Search Engine Optimization

Search engine optimization is often about making small modifications to parts of your website. When viewed individually, these changes might seem like incremental improvements, but when combined with other optimizations, they could have a noticeable impact on your site's user experience and performance in organic search results. You're likely already familiar with many of the topics in this guide, because they're essential ingredients for any webpage, but you may not be making the most out of them.


Even though this guide's title contains the words "search engine", we'd like to say that you should base your optimization decisions first and foremost on what's best for the visitors of your site. They're the main consumers of your content and are using search engines to find your work. Focusing too hard on specific tweaks to gain ranking in the organic results of search engines may not deliver the desired results. Search engine optimization is about putting your site's best foot forward when it comes to visibility in search engines.


SEO Basics

Search Engine Optimization Made Easy
Search engine optimization (SEO) is the art and science of publishing and marketing information that ranks well for valuable keywords in search engines like Google, Yahoo! Search, and Microsoft Live Search.
Contents
 Market Research
 Keyword Research
 Site Structure
 On Page Optimization
 Link Building
 Brand Building
 Viral Marketing
 Measuring Results
 Keeping up to date
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Search engine optimization (SEO) is the art and science of publishing and marketing information that ranks well for valuable keywords in search engines like Google, Yahoo! Search, and Microsoft Live Search. If you run into any new jargon while reading this Knol consider looking up their definitions using the Search Engine Marketing Glossary.

Search engines only show 10 results on the first page, and most searchers tend to click on the top few results. If you rank at the top business is good, but if you are on the second or third page you might only get 1% of the search traffic that the top ranked site gets.

The 2 most powerful aspects of search engine marketing are

• users type what they want to find into search boxes, making search engines the most precisely targeted marketing medium in the history of the world
• once you gain traction in the search results the incremental costs of gaining additional exposure are negligible when compared with the potential rewards, allowing individuals and small businesses to compete with (and perhaps eventually become) large corporations