Easy Business Answers: What is Search Engine Optimization?

Welcome to Qlixite answers where we ask the box to go beyond it. We take common questions that business owners have and give you easy, straightforward answers you can actually use!

Today’s we’re asking the box an internet question about Search Engine Optimization.

So exactly, what is SEO?Search engine optimization (often termed SEO) refers to the techniques you can use to get your site found on internet search engines. Search engines like Google, Yahoo and Bing are independent sites so in order to get that page-one ranking that we all aspire to, we need to understand what they want.

Essentially – there are two parts to optimizing your site – Off page and on page.

What is off page optimization? 
This is often referred to as link building. Search engines look at what other websites link to you to gauge your validity.  If you can get affiliates, vendors, membership groups and listings to put a link on their website that leads to you – it helps your rank! You can also link back to them so you both win. Social Media business profiles are a great way to get more links as well.

What is on page optimization?
On page optimization involves creating a website with structure and content that is search engine friendly.
Search engines gather information through spiders, which are automated programs that randomly visit websites and report back to the search engine.  Anything that can be done to make it easy for the spiders to find all of your site’s relevant information is part of on page optimization.

What makes a website search engine friendly?Search engines examine several parts of your site including…
Meta Data – this can be complicated and confusing but essentially, search engines want each page to have a unique title, description and keywords. These are built into the structure (html code) of your website so seek help from a SEO professional if you’re unsure how to make changes.

They also look at the Quantity and Age of Content on your site. Search engines look at the text on your page – not the graphics or cool design. They give a higher ranking to quality content that is current or updated regularly.

Search engine spiders look at tons of websites so it will help them recognize all of the good stuff on your site if you have a site map. This is simply a hierarchal list of your pages but it is invaluable for increasing your SEO.

Looks like the spider is back to point out that when creating a search engine friendly site you want to minimize your use of javascript and flash.  While flash websites can look great and show fancy animation, most search engines cannot read the information embedded in the flash file.

As always, lets end with our high five review... if search engines designed the perfect site it would include
1. Links from reputable websites
2. A Title, meta description and keywords unique to every page
3. Quality content that is current or updated regularly
4. A complete sitemap
5. Limited  flash javascript

We hope this video helps you to better understand search engine optimization and how it can help grow your business.

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