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Search Engine Optimization

SEO CAMPAIGNING FOR THE FUTURE

Before forming a search engine optimization strategy, one must understand why a search engine is what it is. From a search engine company's point of view, they are catering to the Internet user who is looking for the most helpful of information petaining to his or her query. So for a search engine, they are working towards satisfying the searcher with the most relevant and helpful content available. The search engine companies care little about what the webmaster or SEO wants, their primary focus is what the search user wants. Keep in mind, the search engines don't owe you or your site anything, and are not even required to list a site if it doesn't hold up to their standards. Of course this doesn't necessarily hold true for Pay-Per-Click scenarios.

There are different schools of thought using varying approaches to achieving that coveted top 3 ranking in search results. The most popular ones are the Intuitive, Technical, and Linking, but usually a mix of the 3 philosophies is best. The different strategies can achieve varying results along different time spans.

Intuitive:

The intuitive approach looks at a site and thinks, "Let's put everything in it's place where a user, as well as a search engine should find it". No tricks, no trying to force the search spider to do what it shouldn't, and no cramming of keywords in every possible corner of the page code. The key here is to make the web page as user-friendly as possible with a long term outlook, in hopes that over time the search engines will reward you.

Technical:

The Technical SEO, will look at a site and think, "Ok, how can I best optimize this for exactly what a search engine is looking for." This approach works well on a temporary basis and may achieve very good results until the next major or even minor algorithm change. The problem with this approach is, you have to consistently stay on top of the ever evolving search engine technologies. If enough people milk it long enough, the search engine may end up penalizing those sites that are deliberately trying to skew the results. This has resulted in giving little to no credibility to Meta Tags, and banning link farms, FFA lists and blogs.

Linking:

The linking strategist is ever obsessed with accumulating as many links as possible to a given web site. Since many of the main search engines consider an incoming link as a vote for a site, it stands to reason that if you outlink your competition, you'll make it to the top results. Though this is somewhat true, linking only accounts for partial weight in the whole scheme of things, but it is still a very important component in determining rank.

The Mix:

As you could probably tell, the above 3 philosophies have a tendency to blur or have commonality with each other. This is a good thing, since no one aspect should be ignored. A good search engine campaign requires:

Longevity:
Being ranked well for a month or two is not enough. Proper SEO should keep the rankings relatively stable over a long period of time.
Integrity:
Tricking the search engines is a thing of the past. Search engines have become too smart, and there's no sense in risking a site ban.
Spider Food:
The search engine looks for relevant content, be sure to give it what it wants. Yes, content is still king.
Analysis:
A server's site analysis of search engine referrals and bots, can go a long way in discovering strengths and weaknesses.

When optimizing a site for search engines, don't rely on any single strategy. Like in anything else, it's good to have a balance. A good search engine will sniff out an extreme optimization, and sooner or later penalize a site for it. Getting on a search engine's bad side is a very bad idea, once that happens, it may be a fruitless endeavour in regaining good rankings or getting listed again.

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