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View Full Version : some golden rules on those Search engine thingys


DeveloperBloke
5th December 2005, 13:34
heres how to get your site higher in the rankings

1. Ensure that you have a decent paragraph of text in your home page (and any other pages) which explains exactly what you do. in this text include keywords and keyphrases (i usually write these out first). try to, if possible, use the more likened keywords and phrases up to three times, no more needed. phrases are becoming the better way to add, if someone wants to learn russian, they rtype in learn russian, or, how to learn russian, not just russian. add a meta description tag with a short concise description of your site, include a few keywords if you can

2. add a keyword to all images on the page.

3. if possible, add some text with your keywords in within a <h1> tag.

4. in the title of the page, for the first word, add your best keyword, followed by a few more, but no more than about 35 characters

5. add your list of keywords to the meta keywords tag for the page. it is very important to only use words or phrases on the page. very important

6. do this for every page, and also add a site map, so that the engines can crawl every page in your site.

7. always use absolute links within your site, these count as incoming links (explained below), http://www.yoursite.com/home.htm, as opposed to home.htm

8. and the most important of all, is get links to your site from as many other sites as possible, using absolute links (http://www.yoursite.com/home.htm, as opposed to http://www.yoursite.com). Try and get sites with a higher google page rank, as these are seen as stronger links. also, add some links from your site to other strong sites, though it is best if you can to have loads of links incoming, as opposed to having recipricol links. One thng i do, is just go round (very boring) and register on all the web directories i can f ind

follow these steps and you will see results, though it can take ages (up to three months)

another hack, is to add a no script tag to your site. search engines spider without javascript, so they will see the text in the noscript tag, though your users wont. But, beware that if your user has javascript turned off, then they will also see the no script text! this is not a practiced method but it works

dont whatever you do, use software to bump your site up. if they search engine realises this, your url will get banned forever! they dont like it.

dont create dummy home pages, search engines are very clever. I have read that engines are now able to spot a page o ftext with a refresh = 0, and they dont like it.

put it this way. if you try to up your placings by trying to spoof the engines, they arent going to like it. they are there to provide people with un biased rankings based on content, so if they see you cheating they will ban you.

i am sure that there are other twaeks you can do, but this is all i can remember at the mo. obviously, it helps if your business is different. getting to the top of google for sex is very very tough indeed. as said earlier, use phrases.

other ways to get your site seen are below

adwords (payperclick)
these are great, as people cliking them want to see your site. but, they can be expensive, especially if you are in a big market (such as gifts). you need to ensure that your site will convert them into customers, to cover the costs.

banner adverts
these are ok, but more so for the links to your site to help your listing, nearly no one in the world click on banners any more, they may read them, but i have never seen an instance of a site get more bsuiness throguh the use of banner advertising using services like traffic swarm. it is a low conversion rate indeed.

register your site on Dmoz.org. can take up to a year, but there are thousands of engines whcih use thsi directory

also, try and change the text for yoru site occassionally. when a search engine spiders you, if its the same as last time, you go down. this is from personal experience of clients i have had in the past. just change the text slightly to prevent this.


anyhow, im sure that there will be other things people add, but this will get you started


j

Top Hat
5th December 2005, 13:47
Very good post.

I use http://www.geocities.com/spamtheengines/ to knobble the opposition it’s a bit easier :wink:

DeveloperBloke
5th December 2005, 13:57
:twisted: muhahahahahahah.....cough..splutter.....i mean...

thats very naughty, and un ethical

DuaneJackson
5th December 2005, 14:03
Good stuff.

Don't the two comments below contradict each other though?

another hack, is to add a no script tag to your site. search engines spider without javascript, so they will see the text in the noscript tag, though your users wont.



if you try to up your placings by trying to spoof the engines, they arent going to like it. they are there to provide people with un biased rankings based on content, so if they see you cheating they will ban you.

DeveloperBloke
5th December 2005, 14:17
strictly speaking no, because it is perfectly legitimate to have a no script tag, but it usually just says something like, javascript is turned off, this site wont work.

it is used on sites which rely on javascript

j

duenna
5th December 2005, 14:17
Please so not use <no script> tags for anything but their intention. That is to offer an alternative for browsers that do not support scripts!

