| Keywords |
|---|
| 1 |
Keywords in the URL |
Keywords in the URLs can help quite a bit. For example http://domainname.com/top-seo-services.htm, where Top SEO
Services is the keyword phrase you're attempting to rank well for. But if you don't have the keywords in other parts of
the document, don't rely on having them in the URL.
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| 2 |
Keywords in headings (<H1>, <H2>,etc. tags) |
Another place where keywords count a lot. But you'll also need to ensure that your page has actual text about the particular
keyword or heading.
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| 3 |
Keywords in the <title> tag |
This is one of the most important places to have a keyword because what is written inside the <title>
tag shows in search results as your page title. The title tag should be short (7 to 10 words at most) and the keyword
should be near the beginning.
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| 4 |
Keyword density in the document text |
Another very important factor you need to check - Keyword Density. 3-7% for major keywords is best, 1-2% for minor. Keyword
density of over 10% can be suspicious and can look more like keyword stuffing, than a naturally written text.
|
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| 5 |
Keywords in the anchor text |
Also very important, especially for inbound links. Having the keyword in the anchor text in a link from another site, is
usually regarded as getting a vote from this site not only about your site in general, but about the keyword as well.
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| 6 |
Keywords in <alt> tags |
Spiders don't read images but they do read their textual descriptions in the <alt> tag. If you have images
on your page, use the <alt> tag with relevant keywords or keyphrase as they relate to the image.
|
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| 7 |
Keywords at the beginning of the document |
This also counts, though not as much as anchor text, title tags or headings. Keep in mind that the beginning of a document
does not necessarily mean the first paragraph -- for instance if you use tables, the first paragraph of text might be
in the second half of the table.
|
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| 8 |
Keyword proximity |
Keyword proximity measures how close in the text the keywords are. It is best if they are immediately one after the other. For
example "dog food" - with no other words between them. If you have "dog" in the first paragraph and
"food" in the third paragraph, this also counts but does not have as much weight as having the phrase
"dog food". Keyword proximity is applicable for keyword phrases that consist of 2 or more words.
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| 9 |
Keywords in metatags |
This is becoming less and less important, especially for Google. Yahoo! and MSN still rely on them, so when
you are optimizing, fill these tags in properly. Filling these tags with proper content will not hurt, so do use this to your
advantage.
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| 10 |
Keyword phrases |
Similiar to proximity, you can optimize for keyword phrases that consist of several words. For example "SEO products and
services". It is usually best when the keyword phrases you optimize for are popular ones.
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| 11 |
Secondary keywords |
Optimizing for secondary keywords can be a golden opportunity. When everybody else is optimizing for the most popular keywords,
there will be less competition (and undoubtedly more hits) for pages that are optimized for the minor words. For instance
"new jersey real estate" might have five thousand times less search results than "real estate". Another
benefit of this is you will typically receive better targeted traffic.
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| 12 |
Synonyms |
In addition to the main keywords, try to optimize for synonyms of the target keywords. This works particularly well for
sites written in English for which search engines are smart enough to use synonyms. When ranking sites for many other
languages synonyms may not be taken into account when calculating rankings and relevancy.
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| 13 |
Keyword stemming |
For the English language, this is not so much of a factor because words that stem from the same root (e.g. dog, dogs, doggy,
etc.) are usually considered related and if you have "dog" on your page, you will get hits for dogs and
"doggy" as well, but for other languages, keyword stemming could be an issue because different words that stem from
the same root are considered less related and you might need to optimize for all of them.
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| 14 |
Keyword mistypes and misspellings |
Spelling errors are very frequent and if you know that your target keywords have popular misspellings or alternative
spellings (e.g. Christmas and Xmas), you might be tempted to optimize for them. Yes, this might get
you some more traffic but having spelling mistakes on your site does not usually make a good impression. Use this with
caution in context or in your metatags.
|
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| 15 |
Keyword dilution |
When you are optimizing for an excessive amount of keywords, especially unrelated ones, this can affect the performance
of all your keywords. Even your major keywords can be lost (diluted) in the text.
|
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| 16 |
Keyword stuffing |
Any artificially inflated keyword density (typically 10% and over) can be considered keyword stuffing and you risk getting
banned from search engines.
|
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| Inbound, Outbound and Internal Links |
|---|
| 17 |
Links from similar sites |
Having links from similar sites is extremely useful. It generally indicates that the "competition" is voting
for you and you are popular within your topical community.
|
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| 18 |
Anchor text of inbound links |
As discussed in the Keywords section above, this is one of the most important factors for good rankings.
