Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

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Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

• Prepared by Larry Stewart

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Topic Outline

• Introduction
• How Search Engines Work
• SEO Building Blocks
• Keywords
• Crawler
• Links
• SEO Tools
• Black Hat Methods
• Summary and Conclusion

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Introduction
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Definition of Search Engine Optimization (SEO)1

• "Natural," or "organic," search engine
  optimization (SEO) is designing, writing, and
  HTML-coding a Web site to maximize the chance its
  pages will appear at the top of spider-based
  search engine results for selected keywords and
  phrases
• Organic Listings Listings that search engines do
  not sell (unlike paid listings)

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SEO

• Iterative process
• Dynamic environment
• Art
• Science

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Why is it important?

• Internet advertising 1H 2006 7.9 Billion2
• Search ranking ?more site visitors
• Internet users tend not to click through
• Depends on webs role in your economic model

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Variation in Approaches

• White Hat
• Abide by terms and conditions set forth by search
  engines
• Black Hat
• Breaches search engine terms and conditions
• May provide short-term gains
• You run the risk of being penalized by search
  engines

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Defining Success (Context)

• Search-Friendly (SEO)
• High ranking
• Terms and conditions set by search engines
  (Google, Yahoo, MSN Search)
• User-Friendly
• Site must satisfy the needs of visitors
• Persuasive
• Profitable for site owner

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How Search Engines Works
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Search Engine Operations

• Gather Content
• Crawler or spider moves recursively downloading
  content
• Builds sophisticate index
• Individual web searches run against index
• Results are retrieved and ordered
• PageRank Relevance

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Google Search Placement4

• Placement importance and relevance
• PageRank (importance)
• Counts links
• Weights links
• Query matching (relevance)
• sophisticated text-matching techniques
• examines all aspects of the page's content (and
  the content of the pages linking to it)

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SEO Optimization
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SEO Optimization Categories

• Keywords
• Keyword selection and keyword-rich text
• Crawler
• A crawler-friendly site navigation scheme
• Links
• Link popularity

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Keyword Recommendations1

• Page title visible HTML text ,Above the fold
• Page Size "100 KB" limit is still is still
  widely held. The optimum page size is 500-3000
  words (or 2000 to 20,000 characters)
• Be specific
• Example Apple iPod verses iPod
• exact phrase should appear generously throughout
  your site copy on every page

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More Keyword Recommendations5

• Meta tags use but dont stuff
• ltmeta name"description" content"Free Web
  tutorials on HTML, CSS, XML, and XHTML"gt
• Alt tags use for graphics
• ltIMG src"star.gif" altstar logo"gt
• Content is king
• Write good content with relevant and important
  keywords in mind.
• Geo Targeting
• Add geocentric terms to target local areas
• Domain Names
• Use keywords as part of domain name

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Crawler-friendly

• Engine spiders are primitive beings
• choose simplicity over complexity
• Goal
• All your web pages seen by crawlers
• Google enter in searchbox allinurlutexas.edu

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Suggestions to be Crawler Friendly5

• Traditional lta hrefgt tag
• Keywords in subfolder names
• Minimize quantity of subfolders
• Cross link relevant terms and phrases within the
  site
• Multiple paths to pages to eliminate orphans

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Avoid or Minimize May Negatively Impact Crawler5

• Flash (slow to load and difficult to navigate)
• Frames
• Java navigation
• Session ID to track visitors
• exact same Title tags on every page
• set to require a cookie when a visitor gets to
  the page

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Link Development Inbound Links Impact
PageRank

• PageRank (Popularity, importance)
• Number and quality of links pointing to a website
• Measure of usefulness of site

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Link Development Tradeoffs

• Advantage
• it is dynamic, cumulative, and difficult to
  imitate
• Disadvantage
• takes time (vs. advertising)

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Link Development Approaches (White Hat)7

• Quality content to start with
• Cultivate quality link (not quantity)
• Begin with web directories
• Harness online publicity
• Use Blogs and forums wisely
• Investigate competitors
• Understand their strategy
• Online publicity, blogs and forums
• See inbound links ("linkdomain.com" in Google,
  "linkdomaindomain.com" in Yahoo)

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SEO Tools
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Search Engine Term and Conditions

• Google
• Yahoo
• MSN Search

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Vendor Tools Example Seo Administrator 8

• Ranking monitor site positioning in for
  keywords
• Link popularity checker checks inbound links
• Site indexation tool check site indexation
• Server Log-analyzer Administrator log analyzer
• PageRank analyzer analyze competitor sites
• Keywords tool suggestions, associations,
  competitor analysis
• HTML analyzer dissect html text in the same way
  that a search engine would (syntax, keyword
  density)

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Black Hat Methods
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Head of the webspam group at Google

• Matt Cutts
• Worked on his Ph.D Computer Science at the
  University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
  Undergrad Comp Sci and Math (Graduated with
  M.S.).
• Moved into information retrieval after classes
  from the university's Information and Library
  Science department

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http//www.searchenginegenie.com/seo-blog/images/m
att.gif http//www.searchenginegenie.com
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Link Exchange Advertisement
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Keyword Consulting Advertisement
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Black Hat Terms

