I've been doing SEO for quite some time with an excellent track record as long as I put a real effort. SEO success is easier than you think. All you have to do is forget about trying to do magical things and use your common sense. Allow me to share some real SEO tips with you...1. STOP CHEATING - That's right. Stop trying to cheat the system. Stop looking for tricks and ways to outsmart search engines. The proper way to do SEO is to do it organically so that when search engines get smarter over the years, you website will still retain it's "credible position" and stay on top of the searches.
2. MORE PAGES - Many people don't understand that a 30-page website will more easily rank higher than a 5-page website for the exact same search. If your website doesn't have that many pages but your competition does, it's probably because you need to increase your webpage's size. Find ways to add more unique pages to your website without duplicating content.
3. FORGET ABOUT META-TAGS - When I say forget meta-tags, I don't mean for you to disregard them entirely. Just pick a few keywords and a good description to go along with it that doesn't stuff the keyword too heavily and you will be fine. Don't worry too much about what's the keyword limit. I've found that putting only 5 keywords and using a grammatically correct sentence for the description works best. It's actually possible to rank high on Google without even using meta-tags.
4. OWNERS MUST HELP - Owners must do their own homework. Nobody knows your business like you do. Only owners know what the relevant keywords truly are.
5. SPAM INTELLIGENTLY - Don't mindlessly load keywords into every sentence. Make things appear real. Some sites say that your keyword density can't be higher than 5% or else it's considered spamming. Whether or not it's true, I will just recommend that you type real sentences and don't try too hard to force a certain keyword.
6. MAKE YOUR SITE BETTER - Organize it better, add features but most importantly add value, not confusion.
7. GET SPECIFIC - Don't waste your time fighting for impossible single keywords like "car". Instead, think intelligently and get more specific. "Los Angeles Car Repair" would probably much easier to rank for and still bring you strong clicks and people looking to buy your product or services.
8. NAME EVERYTHING - Name your html pages, titles, links, images, and anything else you can name with your desired keywords.
9. GET QUALITY LINKS - Quality means real links from real sites that link to your site. Avoid everything else.
10. CREATE SITEMAP - Links that are buried deep in your website may not be read very well since search engines may not looking deeper than 3 clicks into your site. Creating a sitemap linked from your home page allows your to link your entire webpage to your homepage in fewer clicks. It's useful for visitors and especially useful for search engines.
11. VALIDATE YOUR CODE - Use a WC3 HTML and CSS code validation tool to ensure that your site is coded to standard or else visitors and search engines might not be able to read your entire website.
12. MATCH YOUR COMPETITION - Type in the keywords you want to rank high for check out the top 10 websites that show up. Look at their webpage and page source to see what they're doing that you're not. It's common sense. You'll probably notice many similar things that they're all doing to rank high. Now all you have to do is copy their ideas and you should instantly rank higher. It's that simple.
13. STAY UPDATED - Read SEO blogs and news in the field every single day to stay on top of common trends and changes in the search engine optimization industry. Internet technology evolves at a frantic pace and you could be a dinosaur within 2 months by not staying connected.
14. DON'T DUPLICATE - Even if it's ok, don't duplicate content that's already out there and don't bother duplicating your own website or individual pages. Search engines are smart enough to detect duplicate content so don't waste your time.
15. AVOID FLASH - Unless you know how to optimize Flash websites for SEO and have the time and or tools necessary to do it, it's best to stick with a CMS system that is based on HTML and comes with excellent SEO components.
16. DON'T KILL OLD LINKS - The age of your pages does have a strong effect on how they are ranked. Many people don't know that other websites are linking to them. If you must build a new website, make sure your old links still work or you could unknowingly drop your SEO rankings after you put up your new website.
17. MONITOR YOUR STATUS - SEO takes time. You have to optimize and then check your rankings and then optimize again. Expect to do this over a period of 3 to 5 months for maximum effect.
18. AVOID LINK FARMS AND AUTO-SUBMISSIONS - This is pretty much an extension of "don't cheat the system". Avoid automatic search engine submissions or services that claim to submit your site to over 200 directories or engines. You should also avoid link exchanges and link farms altogether. The reason is simple, it's not a real link and Google will drop you for it. Reciprocal links are also bad so make sure you and another site are not cross-linking to each other and it's especially bad if the other site has done it many times.
19. HAVE AN SEO GOAL - Many people do SEO work with no goal in mind. What ends up happening is they keep discovering more and more keywords and methods to optimize their website and end up not finishing the SEO process. You should have a well thought-out SEO plan before you start. Are you trying to get visitors for a certain keyword or keyphrase? Or you trying to get business from a specific city? Are you trying to increase your overall SEO rankings or muscle out a direct competitor? Start with what is most important and stick to it. Do not deviate from your plan by trying to address every little thing. You will NEVER have the time to optimize every possible thing on your website.
20. STAY UNIQUE - All your pages within a certain website should be unique from each other. Don't try to focus on too many keywords within the same page. I always recommend to only use every page to focus on ONE set of keywords or keyphrases. By focusing, you increase your chances or ranking high and allow individual pages to rank higher because they are not duplicating each other.
