On Page Search Engine Optimization: Everything You Need to Know

Although Google will not disclose their secret to their algorithm, there are many obvious factors that are often overlooked that will greatly help your webpage rank higher. While quality backlinks from relevant websites are essential to giving your page better rankings, there are many factors on your webpage that you have full control over that can make a significant difference when ranking for your keywords. Optimizing your webpage for the search engines is referred to as "on page optimization."

So what exactly is on page optimization? When Google finds your content, it analyzes the page by looking at different factors such as the Title, Header tags, Meta description, the text, and more. On page optimization is extremely attractive in that you have full control over how you display your content not only to your visitors, but also to popular search engines like Google, Yahoo and MSN.

Title Tag

The single most important factor in ranking for keywords is the title tag. The keyword that you are aiming at ranking for should always be placed between these tags. Obviously, your content will have to be relevant to your title keywords in order to be effective. If you had the keywords "How to train your dog" in your title, but your content talks about training cats instead, then the title tag is not likely to help you or your visitors.

Meta Description

While not nearly as important as your title tag, the meta description is often displayed within search results to give searchers more information about the webpage before they click through. Be sure to include your keywords in your meta description and to write a compelling description about your content so as to entice the visitor to click through.

Header Tags

Not only does breaking up your content into multiple paragraphs and subheadings help people easily read your content, but it also tells the search engines that the keywords you put in your heading tags are important. Typically, H1 and H2 tags are used most often as headers before paragraphs.

Keyword Density

There is a lot of heated debate about the keyword density that your content should have. Many internet marketers will tell you to aim around 2% (or twice per hundred words) while some will say aim for 5% and there are still others that say don't worry about it at all. When writing your content, though it is important to include your keyword in the text you also want to make sure that it is readable by humans. Writing for the search engines shouldn't be your top priority as high quality content will be much more linked to then lower quality content that is specifically written for search engines.

Search Engine Friendly URLs

Another way to boost your webpage is by utilizing search engine friendly URLs separated by a hyphen. If your URL looked something like how-to-train-your-dog.html, it will not only help boost your webpage rankings for that keyword but visitors that see that URL will also be able to tell what the page is about.

Anchor Text

When getting links from third party sites, it is important that your anchor text of your link contains the keywords that you are trying to rank for. One of the biggest and most common mistakes that people make is using the keywords Click Here and hyperlinking it to their domain. Instead, use variants of the keywords that you are trying to rank for.

This also applies to your own websites when you link to your content from your home page. Be sure to use relevant anchor texts in your links when referring to another webpage on your site.

Internal Linking

Having a good internal linking structure lets the search engines know more about what your site is about and it also helps them find deep links within your site. In fact, it is for this very reason why blogs are able to rank so well with the search engines because they have optimal linking structures that utilize categories, tags and more.

Image Alt Tags

While the keywords you put in your alt tags in your images don't nearly count as much as other factors, it is still good practice to target the keywords you are trying to rank for.

While on page optimization is essential to getting ranked in the search engines, it is also very important that you do not spam your webpage with keywords. Not only will this turn visitors off, but you also risk getting your site banned from the search engines.

By effectively combining all these on page factors to your webpage, you stand a greater chance of ranking for relevant keywords. And the best part is that you don't even have to be a so called SEO guru!