Content is king, and should be written for your readers - this is the golden rule in content optimisation, and no less than a principle in SEO.
Content is king, and should be written for your readers - this is the golden rule in content optimisation, and no less than a principle in SEO. Search engines favour honest, user-focused web pages in their ranking algorithms, and are quick to penalise sites with blatant keyword stuffing. Content must be written with the sole purpose of informing your readers, and then optimised carefully with your chosen keywords. It is at this stage, when producing fresh content, that your keyword research and competitor analysis pay off.
In the early days of SEO, page elements were perhaps the most important attribute in search engine ranking algorithms - this was quickly abused as webmasters began keyword stuffing, and naturally algorithms evolved. Today, page elements are nowhere nearly as important as they used to be, but are important enough to include in your campaign.
Pagetitlesandheadings - these allow robots to quickly see what a web page is about, as well as help your readers easily find relevant section of information in a clearly structured manner. The tag is stillimportant in search algorithms, so use your top keywords first, then by descriptive keywords. This is the also the first thing web users will read when they see your web site in SERPs, so try to entice them into visiting your web site.
Meta descriptions may have also lost importance in algorithms, but these are still important to users looking for services which you offer. By writing a short, keyword rich, enticing paragraph about your services, users may be lured to your web site - especially if you command a high position on results pages.
Valid Markup and Cascading Style Sheets (CSS)W3C validation may not the top priority in SEO campaign, but as with most elements in SEO, it cannot be overlooked. and is important for other optimised elements, such as your content. XHTML transitional 1.0 and CSS 1.0 are recommended by the W3C, and is widely regarded as the standard.
Cascading Style Sheets have been around for a while now, and revolutionised web site design. CSS allows to control the layout, styling and formatting of web pages in a secondary document, giving many advantages. Cleaner code allows your page content to be placed nearer the top, where search engines will recognise its importance. Design changes only require editing one file, and changes are applied universally.
Ultimately, your markup code should be as minimal and efficient as possible, and XHTML and CSS is the way to achieve this. Google and the other search engines can then crawl your site faster and index your pages sooner.
Dyron Wilkie is the author of this article and others on search engine optimization. Visit SEO Gibraltar blog for more information on the latest developments in SEO.
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