What do you know about search engine optimization or SEO in short? Do you really know what SEO really are and how it can affect you?
I talk about SEO, think about SEO, eat with SEO and bathe with SEO but I am no SEO expert. And if you are looking for a SEO guru, I am not your man. Why?!
Because I am not going to lie to you what I know about search engine optimization techniques and how you can use SEO for your own good. And, this is not a sales thread…not now, not in the future in my books.
If you’re reading this, then good as we are on the same page now. So let’s go with our first lesson (and my first SEO post here) on search engine optimization, shall we?
What is search engine optimization all about?
The term search engine optimization or SEO is already a household name for many bloggers and webmasters today. Now let’s go with some simple language course on what SEO really means.
Search engines literally refers to Google, Yahoo and Bing to name a few.
Optimization means the process of improving or increasing the optimal result from a certain action.
With the above, I can simply conclude that search engine optimization is a process to improve your article, blog or website ranking in the search engine result pages (SERPs).
Make any sense? As I said below (on my profile), I am not a techie person. So, I will be explaining what SEO is all about in simple terms so that it is easily understandable to both beginners and professional bloggers.
Why search engine optimization is important? What’s so important about SEO?
I get this all the time and I even asked myself before in the past. Good search engine optimization techniques will actually improve the chances of you ranking well on result pages.
This means that the better your SEO methods are, the better chance search engines will see your website. Of course, the more your articles are featured on result pages, the better and more traffic you will get.
Here, we can conclude that good SEO techniques will increase your website ranking on search engines, boost traffic to your website and ultimately, increasing the chances of affiliate sales or making money through your website a reality.
How to SEO correctly? What are SEO best practices?
Regardless which website I visit, I keep seeing bloggers asking the same questions over and over again. Before you continue reading, take 1 minute off and think what you really know about SEO…don’t worry, I will wait.
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Welcome back and I really hope you didn’t take more than one minute though.
The biggest perception I ever seen in my life about SEO is many bloggers believe that SEO can be learned and mastered. Hint: Just Google and see how many SEO gurus you can find out there.
Perceptions on search engine optimizations:
- You can master SEO
- SEO is straightforward and easy to follow
- Learning SEO will help me for tomorrow, next week and the future
The real deal about search engine optimization are:
- SEO is a practise and guideline for bloggers
- Learn what SEO is and modify each search engine optimization techniques to gain the maximum advantage over others
- Understanding how search engine optimization works is more than just important
What are SEO best practices?
I am not going very detail in this as I will be creating separate topics on this. Yes, I want to go into detail and make sure you understand everything about SEO. And I do it for free.
1. Content is king but focus keyword is God
You hear me right. Good content will not bring you to the top spots of the search engines but focus keywords will.
Don’t get me wrong as I know how important content it. What I am trying to say is good search engine optimization or good SEO strategies are to use as very specific and focused keywords.
The biggest mistake here is bloggers tend to stuff hundreds keywords into one article. Don’t ever stuffed all those keywords you can think of into one article as you are going to give a hard time for search engine bots to figure out what your content is all about.
2. Understand how you want to rank your website
One of the best SEO practices is knowing how you want search engines to rank your blog. Pardon me for being so general. There are two ways search engine will rank your blog.
SEO strategy 1: Rank your blog with very specific keywords (between one to five keywords)
SEO strategy 2: Rank your blog with a bigger range of keywords (more than five keywords)
As for the record, both are equally good when it comes to finding the best SEO strategy. However, the paths of both these SEO best practices are very different.
SEO strategy 1 will lead to a better page rank or SERPs ranking within a shorter time frame. Here, your blog or website can even rank better even when you do not have an upper hand in domain age.
One the other hand. SEO strategy 2 will take a longer time to build a good SERPs ranking compared to the above. The SEO process here is long but what makes it worthwhile is it will also produce good domain authority for your website.
Never underestimate both of these SEO practices as they are be very lethal in the hands of a good blogger.
3. Choosing the right SEO tools in your SEO projects
I bet you heard about others saying that they ranked their website faster and better without any SEO tools. This is particularly true and I am not denying the fact.
However, we are in the technology era for Christ sake! Do you think that you can compete fairly with other bloggers or websites without using any SEO tools?
I am also not denying that there are many premium SEO tools that worth your every buck. And for beginners, I do not recommend them (unless it has a trial period) as there are also many free SEO tools which can help you in your search engine optimization project 101.
One of the best SEO tools is Google Keyword Tool and you can find useful tips and tricks on how to use it, Killer SEO Tips Using Google Keyword Tool.
Of course, I will be writing more on this topic as well so stay tune.
*p/s One of the best way to stay tune is to subscribe to my newsletter (yes free for life as well) at the end of this post or on the box on the right sidebar.
What I’m trying to say here is if you want to compete in this SEO world, then you have to compete in the smart way. I am sure you will be amazed on how many free SEO tools there is which many bloggers do not use at all. Such a waste right?
Okay folks, give yourself a pat on the back (or a beer treat) as you have completed the first part of my SEO best practices.
Wait! Don’t click on the Close button yet!
Test your understanding on search engine optimization knowledge (after my post above):
- Do you understand what Search Engine Optimization really is right now?
- Are you practising the right SEO methods?
- Are you using the right SEO tools for your blogs and website?
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