Use Keyword Optimization to Improve Your Web Page Rankings

If you want your website to appear in the top 30 results when someone searches for your keywords, keyword optimization is critical. When building a new website, you first need to develop a keyword strategy and perform keyword research. The next step is to create a wireframe that maps out the relationships between the keywords you intend to target. If you've already done that or have an existing website you can begin to optimize individual pages.

You need to make liberal use of keywords in your website (see online copywriting) copy and ensure they appear in the right places with the right frequency.

It's easy to get all the free search engine traffic you deserve! Learn how.

A web page is made up of many different HTML tags. In addition to the copy you see on most websites, there are HTML tags that create text links and text of different sizes and styles. There are title, description, keyword, and alt tags. In order to capture search engine referrals for specific keywords you need to become familiar with these HTML tags and web page elements. The following HTML tags are some of the most important tags you need to become familiar with when embarking on a search engine or keyword optimization program:

• Title Tag - The title tag appears at the top of the browser window. The title of this page is "Keyword placement for top search engine rankings from Keyword Marketing Superstar". Most search engines will display the contents of the title tag in their listings.
• Description Tag - The description tag appears in the head section of a web page. It is displayed in some search engines and should contain one or more repetitions of the primary keyword associated with the web page.
• Keywords Tag - The keywords tag appears in the head section of a web page. It is simply simply a list of keywords that represent the content of the web page.
• Alt tags - The Alt tag is shot for alternate text. Is is used in conjunction with an image. Since search engines do not typically read the content of images and some people use their browsers with images turned off the alt tag was created to fill in for a missing image.
• Headers - Headers are larger than average text headings found at the top of a web page. They provide a snapshot summary of the content of the page and should be in HTML text format, not image format.
• Bold Text - Naturally, bold text is used to show emphasis and can be a vital part of the copy on a web page.
• Link Text - Link text is the hypertext that links one page to another. In order to help your visitors find what they want and show search engines what your pages are about, use keywords in link text instead of words like Click here!
• Body copy - Naturally, a page about keyword optimization would contain the term "keyword optimization" in the body copy. When writing copy for your web pages, use the desired keyword as early as possible in the web page, a few times throughout, and again near the end of the page.

Include keyword optimization from the start

If optimization is part of the initial planning and both keywords and the sales process are taken into account from the start, your marketing costs are likely to be much lower in the long run. Search engines are much more likely to deliver a steady stream of incremental traffic to your site for free.

To learn more about specific HTML tags mentioned above, click on the bold names of the tags and page elements. Every single page in your website is a potential entry point through which a search engine may deliver visitors to your door. You should take keywords into account and plan to optimize for them on every page of your site if possible.

If you want a page to target a specific keyword, at minimum, that keyword should be present in the title tag, in a header if possible, a couple times in the description tag, a few times in the keywords tag (though the keyword tag has been greatly depreciated in some engines like Google), several times in the body copy and in at least one incoming and one outgoing text link.

Keep in mind that search engines only read text in text format. An image or multimedia file containing text is essentially invisible to an engine and will do nothing to help your rankings and may in fact make your site virtually invisible in the search engines.

Once your site is optimized, site analytics and ROI tracking will help you learn to track your results. The pay per click advertising section will give you the knowledge to make intelligent keyword buys, and identify the best programs to use.

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