What’s the difference between the website on TOP of the Google search results and that on the THIRD page (which is as good as dead)?
It’s SEO (Search Engine Optimization)
In layman language, it is the process of fetching traffic on your web-content, from all over the internet.
In briefer terms, SEO is an ongoing technique used to optimize web-content (webpage/blog/website/apps) in such a way that the popular search engines (say Google) find them most relevant for the type of query that was input by the user.
It’s a major technique in propagating anything over the internet and is a very important factor to be taken in account while you are trying to establish a business/online retail/e-commerce with the help of the same.
The position of a particular web-content on a search result is called its “SEO Ranking”
Top search engines like Google, use a constantly evolving algorithm that ranks the search results on the basis of certain parameters and avails the most relevant information to the seeker. Many people, at times, have assimilated this concept and tried to cheat the parameters; but as we have mentioned, that the algorithm constantly evolves itself, majority have ended up being blacklisted. This conforms to the saying that:
There are no shortcuts to success.
In order to understand the ‘bit longer but more certain’ route, let’s take a look at the basic parameters that these search engines test to determine the SEO rankings of a web-content, and along with that; how to optimize them:
1. Recognition
The way a search engine recognizes your content is very important to be taken into account. For that you need to take care of factors like meta-description, title, sub-headings etc. that provide kind of an introduction to search engines.
The meta-description is the most important among these. Search engines use it to trace the relevance of the title of your web-content.
The title, especially, should be very specific as it is the face of the content on the search results. Don’t try to woo the audience by using complex titles. Audience is almost never in a philosophical mood while browsing.
The sub-headings, quotes and other sub-components, if included in a relevant manner, are actively inferred by the search engine as useful for seeker.
2. Content
When was the last time you read an article/browsed through a famous website with spelling mistakes and similar flaws? Probably never!
A lesser known factor in SEO is correct grammar. Of course, there’s nothing as such called ‘Perfect grammar’, but the bottom line is; No common errors. Always proof-read the content before making it live.
And if people are looking for ‘America’, the content should be talking about America and not how something else is related to America. The content should be pin point because even if (by virtue of other parameters) you make it to the top of search results and people start visiting your page, your success would be short-lived, as poor content will lead to people reverting back from your page. This is called “Bounce rate”. If the Bounce rate is too high, you will quickly lose your SEO rankings.
3. Keywords
As the title suggests, these are the ‘Key’ words that the search engines look for, in the web-content. Every generalized query has some keywords that the search engine algorithms keep listing & evolving and this play a major role in sorting your content. For example – Let’s say if the query is about Christmas and the relevant keywords are ‘Christmas, tree, Santa, tree, gifts’, the algorithm would search for these keywords among the web-contents over the internet. But this doesn’t mean you just have stuff these keywords in your article, without the context actually making sense. The algorithm would know when you do that and puts you on the last bench. The keywords have to be used in a flow, with uniform density over the content and in a contextually sensible manner.
4. Back-links
Your credibility in the society comes from the number of people that know you. And search engines sort of do the same. The more the webpages/websites are linked to it, the more credible it is for the search engine. The links shall correspond to those relevant to your web-content. Search engines can always trace if fake back-links have been associated to the content. Such attempts are immediately foiled. So, either try to use genuine links within your website or get affiliated to other relevant pages.
5. Images
Including images with relevant keywords is another way to climb up the SEO charts, as people are sometimes looking for images and an image with the most relevant keyword and contributing parameters would show up first.
SEO is an ongoing process and thus, search engines also keep a track of how much trending. To earn good SEO rankings, also try to write about trending topics in the company’s blog to attract more traffic. Maintaining SEO ranks within a range is the key to stay on top of the charts, and that is important because the third page of Google search result is the best place to hide something. Because nobody visits it!