Search Engine Optimization

SEO is an acronym that stands for Search Engine Optimization. Search Engine Optimization is the process through which a web owner edits his or her web pages in order to be more search engine friendly. By optimizing their web pages, a web owner allows for their site to be searched and indexed by robots in a more effective manner, leading to a higher ranking in the search engines, and therefore a higher level of organic traffic.

Not only does SEO allow for more traffic, it allows for more highly targetted traffic. For instance, if you are the owner of a site that sells a program for training parrots to talk, you would like people who search for "parrot training" to find your website. While optimizing your site for people who search for the word "parrot" will allow anyone looking for information about parrots to find your site, it will not help you sell more programs. People who are looking for information on training their parrots will be more likely to buy your program than someone who just wants general parrot information.

When search engine robots crawl your site, they use many factors to determine which pages of your site should be indexed. If one of your pages is buried in a subdirectory far from the root directory of the site, it may not be indexed. Also, some pages or site do not get indexed because they do not have enough traffic or links. It may seem frustrating to those just starting out that you can't get visitors through search engines without already having visitors. This dilemma further legitimizes the need for a properly-optimized web site.

There are two generally accepted categories of SEO - "White Hat" and "Black Hat." White Hat SEO refers to methods that go along with the search engines' guidelines and does not involve any sort of trickery. This can refer to proper optimization of the coding used to create the page, and the creation of unique content that is user-oriented, and not search-oriented. Black Hat SEO is at the other end of the spectrum. These methods generally include techniques such as cloaking, which refers to having a web page optimized for search engines that leads you to a different page, with potentially different/non-related content. While Black Hat can be seen as effective, it can also be potentially damaging to your site. If search engines discover you have been using Black Hat SEO methods, they can punish you by reducing your rank or even taking you out of their database.

Overall, SEO is not something that should be overlooked when formatting your website. It is a free and relatively easy way to increase the number of visitors to your website. In order to gain a plentiful amount of organic, highly-targeted traffic, proper SEO is absolutely essential.