Many Web Designers will build a web site without considering how the site will be read by the search engine spiders however there are some basic things that can be done to improve a web site’s rankings.
Perhaps the most important consideration is to include some relevant keywords in the title tag that relate to the theme of the page as Google and other search engines place a high level of importance on this tag.
Most pages should ideally be optimised for two to three unique keywords and these keywords should also be included in the meta description and meta keywords tags. Although Google has stopped reading the meta keywords tag, other search engines do continue to read it so it is still worth including as part of your overall search engine optimisation strategy.
Keywords should also be included in header tags and be distributed throughout the visible content of the web page but in a way that doesn’t distract from the flow of the content. The actual keyword density percentage in relation to the rest of the content is still debated however most search engine optimisation experts believe a good figure is between about 2 and 7% with keywords appearing throughout but especially at the beginning and end of the content.
These keywords used throughout the visible content can also be used as anchor text for hyperlinks as search engines will see these as more important that the rest of the regular text. The same goes for text that is bolded or underlined.
Images can also be optimised by way of their alt tags. Keywords can be placed within alt tags to further optimise a web page as any text within an image cannot be read by the search engines.
So these are some basic rules for optimising your web pages and help boost your sites positions in the search engines. Of course there are many more ways of optimising a web page to help get your web site page on the number one page of the search engines.
Should you wish to give your web site a fighting chance against your competitor’s online then contact Sunset Web Designs in Perth, Western Australia for an assessment and we will work towards boosting your web site rankings and ultimately your sales!