Outsourcing - BPO
Search Engine Optimization --- An Overview
Search engine optimization is one of most popular online marketing
tool for any website. With most websites looking forward to increasing
the online sales of their products/services, search engine optimization
can be a very cost-effective tool to target and procure your customers
online. In this paper, we will discuss about search engine optimization,
its benefits and how you can optimize your website for top search
engine rankings.
What is search engine optimization?
Search engine optimization (also known by various other names
like search engine ranking, search engine promotion, website promotion,
SEO etc.) is a method through which a website is given top rankings
in various search engines. According to a recent industry study,
1 in every 20 people go to the second page of search results pages,
but only 1 in every 100 people go beyond that. So, by top search
engine rankings, we mean that your website should be within the
first two pages of the search results, preferably in the first
page (i.e. within top 10 rankings).
2. What are the prime benefits of search engine optimization?
§ Top search engine rankings result in more pre-qualified
business leads coming to your website which in turn can convert
to greater sales for your organization.
§ Search engine promotion is one of the cheapest methods
of advertizing for your organization. Compared to advertizements
in the newspapers/magazines or in the television, search engine
promotion costs many times less and can bring more traffic to
your websites, thereby providing greater ROI.
§ Search engine optimization enhances online brand identity
of your organization.
3. What are the key factors for your website to have top search
engine rankings?
Search engines change their algorithms frequently, thereby forcing
the search engine optimization companies to re-strategize their
search engine optimization techniques. However, the following
attributes are basic and play a major role in procuring top search
engine rankings.
a. Keyword Research – Keywords play the most vital role
in your search engine optimization campaign. Keywords (can be
1, 2, 3 or more words) are the search terms which a surfer types
in the search box of a search engine to reach your website. Let
us consider that you are an “India-based Outsourcing consultant”
interested in optimizing your website for top search engine rankings.
The following are some of the keywords which surfers will type
to reach your website -
Keywords
bpo
bpo india
bpo outsourcing services
business outsourcing services
business process outsourcing
offshore companies
offshore outsourcing
offshore outsourcing services
offshore services
outsource india
outsourcing companies
outsourcing consultants
outsourcing india
outsourcing services
outsourcing services company
Keyword research tips –
* Always target keywords that best describe your products/service.
* Try to find multiword potential keywords compared to single
keywords.
* Try formulating keywords which give answers to as “why/how/what
…….?”
* Utilize your server log files to know what your customers
searched most while visiting your site.
* Use keyword generator softwares like Wordtracker (http://www.wordtracker.com)
or Overture (http://inventory.overture.com/d/searchinventory/suggestion/)
* Include popular common misspellings (e.g. viagra typed as
viagara etc.) in your keyword list.
b. Title of the webpage - …… - Title has a deep impact
on your website’s search engine rankings. Experience shows
that most companies use the following as title of their index
page which can prevent them from getting top search engine rankings.
Welcome to the website of XYZ.com
For example, let’s continue with the above example of “India-based
Outsourcing consultant”.
An ideally optimized title should contain the top 3-5 keywords
of your business, e.g. outsourcing consultants, outsourcing india,
outsource india
Optimized Title - Outsourcing Consultants, Outsourcing India,
Outsource India
c. Description Meta tag of the webpage – Description of
a webpage also plays important role in getting top search engine
rankings.
Optimized Description - Develop a suitable description based
on your top 3 keywords
d. Keywords Meta Tag of the webpage - This meta tag was of great
importance at one time. But rampant manipulations (i.e. multiple,
often non-relevant keyword stuffing in the “keywords”
tag), leading to abuse has resulted in search engines giving lesser
importance to “keywords” tag while ranking sites. Nevertheless,
you can always place top 3 – 5 keywords of your site in the
“keywords” tag.
Optimized Keywords -
e. Importance of Content/Keyword-enriched optimized pages for
top search engine rankings –
Well, if there is one aspect which holds supreme importance in
search engine, specially in Google ranking, then it is this. Yes,
content! The popular industry say – “Content is King”
was perhaps devised by watching Google’s love for content.
Develop content based on the top keywords related to your business.
While developing content for your web pages, keep in mind the
keyword density (KD).
