising
Our
sister site SPW Webwork was born after it's owner had retired from a
web designer position from a major corporation in Silicon
Valley. He designed a website for a friend and one for his
church. Soon the demand for his services forced him from the
leisure of retirement to ex-retirement and the inception of
http://www.spwwebwork.com
and later the development of Bowie Web Design.
Our
sister site, SPW Webwork has reasonable success with an advertising
method costing next to nothing. Use existing graphics another
page was designed. The design was made as if was advertising
copy for a publication. Using graphics generated in-house an Ad
Page was developed. The page has been edited three times to date
because of comments from viewers. The only major expense was
time. The page served twodistinct purposes.
-
It
was also used as an insert on an E-mail message sent to a specific
target audience.
-
Lastly,
it was printed and sent as a Direct Mail Piece to a target
audience.
We
have no demographics on the impact of this on our bottom line. Our business however, is growing and we do attribute it to our active
pursuit of marketing hints and help and these types of activities.
Our
community has a weekly Shopper that ran this brief ad.
RETIRED
WEBSITE DESIGNER
available for web work. 872-8399
http://www.bowiewebdesign.com
This
resulted in 3 new clients the first day the ad ran. By the end
of the month, several more clients and many inquiries gave us the
start of a good 'potential client' data base. All this for a
$50.00 ad.
There
are many professional companies that can be very helpful in getting
your website listed on Search Engines with a high PR and guarantee you
a large amount of hits on your website. Remember though, that
many hits do not always mean many sales. Try to always target
your market audience and focus on what they would look for when
surfing the Internet. We have not used any specific organization
that specializes in this process, so we do not have a recommendation
for you. We went to the Google Search Engine and entered "website promotion".
Google gave us 5,210,000 sources. Amazing!
Bowie
Web Design has experience in SEO, Marketing, Copywriting, Graphic
Design and is pleased to offer you help in these areas
FREE of charge.
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