Think About SEO Before You Launch Your New Website
Are you launching a new website? If you are, then think about your Search Engine Optimization (SEO) NOW!
There's no better time to start doing SEO than when you are about to launch a new site. By giving forethought and consideration to your so-called on page optimization before you create the website, you can increase your chances of achieving very good organic search results.
To prepare your site for better search engine rankings, be sure to follow the following guidelines:
1. Keep use of Flash to a minimum. The more complex you make your code, the more difficult it becomes for the search engine spiders to read your content. When thinking of search engines, think ‘content’. Search engines read content, not images, not animation, not fancy effects.
2. Ensure meta tags are coded correctly, include the Robots.txt tag. Many people, even SEO ‘experts’ belittle the importance of meta tags, but they are still important nonetheless. Although meta tags themselves won't drastically change the organic ranking of your site, they do create the display text users will see when your site appears in search results. If your meta tags are compelling and relevant to your content, you will increase the chances of increasing the rate of click throughs to your site.
3. Apply the proper tags to your webpages. H1, H2, and H3 tags draw attention to your content and promote your keywords and keyword phrases to search engines. Try to use each tag at least once, but don't overuse. Your text should flow and appear normal.
In addition to the above, you should also consider other factors that can help boost your rankings and your overall long-term SEO strategy. Web Designers often get so hooked up on the look and feel aspects, that they forget the other elements of a website that establish foundations for long term initiatives.
For example:
1. An html and xml sitemap. Search engines use the sitemap to index and search through all your pages. Your sitemap should be html as well as xml. Users would not access the xml sitemap, but search engine spiders use this version to crawl websites. Additionally, search engine submission resources like Google's Webmasters Tools require xml site map versions.
2. Include a partners page. A Partners page is a good way to establish reciprocal linking. This is a means to get more links to your site, which helps boost rankings. So begin your link exchange program with a Partners page that allows you add or remove link quickly and easily and then begin to build one way links.
3. Build in submission pages that encourage users to submit new content - forums, blogs, articles etc. One of the most powerful SEO techniques is the addition of new content, which can be very time consuming to write if you do not have a dedicated team. So, make it easy for your users to add or submit content to your website themselves! Providing the ability for users for users to submit content is a great way to appease search engines, which give higher ranks to those website that increase the volume of the content on a regular basis.
When you think of search engine optimization, don’t think this is something that is done after a website is up and running. It normally ends up like this because many of us had a website before we thought about using it for sales and marketing and before we wanted people to find it! However, if you are thinking about a website redesign or about building a brand new website, then think SEO now. If you start with a strong foundation - a site design that meets basic SEO standards but one that also supports your long range search engine optimization goals, then your search engine rankings will only benefit as a result.
For more information on our SEO services and how your website, combined with effective an SEO strategy and a CRM can be used to your business advantage, feel free to contact us here.