It is best if you have a keyword in the anchor text but even if you don't, it can still help.
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| 19 |
Origin of inbound links |
Besides the anchor text, it is important if the site that links to you is a reputable one or not. Generally sites with
a higher Google PageRank are considered reputable. Check your PageRank for free.
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| 20 |
Number of backlinks |
Generally the more, the better. But the reputation of the sites that link to you is often more important
than their number. Also important is the backlink's anchor text. Is there a keyword in it? How old are they?, etc.
Check your backlinks for free.
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| 21 |
Links from .edu and .gov sites |
These links are precious because .edu and .gov sites are more reputable than .com,
.biz, .info, etc. domains. Additionally, these type of links are very hard to obtain.
|
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| 22 |
Anchor text of internal links |
This also matters, though not as much as the anchor text of inbound links.
|
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| 23 |
Around-the-anchor text |
The text that is immediately before and after the anchor text also matters because it further indicates the relevance of
the link -- i.e. is the link artificial or does it naturally flow in the text.
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| 24 |
Links from directories |
Great! Though it strongly depends on which directories. Being listed in DMOZ, Yahoo! Directory and
similar directories can be a great boost for your ranking but having tons of links from PR0 directories is useless and
it can even be regarded as link spamming (if you have hundreds or thousands of such links).
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| 25 |
Number of outgoing links on the page that links to you |
The fewer, the better for you. This is because your link looks more important.
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| 26 |
Age of inbound links |
The older, the better. Getting many new links in a short time can sometimes suggest that one is purchasing or buying them.
|
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| 27 |
Named anchors |
Named anchors (the target place of internal links) are useful for internal navigation but are also
useful for SEO because you stress additionally that a particular page, paragraph or text is important. In the code, named
anchors look like this: <a href="#dogs">Read about dogs</a> where #dogs is the named anchor.
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| 28 |
IP address of inbound links |
Google denies that they discriminate against links that come from the same IP address or C class of addresses, so for
Google the IP address can be considered neutral to the weight of inbound links. However, MSN and Yahoo! may tend to discard
links from the same IPs or IP classes. It is always better to get links from different IPs.
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| 29 |
Inbound links from link farms and other suspicious sites |
This should not affect you one way or another, provided that the links are not reciprocal. The idea is that
it is beyond your control to define what a link farm links to, so you typically don't get penalized when such sites link to
you because this is not your fault. Be careful though of suspicious sites and check their PageRank.
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| 30 |
Excessive linking and link spamming |
It is generally bad for your rankings, when you have many links to/from the same sites (even if it is not a
cross-linking scheme or links to bad neighbors). It can often suggest link buying or at least spamming. In the best case
only some of the links are taken into account for SEO rankings.
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| 31 |
Too many outgoing links |
Google usually does not like pages that consists mainly of links and little to no content. It's generally best
to keep them under 80-120 per page. Having a significant number of outgoing links does not get you any benefits in terms of
ranking and could even make your situation worse.
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| 32 |
Single pixel links |
When you have a link that is attached to an image that is a pixel or so wide. These links are invisible on a webpage and nobody
will click on it. It is fairly obvious that this link is an attempt to manipulate search engines and can be detrimental to
your website.
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| 33 |
Outbound links to link farms and other suspicious sites |
Unlike inbound links from link farms and other suspicious sites, outbound links to bad neighbors can drown you.
You should periodically check the
status of any website you link to because sometimes good sites become bad neighbors and vice versa.
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| 34 |
Cross-linking |
Cross-linking occurs when SITE A links to SITE B, SITE B links to SITE C, and SITE C links back to SITE A. This is the
simplest example but more complex schemes are possible. Cross-linking can look like disguised reciprocal link trading and
is usually penalized.
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