What is Search Engine Optimization (SEO)? How it is done?

[KailashNadh]

What is Search Engine Optimization (SEO)? How it is done?

[StonedGorilla]

You could have typed your question into Google and got this extremely useful website from it.

http://www.seologic.com/guide/

[AutumnDreamwalker]

There are SEVERAL methods and its a big processes. Its best to Google the topic and research different SEO companies.

[Fade]

SEO (Search Engine Optimization) is a method to increase your 'page ranking' so that your website appears at the top of search engine lists when users search for specific keywords.

There are many aspects to this and it is more of an art than a science.
Some important things to consider for SEO (in order of importance)

1.Domain name
These should contain key words if possible. e.g. if I were selling flowers I?d want something like:
www.buy-london-flowers.com or www.online-flowers-delivery.com
This is the single biggest factor in SEO and it really helps to have keywords contained within your domain name.
2.Standards compliant Markup
If your website is standards compliant (http://www.w3.org/) then search engines will be able to read the code more efficiently.
3.Incoming links
Your page ranking increases depending on the amount and quality of websites that link to yours.
Quality is very important, if nefarious sites (such as paid referral sites etc) link to your website then the opposite effect occurs and your page ranking decreases.
There are some well known directories where you can ?post? your business website. The best directories are stringently maintained and well regarded with search engines.
However, it can be difficult and time-consuming to get your website accepted by them.
http://www.dmoz.org/ is probably one of the most well known and best regarded directories.
There are plenty of quick and free directories available, although you should be very careful which directories you submit to.
4.Page titles
Pretty self explanatory. Use different titles for every different page.
Use keywords within your titles.
5.Placement of content within code
Search engines judge content to be more important the higher up it is within the website code.
View the source code of your site, is the ?main content? near the top of the code or the bottom?
If it is near the bottom then it is badly designed and will negatively impact your SEO.
6.Use of correct semantic markup
In HTML certain tags (when used correctly) can give content more ?weight? and can benefit your SEO.
e.g. <h1>Plant Machinery Sales</h1> = Content header
(There are of course many different tags)
7.META Tags
Meta tags are now depreciated, most search engines ignore them completely and they have no effect whatsoever on your page ranking.
Some smaller search engines however do still use them, so it?s best to include standards compliant meta tags just in case.

There are of course many other aspects to SEO but that is a very brief overview.

You can also set up ?paid? search engine links such as Google Adwords (www.google.co.uk/adwords) and Microsoft AdCenter (https://adcenter.microsoft.com/) although these can get expensive.

Localization
For advertising in different countries the same SEO tips apply (see above)
Also to take into consideration are:
1.Localized domain names.
e.g. www.flowers.co.uk ? ranked higher on UK search engines
www.flowers.ru ? ranked higher on russian search engines
2.Location of website servers
e.g. a UK IP address will be listed on google.co.uk and a russian IP address will be listed on google.ru
3.Website content Language
English ranked higher on UK websites, Russian ranked higher on Russian websites.

Phew!
I hope this helps

- Endjynn

[markspenser]

“SEO is a process of optimizing a web site by improving on site and off site aspects in order to increase the traffic the site receives from search engines.”

[adamalexandru]

SEO Book for the SEO Newbie
Online Marketing Inside Out by Brandon Eley & Shayne Tilley
This is a book that will lead you through all the elements of an effective online marketing strategy including SEO and social media optimization. The book deals with some important aspects of PR and new media as well and it teaches you how to develop your own marketing plan to achieve the most from the search engines and other online venues. If you have a website, want to promote it, but you don’t know where to start, this is the book for you.

[lahmanwokard]

SEO simply means
As per my thoughts are concerns SEO is such a process in which we are trying to get backlinks in such a manner that it can give more traffic and a good page rang to our regarding domain,by this way we are promoting the regarding product of the site..

[nevaeh.aaric]

Search engine optimization (SEO) is the process of improving the volume or quality of traffic to a web site or a web page (such as a blog) from search engines via "natural" or un-paid ("organic" or "algorithmic") search results as opposed to other forms of search engine marketing (SEM) which may deal with paid inclusion. The theory is that the earlier (or higher) a site appears in the search results list, the more visitors it will receive from the search engine. SEO may target different kinds of search, including image search, local search, video search and industry-specific vertical search engines. This gives a web site web presence.
As an Internet marketing strategy, SEO considers how search engines work and what people search for. Optimizing a website primarily involves editing its content and HTML and associated coding to both increase its relevance to specific keywords and to remove barriers to the indexing activities of search engines.