Creating a great website is half the battle; the other half is to get it noticed on the web. The favorite method which has been used by many Internet Marketers for the past decade is to rank their online property on Google Search. That number one spot or even the first page can make a great difference when it comes to attracting visitors to your page, but how can one achieve these ranking?
The Google Algorithm is a very complex tool which is constantly being tweaked to allow only the most relevant results on top of its pages. This algorithm is not revealed to the public, nor does it discriminate between individuals when it comes to online content, which means that anyone in the world has an equal chance of getting their site on the first page. It is however important to understand that this process takes time and that nothing will happen if enough effort isn’t put into ranking your site.
The first thing a successful webmaster must know when it comes to ranking websites is Search Engine Optimization or SEO. This acronym will be thrown at you very often if you decide to venture in this field, but what is it exactly? Some Internet Gurus market it as “voodoo” or magic they perform on their sites in order for them to rank on the first page. Search Engine Optimization is actually very simple, it is the action of providing your website with the best possible tools to succeed on the web. SEO is broken down into two major branches: on-page SEO and off-page SEO. It is crucial to have optimal on-page SEO before moving on; this article will therefore only cover the best practices when it comes to your own web pages.
The first rule of internet marketing is to have unique content, and this is absolutely crucial. Google quickly notices pages that have been copied from other sources, and they rarely rank. Unique content is not the only thing Google requires: it also weeds out pages that try to cheat their way to the top. Stay away from the shady methods you’ll come across all over the web, and take no easy shortcuts! Once you’ve chosen a topic, use a keyword tool such as Google Keyword Planner to pick the right keyword for each page. If you are just starting out, set realistic goals and pick a keyword with low competition. With your keyword in hand, write a thorough, helpful article or page that covers the topic well, using your keyword naturally in the text. Your article will also need a catchy title that contains the keyword, and a description that mentions it.
There are many discussions and debates online claiming that a keyword has to be included ten or twenty times, once or twice in the title, or at the beginning or end of your article, but you need to understand that these are simply speculation. Google has said there is no ideal keyword density. Nobody outside Google knows exactly how to get a page to the top spot, but you now have the tools to experiment and see what works best for you!