Search engine optimisation is the term used to describe work completed by a search engine optimiser (SEO). SEO’s become experts in how search engines rank websites in the search results.

Performing well in the search engines is vital to the success of your website, but there’s a lot of competition which can make it challenging. Most web searchers won’t go past the first 10 results in Google and in most industries there are dozens if not hundreds of websites jostling to get into those first ten spots.

So what is the magic formula to get to the top of Google? Well, only Google knows for certain, as they use a secret algorithm to rank websites. But there is widespread general agreement about the basic things you can do to rank well. These include;

1. Getting links from other websites

Google takes into account how popular a website is when it ranks it against other websites. Google does this by determining how many links are going to the website. It also factors in the quality of these links. So you want to get lots of links from other websites, but especially so from sites that are very popular.

2. Good content

Well written content helps considerably with your rankings in Google. So make sure you use the words people will put into a search engine.

3. Adding more content on a regular basis

Adding more content to your website helps in two ways. Firstly, Google will know you are updating your site more often so will visit your site on a frequent basis (which means new pages can get into Google quickly). And secondly, the more topics you can cover in articles or blog posts the more visitors you can draw to your website via search and links.

4. Pay attention to your title tags

A title tag is a piece of HTML code that tells the search engines what your website is about. Every page on your website needs to have a different title tag that includes your keyword phrases.

5. Well worded description tags

A description tag is a piece of HTML code that describes in a short sentence what a web page is about. This description is shown in the search engines, so it’s important that it is enticing to searchers and it should also include your keyword phrases.

6. Include your keywords in your page address (URL)

The words used in your page name create the final URL (or web address) for a specific page. So if the page is about dog grooming services, an ideal URL and page name would be www.doggroomers.co.nz/dog-grooming/.

To find out more about search engine optimisation and how we can improve your ranking in Google give us a call on 03 366 3340.