Mathematically speaking, Keyword Density is the ratio of the
total number of time a keyword is repeated divided by the total
content words. Since KD is normally represented in percentage,
the above figure is to be multiplied by 100
For example, if you have developed a web page of around 250 words
on the keyword “search engine optimization”, and that
particular keyword (search engine optimization) is repeated 10
times, then
Keyword Density (KD) = 10/250 * 100 = 4%
As a thumb rule, Keyword Density of an optimized page for top
search engine rankings should vary between 2 – 7 % (this
figure varies among different search engines)
4. Submission of Keyword-enriched optimized pages – After
you have finished content development for the optimized pages
based on the keywords targeted for top search engine rankings,
submit those pages to various search engines.
1. Google - http://www.google.com/addurl.html
2. AlltheWeb - http://addurl.alltheweb.com/add_url
3. AltaVista - http://addurl.altavista.com/addurl/new
4. MSN - http://submitit.bcentral.com/msnsubmit.htm
5. Role of Link Popularity in top search engine rankings –
Link popularity has assumed tremendous importance for getting
good ranks in Google now a days. In fact, what started as a friendly
reciprocal link exchange program among various webmasters has
now become a sub-industry within the SEO industry itself, with
thousands of link farms popping up every day! Yes, if you are
interested in getting top ranks in search engines, especially
Google, then you must pay effort in building up links for your
site.
Create a html page, preferably named as “Resources/Links/Partners”
and place a link of this page from Index Page of your site. This
page should never be more than 1 click away from the index page
of your site, else webmasters won’t be interested in participating
in the reciprocal link exchange program.
Target both “industry-related” and “non-industry-related”
websites as your link exchange partners. For example, if you are
providing outsourcing services, then try getting links from “industry-related
websites (i.e. websites dealing with outsourcing services, maybe
your business rivals!). This is important, because if 10 of your
rival sites give links to your site, then Google will surely pay
importance to your site, because getting links from rival companies
are difficult. Your site MUST be of some high caliber, else the
other 10 sites won’t have linked! Also, try procuring links
from top ranked general informative websites as well.
Always exchange links with websites which have high Google PageRank
(PR) of at least 4, the more the better! (both Index Page as well
as Resources/Links Page of the Link Partner’s site should
have PRs of >=4) [PageRank is a proprietary tool that Google
uses to determine the importance of a page and varies in a scale
of 0 (least important) to 10 (maximum importance)].
Have a link code ready for participating in link exchange program.
Here is a sample link code for an India-based Outsourcing consultant.
- Indian outsourcing consultant providing guidance to companies
willing to set up outsourcing centers in India.
Always prefer a text link (as given above) in comparison to a
banner link, where your chance of Google and other search engine
spiders finding the potential keywords is limited only to the
“alt tag” of the banner. Also, Google pays importance
to the text of the incoming link/anchor text (i.e. the incoming
link text must contain high potential, relevant keywords), so
develop a link text with title (”indian outsourcing consultant“)
which will help you in Google Ranking.
Refrain from javascript link code because Google spider finds
it difficult to index.
Key SEO Factors
* Targeting the right keywords for your website
* Title of your webpage
* Description Meta tag of your webpage
* Keywords Meta tag of your webpage
* Quality, Informative Content
* Link Popularity
Conclusion -
With Google’s numero uno position in the search engine market
being threatened by arch-rivals Yahoo! [bought Overture, the largest
PPC search engine recently, who in turn bought Altavista and Alltheweb]
and Microsoft’s MSN [believed to be developing its own search
engine], it is no doubt that the search engine industry is going
to experience tremendous changes in the next few months. The recent
Google “Florida” Update is just one of the many upheavals
that we may be witnessing in an industry where the only constant
factor is the “change”. However, the various techniques
outlined in this paper are basic and are we believe that following
them you will be able to achieve top 10 ranks in Google and other
search engines.
About The Author
Prabuddha S Raychaudhuri is the Founder & CEO of Search Engine
Optimization Guru Pvt. Ltd. (http://www.searchengine-optimization-guru.com),
a premiere Search Engine Optimization and Marketing (SEO/SEM)
consultancy firm, catering to clients which range from Fortune
500 to small home business start-ups. Our services include Top
10 Google and other search engines rankings, Pay Per Click (PPC)
targeted traffic campaign, Paid Listing Management, Keyword Advertizing.
Prabuddha holds a Bachelor Of Engineering (B.E.) in Construction
Engineering and can be contacted at prabuddha@searchengine-optimization-guru.com.
prabuddha@searchengine-optimization-guru.com
Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/
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