What Ranks Well With the Search Engines?

There are many rumours out there about what factors will allow Search Engines to look favourably on your website. As a guide here are some of the most important factors that will rank you well with the search engines. We must note however, that search engine algorithms are always changing as Google attempts to improve the relevancy and importance of its search results. So use this as a guide, but remember that its always best and safest in terms of rankings, to write for a human audience not for Google's crawlers. Click here to learn more about How Search Engines Work.

Using targeted keywords in your title tag

The title tag is a label given in a HTML document to the title of a webpage. It is usually what shows up on the top tab of your internet browser when you visit that page. Wordpress and other content management systems usually have their own simple methods on how you can edit the title of a page if your not too acccustomed with HTML programming. Every webpage, if you want to be serious about SEO, should be targeting a set of concise keywords and having these keywords in your title tag will score you extra points with the search engines.

Keywords in link anchor text

The anchor text of a link from another website to yours should also contain important keywords within it. The anchor text is the actual text a user would click on. So something like 'Cure for Hiccups Exposed!' would hold more value than a simple 'click here'. Thats why inbound links from keyword-rich anchors and keyword-rich webpages can really help your website rise to higher ranks with the search engines.

The amount of incoming links into your site

This is the total amount of links that are coming into your site not just a particular webpage. Also the quality of these links is also important and is also measured by the search engines. Some links are more valuable than others however, if you use software technology to generate backlinks, and do it carelessly and over-do it, Google will catch on and can penalise your site. This is usually the case when you use software solutions to generating thousands of backlinks to try and manipulate search engine results and Google notices that all your inbound links appear unnatural.

Age of your site

Older, more respected, more reputable sites tend to fair better in search engine results. This is mostly because, being in the game for so long, they have founded a solid base in the internet community. They would have heaps of links to their sites and heaps of daily traffic. Also these sites are less likely to have been set up for the purpose of spam, like many new webpages put up just for that purpose.

Popular pages on your website

Here is something you can have more direct control over. Having link popularity on your website gives the search engines the hint that you believe a particular webpage has more credence than others. You communicate this, when you have a page that is linked to from every other page on your website, contrary to a page that only has a few inconspicuous links to it. Again the relevance of all links is also taken to account.

Highly relevant links to your webpage

Generally, all links to your site are valuable. Not only from a search engine point of view, but they also give your site greater reach and more advertisement. However, like we mentioned before, having links from webpages related to your content material are more valuable and will help your site fair better in rankings, than those from random sites with which you shared nothing more than an exchange of emails. Having a lot of good quality links from authorities on your subject matter is also solid indication of the importance and relevancy of your website.

Usage of Keywords

Having your targeted keywords reasonably repeated throughout your content will also win you points with the search engines. Take care not to excessively repeat them though, because it will be picked up buy Google's crawlers! Also don't be shy to use synonyms, related terms and phrases. With the search engines making use of semantic connectivity, all related terms add credibility to your website.

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