• Link Farming exchanging reciprocal links
• Keyword Stuffing Hidden text, Stuffing text in
  every nook and cranny
• Cloaking stealth, deliver different page to a
  search engine for indexing
• Doorway Pages bridge, jump page, designed to
  appeal to search engine spiders
• Fast meta refresh used to quickly switch doorway
  pages to the page the user is supposed to see
• Code swapping swap it on the server with the
  "real" page once a position has been achieved.
  also sometimes done to keep others from learning
  exactly how the page ranked well.
• Bait and Switch loads the page with a popular
  search words such as sex, travel or antivirus
  when is irrelevant to site

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Online Resources
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Search Engine Standards

• Google
• http//www.google.com/support/webmasters/bin/answe
  r.py?answer35769
• http//www.google.com/support/webmasters/bin/answe
  r.py?answer40349ctxrelated
• Yahoo
• http//help.yahoo.com/help/us/ysearch/basics/basic
  s-18.html
• http//help.yahoo.com/help/us/ysearch/basics/basic
  s-17.html
• http//help.yahoo.com/help/us/ysearch/basics/index
  .html
• MSN
• http//search.msn.com/docs/siteowner.aspx?tSEARCH
  _WEBMASTER_REF_GuidelinesforOptimizingSite.htm
• Web Robots
• http//www.robotstxt.org/wc/robots.html
• http//help.yahoo.com/help/us/ysearch/slurp/index.
  html
• http//www.google.com/support/webmasters/bin/topic
  .py?topic8843

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Keyword Tools

• Overture tool
• http//inventory.overture.com/d/searchinventory/su
  ggestion
• Wordtracker tool recommended
• http//our.affiliatetracking.net/wordtracker/a/122
  46
• Google Sandbox Tool
• https//adwords.google.com/select/main?cmdKeyword
  Sandbox
• Espotting Tool
• http//www.espotting.com/popups/keywordgenbox.asp
• Related Pages
• http//www.related-pages.com/adwordskeywords.aspx

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Conclusion and Summary

• Website Success
• Search-friendly
• User-friendly
• Persuasive
• Search-friendly Optimization components
• Keywords
• Crawler
• Links

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Bibliography

• 1 Thulow, Shari. What Search Engine Marketing
  Does Your Site Need? Clickz. 15 Nov. 2006
  lt
  http//www.clickz.com/showPage.html?page3105241
  gt.
• 2 2006 Second Quarter Results (October 4, 2006)
  . Interactive Advertising Bureau. 15 Nov. 2006
  lt http//www.iab.net/res
  ources/ad_revenue.asp gt.
• 3 Event Homepage. Search Engine Strategies 2006
  Conference and Exposition. 15 Nov. 2006
  lthttp//www.searchenginestrategies.com/sew/winter0
  6/index.html gt.
• 4 Our Search Google Technology. Google
  Website. 15 Nov. 2006
• lt http//www.google.com/technology/index.html gt.

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Bibliography

• 5Laratro, Joe. Dos and Donts of Search Engine
  Optimization. MoreVisibility. 15 Nov. 2006
  lthttp//www.morevisibility.com/whitepaper/2006/SEO
  _Do_and_Donts_WP.pdfgt
• 6 Thulow, Shari. Link Development The Key to
  Successful SEO Clickz. 15 Nov. 2006
  lthttp//www.clickz.com/showPage.html?page3431741
  gt.
• 7 link farming. webopedia. 15 Nov. 2006
  lthttp//www.webopedia.com/TERM/l/link_farming.html
  gt.
• 8 SSEO Tools. SEO Administrator.
• lthttp//www.seoadministrator.com/seo-tools.htmlgt
• lthttp//seo-tutorial.seoadministrator.com/gt

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Backup
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Vendor Tools Example Seo Administrator 8

• Ranking monitor monitor web site positioning in
  the major search engines for keywords
• Link popularity checker checks inbound links
  across a number of search engines
• Site indexation tool check site indexation in
  Google, Yahoo, MSN and other search engines
• Server Log-analyzer Administrator log analyzer
  automates (Number of unique IP addresses, Number
  of visitors )
• PageRank analyzer analyze competitor sites
• Keywords suggestion tool Keyword suggestion
  services, Keyword Associations, search query
  suggestions, Competitor analysis
• HTML analyzer dissect html text in the same way
  that a search engine would (syntax, keyword
  density)

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Black Hat Terms

• Link Farming exchanging reciprocal links with
  Web sites in order to increase search engine
  optimization
• Keyword Stuffing Hidden text, Stuffing text in
  every nook and cranny
• Cloaking stealth, deliver one page to a search
  engine for indexing while serving a different
  page to everyone else.
• Doorway Pages A Web page that is designed to
  appeal to search engine spiders.
• Fast meta refresh used to quickly switch doorway
  pages to the page the user is supposed to see
• Code swapping swap it on the server with the
  "real" page once a position has been achieved.
  also sometimes done to keep others from learning
  exactly how the page ranked well.
• Bait and Switch Another technique combines word
  stuffing with "bait-and-switch," which loads the
  page with a popular search word such as sex,
  travel or antivirus, even though the word has
  nothing to do with the site content.