Do not stuff keywords into images!!!!!! Thats bad. Alt text is for an alternative representation of an image not for keywords! Got nothing to say about an image? then say nothing leave the alt=" " with a space, this will validate aswell.

If you want legitimate additional content for your website then how about providing a well crafted valid page of just pure text. Can be formatted with CSS and include what your about, why you are so goos and your contact details. This text only content is for people with impared vision who use screen readers, who just want your information without having to put up with the visual stuff you give them.

DuaneJackson
5th December 2005, 14:20
hehe, i knew this thread was going to blow up in to a minefield as soon as I read it. I could find fault or counter-arguments with a few points, but it's all debateable.

SEO is a contentious issue, I'm staying well out of this one!

DeveloperBloke
5th December 2005, 14:46
hehe, i knew this thread was going to blow up in to a minefield as soon as I read it. I could find fault or counter-arguments with a few points, but it's all debateable.

so am i :P

Do not stuff keywords into images!!!!!! Thats bad. Alt text is for an alternative representation of an image not for keywords! Got nothing to say about an image? then say nothing leave the alt=" " with a space, this will validate aswell


alt text is perfectly legitimate. you dont stuff it full of keywords, add alt text whic contains your keywords,

Please so not use <no script> tags for anything but their intention. That is to offer an alternative for browsers that do not support scripts!

as i state, this is a hack, not recommended, but perfectly legitimate. for instance, i worked on a site a few years back. theri site used js heavily. so what he did was stuff all of th etext about the site intot he no script, so if a user went their without js, then they could read the sites text, like your text only page,



i do agree with your text only page, but then that will be picked up by the engines, and not your home page

as duane states, SEO is a huge issue, and there are many many factors and methods of doing things, all i have done is merely stated legitimate ways of improving your sites ranking for people who dont have a clue. these ways have worked for me on many occassions with many of my cleints sites. i used to do a lot of seo work, but i find it boring now, so i would rather just let people know how i used to do it, if they want to try it, then good, if not then thats good too.

j

mattk
5th December 2005, 17:36
The golden rule for search engines is:

Content is king.

Sorry folks. No secret formulas or magic keys here!

Jayne
5th December 2005, 17:50
I enjoyed reading the post, very educational :D

Thanks

Jayne

Hayles
5th December 2005, 19:29
I enjoyed reading the post too.... but didn't understand a damn word of it! :D

Jayne
5th December 2005, 22:45
I understood it...whipee! Does that mean i've moved to the dark side :lol:

Jayne

DarrenH
6th December 2005, 07:14
Hi

Whoever said leave the "alt" attribute blank needs to visit www.w3c.org

People with site problems will not be able to get a grasp of what an image is if the "alt" tag is left blank.

Darren

DeveloperBloke
6th December 2005, 16:30
I understood it...whipee! Does that mean i've moved to the dark side

come into the light, :D

Content is king
perfect summary

so there you have it people, thats what you pay the seo guys for, just do it yourself, or at least tell your web bloke to

cheers

j

creospace
6th December 2005, 16:51
It's perfectly acceptable to leave the alt tag blank if the picture is nothing more than eye candy.

Gary

Enigma121
6th December 2005, 20:52
It's perfectly acceptable to leave the alt tag blank if the picture is nothing more than eye candy.

Gary

I'd go a bit further than this Creospace, every img tag MUST have an alt tag in order to be valid W3C HTML code. The alt tag is a mandatory part of the markup.

We can choose to add descriptive text or just leave it blank.

creospace
6th December 2005, 21:06
Well yes that goes without saying but I was refering to whether it had any text in it or not!

DarrenH
7th December 2005, 04:45
Hi

Sorry folks, but I'm speeking as a blind person myself, and whether the image is eye candy or not, I want it fully accessible to me, what I choose to make of it or do with it is up to me.

One person's eye candy might be something essential to my browsing experience.

It's a question of accessibility not whether it's correct mark up or not.

Darren