May

...a common comment I have heard over the years is; "I've spent a lot of time preparing all of the content for my web site and put a lot of time and money into building my site, so, where are all of the visitors?" ...some people have even said they were so discouraged that they were considering "taking their site down" as they were questioning whether it was even worth the cost of 'having' a web site at all ...first of all, just to get this out of the way - these days it is extremely difficult to have an ongoing successful business, or to maintain and/or grow a group, or organization, without maintaining "some kind" of web site, as today, more and more people are turning 'first' to the Internet to research what they are looking for, or to get more detailed information before joining a group or organization

...further discussions inquiring into what they have been doing to 'promote' their web site has led to some, well, I'll say, 'interesting' responses ...while the 'World Wide Web' and having a web site does indeed fall into the realm of "build it and they will come", visitor traffic is 'not' something that happens automatically ...developing and maintaining visitor traffic is a never-ending process ...today, most people that have and maintain their own web site have at least heard the terms "Search Engine Optimization (SEO)" and "Search Engine Marketing (SEM) - but many have expressed confusion as to what SEO and SEM 'really' means and what is involved

...first of all, as described at Wikipedia.org; Search Engine Optimization (SEO) "optimizes" website content to achieve a higher ranking in search results, for example, by incorporating specific keywords or links associated with the website. Search Engine Marketing (SEM) is a form of Internet marketing that seeks to promote websites by increasing their visibility in search engine result pages (SERPs) through the use of paid placement, contextual advertising, and paid inclusion. Depending on the context, SEM can be an umbrella term for various means of marketing a website including SEO, or it may contrast with SEO, focusing on just paid components.

...all of the various tasks related to SEO and SEM can be a time-consuming and involved process, which has led to the formation of many companies that specialize in, and provide services specifically relating to, just SEO and/or SEM ...these types of services can cost from a couple hundred dollars to thousands of dollars per month ...as the various types of SEO and SEM services "are" so involved, an in-depth overview is simply not possible within the scope of this one general article ...however, there "are" some SEO/SEM tasks that can, and should, be done by everyone with a web site today, most of which are typically affordable even for those with minimal available budgets during these difficult economic times

...one of the most important tasks available to anyone with direct access to their site files, is to ensure that you have included relevant information, within what is oftentimes referred to as "the big three META Tags"; Title, Description and Keywords, on "every" page of your web site ...these three META Tags are scanned and evaluated by pretty much every search engine on the planet, yet surprisingly, I regularly find that while many people put a lot of time and hard work into developing the web site page's "content", they oftentimes devote little to no time properly adding these three Tags, or, they simply "duplicate" these Tags across "all" of their site pages - which can quickly help your site fall into obscurity

...the Title, Description and Keywords META Tags should be "unique" and "specific" to each individual web page ...while many search engines have their own methodology as to "how" they evaluate these Tags and the content of the individual pages themselves, some general rules and concepts are indeed relatively consistent ...again, while covering the multitude of options utilized is beyond the scope of this article, there are some basics related to these three META Tags that most search engines employ that I thought were important to share

...first, the "Title" Tag; this Tag serves several purposes ...not only does this Tag's information appear in the title bar of the user's web browser, many search engine's will also show this information when listing your site within their organic search result pages ...therefore, putting something like; "Welcome to MySite.com" does little to inform the user as to what the found page's content contains ...most importantly, it is critical that the page "Title" be relevant to the content of the page - certainly the easiest way to do this is to ensure that the "exact" words used in the Title Tag are included somewhere within the page's text content itself at least once ...therefore, a "Title Tag" of; "The tastiest chocolate chip cookie recipes from The Cookie Factory, Inc." makes it pretty clear what the page content will be about, not to mention the fact that when someone types "chocolate chip cookies" or "cookie recipes" into a search engine's search box, your page stands a higher probability of being found - and by including your company name within the Title Tag of at least your 'Home Page', can help your site be found by someone typing your company name into a search field ...this is obviously a very simple example, but I'm sure you get the idea ;-)

...second, the "Description" Tag; similar to the Title Tag, some search engines will 'pick up' the first sentence or so and use 'that' when displaying their search results page instead of the page title ...therefore, it is most important that the first sentence of your description be as descriptive as possible as to what the page content is about ...also similar to the Title Tag, the exact text you use in your Description Tag should be used within your page's text content ...it is often recommended that this text even be a part of the opening paragraph ...while there is no real limit as to how long a description 'can' be, many SEO experts typically say "25 words or less" is a good guideline

...third, the "Keywords" Tag; initially it was recommended, and for many search engines was required, that this Tag consist of 'single' words, each separated by a comma ...as the algorithms utilized by today's search engines to scan and evaluate web page content have become much more sophisticated, it is now acceptable for individual keywords to be more than one word, each 'phrase' still separated by a comma ...however, many SEO experts recommend that multiple word keywords (phrases) be limited to 'three' words ...while today there is no definitive 'maximum' number of keywords and/or keyword 'phrases' that may be used, the first five or six are still the most important and many SEO experts recommend limiting the 'total' used to around twenty-five ...once again, it is critical that the words and/or phrases you include in your Keyword Tag be included somewhere within your web page's text content

...as many have asked me 'why' should the text content used in these three Tags be repeated and included within the web page's text content, I thought I would mention it here as well ...first, these Tags are "behind the scenes" text that are scanned and evaluated primarily by search engines and are not immediately seen or visible to your site visitors ...these Tags are generally only visible to 'human' visitors if they elect to view the web page's "page source", which most web browsers today allow you to do if desired ...second, is to determine "relevance" - most search engines check to confirm that the content included in these three META Tags are 'relevant' to the actual content of the page and are 'not' random words attempting to 'trick' users into visiting your web site

...the above is just scratching the surface of SEO and SEM tasks, however, with the millions of web sites in existence today and the increased utilization of search engines we all use to "find what we're looking for", by devoting careful attention to 'at least' these three META Tags for 'every' page of your web site, can significantly improve your chances of 'your' web site being found, without having to spend a lot of money

...if you 'do' have funds available, there are 'many' options available today for helping to improve your web site's visibility on the Internet - I 'do' recommend caution however - take the time to research current SEO and SEM tactics and practices ...unfortunately, there are disreputable SEO/SEM service providers that charge exorbitant fees and/or make promises, or worse yet, 'guarantees', of "getting you on the first page" of search engine result pages - many of which, use frowned upon methods, often referred to as "Black Hat Methods", to do so ...while you 'might' see some short term improvement, many of these tactics can get your web site "blacklisted" from many search engines - and repairing your web site's credibility in this regard can oftentimes take a very long time ...bottom line, as with many things in life, you'll be better off, as well as spend less money in the long run, if you "play by the rules" ;-)

...finally, I wanted to mention one last thing that is surprisingly often overlooked regarding promoting web sites ...your web site address; www.YourSite.com, should be on EVERYTHING you 'hand out' to your customers/potential web site visitors; business cards, letterhead, promotional materials, postcards, sell sheets, pamphlets, brochures, invoices, print advertising, and included in all media advertising such as radio or television advertising - EVERYTHING! ;-)

...if anyone would like to know more about the types of services I can provide, you can learn more by visiting my web site at: http://www.evadware.com ...I would also be happy to set up a phone call with anyone interested in exploring how I might be of assistance - appointments can be requested through the "Request Info" page at the site, or by dropping me an email here at: This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it

best to all!

:-)

evad