SEO Marketing Strategy
Search engine optimization (SEO) is the process of improving the volume and quality of traffic to a web site from search engines via “natural” (”organic” or “algorithmic”) search results.Normally, the earlier a site is presented in the search results, or the higher it “ranks,” the more searchers will visit that site. SEO can also target various kinds of search, including image search, local search, and industry-specific vertical search engines.
As a marketing strategy for increasing a site’s popularity and relevancy, SEO considers how search algorithms work and what people search for. SEO efforts involve a site’s coding, presentation, and structure, as well as fixing problems that could prevent search engine indexing programs from fully spidering a site. Other, more noticeable efforts include adding unique content to a site, and making sure that the content is easily indexed by search engines and also appeals to human visitors.
The acronym “SEO” also refer to “search engine optimizers,” a term adopted by an industry of consultants who carry out optimization projects on behalf of clients, and by employees who perform SEO services in-house. Search engine optimizers usually offer SEO as a stand-alone service or as a part of a broader marketing campaign.Since effective SEO may require changes to the HTML source code of a site, SEO tactics may be incorporated into web site development and design. The term “search engine friendly” may also be used to describe web site designs, menus, content management systems and shopping carts that are easy to optimize.
SEO companies that employ overly aggressive techniques can even get their client websites banned from the search results. In the year 2005, the Wall Street Journal profiled a company, Traffic Power, that allegedly used high-risk techniques and failed to disclose those risks to its clients. Wired reported the same company sued a blogger for mentioning that they were being banned. Google’s Matt Cutts later confirmed that Google did in fact ban Traffic Power and some of its clients as well.
Few search engines have also reached out to the SEO industry, and are frequent sponsors and guests at SEO conferences and seminars. In fact, with the advent of paid inclusion, some search engines have a vested interest in the health of the optimization community. Major search engines give information and guidelines to help with site optimization. Google also has a Sitemaps program to help webmasters learn if Google is having any problems indexing their website and also provides data on Google traffic to the website. Yahoo! Site Explorer provides a way for webmasters to submit their URLs, determine how many pages are in the Yahoo! index and view link information easily.
The use of white hat techniques is essential in SEO as rightly pointed out in this post. As the internet is expanding the importance of online marketing and ranking on Google has increased manifold. Now whether you are a small business or an established one, search engine ranking is essential to the success. Taking risks by using black hat techniques is just not worth it. I could not even imagine what would happen to our business if our website were to be baned form search engines completely.