Your Free Guide To SEO

The term ‘SEO’ is often loosely used to describe a vast range of optimisation services/techniques covering the very basic to the very advanced. Customers can therefore often be left scratching their head as to exactly what SEO is, who can do what and what to look for in a good SEO service.

If that sounds familiar, then the rest of this guide is dedicated to you………….

Introducing The Industry & Regulation

The search industry is young in real terms (it has only been around for a decade or so) and there is no real regulatory body that polices it.

There are however some professional bodies that exist and maintain a list of members. Globally the most recognised is SEMPO. This is dedicated to search engine marketing professionals worldwide. SEMPO provides white papers, learning resources, exhibitions and other initiatives aimed at improving standards in the industry. In the UK, we had the SMA-UK but that unfortunately is no longer an active trade association.

Other places where clients / suppliers can get solid background information include:

Search Engine Watch -  probably the most well known professional resource online discussing all things SEO.

Search Engine Land – Run by Danny Sullivan and similar to Search Engine Watch.

Matt Cutts – The head of Google’s search quality team runs a blog to communicate with the industry.

Search Engine Strategies – Most well known industry conference, training and expo event.

Webmaster World – Community forum which is quick to discuss SEO issues as they happen.

Seomoz & SeoBook - Two great SEO community sites packed with resources and tools and run by Aaron Wall & Rand Fishkin respectively.

There is also a wealth of bloggers and analysts who share information and resources.

So What Is Search Engine Optimisation  (SEO)?

Firstly it is useful to get our bearings and probably the best place to start is to head over to Google and read their SEO starter guide. This is a great resource for anyone looking at using an SEO service and we recommend you take the time to read it fully. On a general basis, this document covers the foundations of any good search strategy.

Introducing The Different Types Of SEO

Generally it is accepted that SEO techniques broadly fall into two main areas – black hat and white hat.

Black Hat SEO

Black Hat SEO is a loose term used to describe techniques used by practioners to exploit search engine technologies and loopholes within the system. These tend to be tactics that search engines may deem to be outside its guidelines and generally frown upon. Search engines use the threat of penalties as well as sophisticated algorithms (and a small army of reviewers) to combat these approaches. Search engines such as Google also encourage web site owners to report competitors they feel are playing outside the rule book – via Spam reports.

Some common ‘black hat techniques’ frowned on by Google include:

Paid Links – Buying or selling links to simply pass page rank.

Hidden Text/Links – Hiding content to users but displaying it to search engines.

Content Spam – Stuffing pages with keywords.

Cloaking – Showing the visitor one thing, search engines another.

Redirects / Doorway Pages – Bouncing visitors to the right page which search engines often can’t follow or pages purely designed for search engines.

Link Farms – Tightly knit websites, all linking together to artificially boost popularity often artificially ‘grown’ by those intent on forcing ranking.

Rather than discuss each, we would suggest you follow the links above to learn more about these areas and what they mean.

White Hat SEO

White Hat SEO on the other hand is a general term used to describe techniques aimed at covering all areas of best practice which, when combined, can provide a powerful aid to search engine ranking.  These approaches cover everything from the way you mark up page content, through to code quality and server administration/setup.

White hat techniques therefore requires practioners to have a broad depth of knowledge at both the page and server level in order to provide the best possible experience to web visitors  and search engines. As a guide, we would put forward the following as general technical and business areas of competence that could fall under the banner of ‘white hat seo’.

* Understanding of Information Retrieval Systems

* Commitment to Web Standards & W3C Compliance

* Awareness of Accessibility Standards & (WCAG)

* Server side optimisation management and administration expertise

* HTML semantics and code mark up principles best practices

* Keyword research, copywriting and semantic connectivity understanding

* Competitive and marketing lead link building experience

* Marketing principles and link building concepts

* Social media, blogging & networking skills

* Solid understanding of web spam & search engine guidelines

* Industry awareness & ability to follow technology and search engine changes

* Abilities in common web technologies (such as HTML, XHTML, PHP, CSS, Javascript, Ajax, Flash, MySQL, Linux)

* A commitment to usability best practices

Background To Good Ranking

Search engines historically used on page factors (such as keywords and text) to rank web sites. In 1998, Google came along and introduced a new way of ranking web pages using citations (hyperlinks!) as a measure of trust, popularity and relevancy. This proved a popular approach to rankings and it combated a major spam issue in the industry at the time.

A decade on and we find that hyperlinks to your site and the content on it are still the major tools used by search engines to rank web pages.

