Yesterday we shared some tips with you on ways to develop back links to your website. In addition to back links, you want to focus on search engine saturation, which is the number of web page you have cataloged at the search engines.
“If each web page is cataloged and ranked separately then why does it matter how many you have ranked in the search engines?”
That’s a good question. The answer is that old cliche “It’s a numbers game.”
Here’s how it is played. Searchers generally don’t look beyond the top two or three pages of the search engine ranking pages (SERPs) for a particular keyword. That mean you have to be in the top 20 or 30 listings in order to be found. Every page that you have being crawled by the search engines increases your chances of being listed in the search engines. With that, you’ll need to think about things that influence the rankings at the search engines:
- Highly optimized and keyword-rich copy (for each page)
- Proper meta tags
- An effective back link strategy
- Internal linking strategy (how pages are linked within your website)
- Do you have any pages that are not relevant or related to the subject matter of the rest of your website?
- Fresh, quality content updated regularly
So how do you ensure a good search engine saturation (SES)? Well, it isn’t about building a bunch of static pages. That last point – fresh, quality content – is particularly important. Here are some ways to ensure you meet the standards for building a strong SES:
- Choose one or two keywords for each web page and build your copy around those
- Refrain from keyword “stuffing”
- Use your keywords in your meta tags
- Make sure you have a title, description and keyword tag for each web page and use your page-specific keywords for each tag
- Use anchor text in your back link strategy
- Use anchor text in your internal inking strategy
- Do not include non-relevant information on your web pages
- Publish your articles on your own website
- Start a blog
Now for the elaboration:
Keywords – A successful website begins with good keyword research. Be sure to find a good keyword research tool. There are plenty of free ones online and some real good ones on the market if you’d prefer to pay. However you do it, research your site topic well and keep all of your keywords;
Web Copy – Make sure every web page on your website is assigned its own keyword from your keyword list. Pick highly profitable keywords (those with high demand and low supply);
Keyword Stuffing – Too many keywords is as bad as not enough. Search engines will think you are spamming them if you just cram pack your pages with keywords. Include keywords often but make sure they fit in with the logical flow of the text on your web pages. The best way to do this is to ask yourself on every page, “Would human visitors make any sense of this?”
Meta Tags – Every page on your website needs a title tag, description tag and keyword tag. Include your page-specific keywords and only your page-specific keywords in each of those tags. Many website owners make the mistake of adding superfluous tags like “content” and “copyright.” These aren’t necessary and you want your web pages to have as little code as necessary to make it easy for search engine crawlers to find the important details they need to rank your pages accordingly.
Anchor Text – Anchor text is when you use your keyword as a link. For instance, your website is about auto mechanics and you have a page written around the keyword “carburetor,” then you want articles, internal web pages and back links from other websites to link to that page using the word “carburetor” as the linking word.
Relevant Web Pages – You want every page on your website to be about auto mechanics, unless you’re a dentist. You get the point. Don’t put that nice picture of Aunt Alice at the family reunion last year on your front page – unless you are trying to show the world what beautiful teeth she has and you’re a dentist. Make everything on your website relevant to your topic. Otherwise, you’ll water down your content and it will count against you.
Articles – Remember those articles you sent to the directories to build back links? Put them on your own website. Give each article its own web page. They should be highly optimized articles with anchor text. In fact, before you send them to the directories, put them on your website first.
Blog – One of the most powerful marketing tools online is a blog. You don’t get any SES value from a blog that is not on your website so if that is one of the things you want out of a blog, then you’re better off putting it on your website. Remember, each blog post is a separate page and if you optimize each one with keywords and anchor text then you are building search engine value.