Google now has around 200 signals of quality that it uses to calculate relevance/ranking, one of which being their page rank algorithm. Only those inside the Googleplex know these factors explicitly but it is fair to assume their principal aim is to serve their users as comprehensively as they can. Ultimately, Google is serving its customers so this therefore requires you to think along marketing lines to identify factors that will help users and potentially give Google incentive to rank your site at the same time.

Users tend to have common goals and characteristics:

Common user goals when searching:

• To find relevant information fast
• To visit the returned web pages using the returned info.
• To interact with the best web pages returned.
• To do something (i.e. make a purchase, contact someone, signup, print, review etc.)
• To trust the website we are on.

Common users likes/dislikes when on a web site:

• We don’t like technical errors or things that can frustrate us.
• We like websites that **respond fast and don’t keep us hanging around.
• When things go wrong, we like to know why and be informed what to do about it.
• We like usable web sites that have clearly labelled navigation, call to actions, links and content.
• We like information presented to us clearly so we can read the important bits.
• We like to revisit/bookmark/link to sites that we found useful and gave a good us a experience.

Could these factors be important to Google?

Exploring some of these areas gives us a window into modern day SEO and what Google could be looking for. What other things do you like as a user that make your web site experience enjoyable?

**Guide Update – since writing this guide in 2009, Google has announced that page speed is now a ranking factor for web site owners to consider and provides tools to help web site owners improve page speed performance.**

Identifying Who To Work With

For the rest of this guide, lets assume you want to play by the Google rule book. Lets assume you want to pick the right supplier with the credentials to give you long term, ethical visibility. How can you make that choice?

Here are a few ideas and suggestions. Google also offers web site owners advice and this is a recommended article to read.

Past results

Ask the supplier for past results and case studies. These should be common search terms not obscure things only a few people will ever look for.

Run a QA check

Tip 1
Use the web developer tool kit for Firefox or SEO Browser to check for SPAM (such as hidden text) on the reference sites you are given. Turn off Javascript and CSS  – does anything suddenly appear that you didn’t see before? If you do, could it be SPAM? is there a sensible reason why this is happening and can you get an explanation?

Tip 2
Google the company you are planning to use. Do they have more negative than positive feedback online? people often post in forums about SEO companies and whilst sometimes it has to be taken with a pinch of salt, too much negaive feedback may represent a problem.

Tip 3
Can you *‘see’ the SEO work? has lots of  text been dumped way below the page fold or in the footer of the reference sites? Does it look part of the web site fabric and does it read well to you? has the brand impression been crushed by the SEO techniques deployed?

* We believe (hey – we have an opinion at least!) best practice SEO work should really leave no nasty trace and should integrate seamlessly with your website – helping the user and search engines receive a positive experience on your website and without low quality techniques being needed.

Tip 4
Read the content! Does it read well or does it look like it was written for search engines? Does it look forced or stuffed full of keywords? If you were a user – would you consider buying from that site? do you want this for your brand?

Longevity

How long have they been around? 5 years, 5 months or 5 minutes? Longevity in this industry can be a really good indication (when used with other factors mentioned here) that you are choosing the right people to work with.

Does Size Matter?

If you are a company with a large budget, many products or a fast growing turnover and need a lot of support, then you might need to work with a larger company that can provide an account manager, handle the growth and the budget wisely. If you are a smaller firm (or a bigger firm with plenty of in house resources) then a consultant/smaller agency may be the better option.

Main Business Or Sideline?

Is search really their main business? if you look at their web site, do they really look to specialise in the field? Is this just a bolt onactivity to their core business?

Meet Them

If you still aren’t sure, arrange a meeting. Get a feeling for the company and their experience. Don’t be afraid to challenge them and ask about the techniques they use.

Guaranteed Rankings?

Google themselves say rankings may fluctuate over time and with around 400 algorithm changes made per annum, it is very difficult to provide a meaningful guarantee in such a turbulent arena as search.

Conclusions

Picking a reputable agency is not an easy task and ultimately you have to make the decision. No one can do that for you so think long and hard about who you are going to use.

and finally……..

Google do not endorse or hold lists of accreddited SEO companies!

“Beware of SEOs that claim to guarantee rankings, allege a “special relationship” with Google, or advertise a “priority submit” to Google”

Source: Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) Webmasters Help

This guide was written by Jon Colegate. Jon is a member of SEMPO, Google Adwords Professional and Yahoo! Search Ambassador. Jon is available for site reviews, hands on SEO, workshops and consultancy and works with a range of businesses across our region. Jon is a regular guest speaker on behalf of Business Link Yorkshire and has a range of commercial clients.