This is part one of ten in this search engine positioning series. In part one; we will outline how to choose the keyword phrases most likely to produce a high ROI for your search engine positioning efforts. Over this ten part series we will go through ten essential elements and steps to optimizing a site. Some steps take a few hours, some may take months depending on the competition, but in the end and, if done correctly, you will have a well optimized site that will place well and hold it’s positioning.

Of course, all websites fluctuate up and down. However, well optimized sites will spend more time on the upper end of the rankings than poorly optimized or spammy sites which may see high rankings but which will lose those rankings over time.

The Ten Steps We Will Go Through Are:

• Keyword Selection
• Content
• Site Structure
• Optimization
• Internal Linking
• Human Testing
• Submissions
• Link Building
• Monitoring
• The Extras

Step One - Keyword Selection
Arguably, keyword selection is the single most important stage in the entire optimization process. If you do not choose the correct keyword phrases you will not maximize your ROI on this campaign. I mention ROI and use it as a reminder that keyword selection is not necessarily about looking for the most searched phrases. A profitable optimization is one which produces the greatest return on investment for the time and money that are available to put towards it.

Bigger Is Not Always Better
If you are a web designer in Seattle who has just started your own business, you could make “web design” the targeted keyword phrase for your site as it certainly has the highest number of searches with 707,962 in September 2004 according to the “Overture Search Term Suggestion Tool”. If you have thousands of dollars and many months to dedicate just to attaining those rankings it could be done. However, would that be the best use of your time? Alternatively you could target “seattle web site design” with 5,070 searches in September. A Google link-check shows the number of links for the top three competitors for the Seattle search had 132, 21, and 47 respectively whereas for “web design” the top three had 18,700, 5,420, and 1,310 incoming links each.

With a good site you would get more work than you could handle with 5,070 searches on Overture alone if you were ranking well on the major search engines. This would clearly provide the highest return on investment for the small business owner who most certainly does not have the time and money available to target “web design” and who wouldn’t have the manpower to take advantage of the rankings even if they were attained.

This is an extreme example, but it clearly illustrates that sometimes the phrase with the highest number of searches is not necessarily the best target for your business.

Phrases That Sell
Another consideration you will want to make when choosing your keyword phrases is whether or not they are “buy phrases”. Phrases with a high number of searches that are not “buy phrases” will tend to bring a lot of traffic; however the conversion ratio will be far lower. Should you choose to target “buy phrases” you may not get the same number of visitors but your ratio of visitors to sales will be much higher.

In this example, let’s assume you are the marketing director for a well-known accounting company. There will be many choices you can make for your targeted keyword phrase. The top searched phrases in September 2004 that were accounting-related are:

• “accounting” with 156,095 searches
• “accounting software” with 54,621 searches
• “accounting job” with 32,015 searches
• “accounting services” with 19,260 searches
• “accounting firm” with 13,089 searches

Many might go with their gut instinct and attempt to target “accounting”. The problem with this phrase (other than the competition for it) is that the people doing that search are not necessarily even looking for an accounting firm. They may be accounting students, small business owners not interested in hiring an accountant but just looking for tax information, etc. “Accounting software” and “accounting job” are irrelevant, which leaves us with “accounting services” and “accounting firm” as the two main options.

From this point an evaluation of competition should be performed and the pros and cons of making each the primary target should be weighed based on the amount of work it will take to attain the phrase vs. how many searches there are for that phrase.

Often promotions that target multiple “buy phrases” will end up far more successful that those targeting phrases based solely on the number of searches due to the increased conversions and generally decreased competition.

Tools to Use
Armed with knowledge on how to recognize and choose between different phrases there remains only one question, how do you know which phrases are even searched? Fortunately there are a couple great resources out there to help you find out how many searches are performed for specific phrases. They are:

The Overture Search Term Suggestion Tool
A decent tool for researching keyword phrases. It indicates which phrases had the highest numbers of searches on Overture during the previous month. The biggest weakness it has, as far as applying it to the natural search engines, is that Overture counts singular and plural as the same and also corrects misspelling so the totals are all lumped together in this tool whereas on the natural engines they are considered differently.

WordTracker
WordTracker is very similar to Overture’s Search Term Suggestion Tool except that this tool differentiates between plural and singular searches, does not correct spelling (i.e. it gives the number of searches for misspellings rather than correcting them and giving a total for correct and misspelled words) and gives the results in predicted numbers of searches over all the engines per day rather than just one engine over a month.

They have a great free trial that doesn’t give you as many results but which can be very useful.

When using these tools I recommend beginning with the Overture Search term Suggestion Tool and once you’ve narrowed down your choices, switch to WordTracker to insure that you’re getting the right information in regards to tense (singular vs. plural) and also that the numbers match. Sometimes you will find that the numbers are completely different from each tool. In this event you will have to use your best judgment.

Don’t forget to check misspellings when using WordTracker!

Tips & Tricks
There are no real “tricks” to uncovering the keywords you should target however there are a few tips. A few pointers that will help you maximize your keyword selection:

Think like a layman. Just because you know your industry terms doesn’t mean that everyone does. Don’t just think of the words you use to describe your products/services, think of the words you would use if you knew nothing about it other than the fact that you needed it. You may want to recruit a friend and have them run some searches for you.

Think like an expert. On the other side of the coin, there may be phrases used specifically in your industry that people “in the know” would use to search for your products and/or services. Be sure to look into these phrases. You just may find some hidden gems that no one else has thought to target.

Don’t target too many phrases. Some SEOs and webmasters target dozens and sometimes even hundreds of phrases. The end result, they often miss the ones they most wanted to attain. Keeping yourself and your keyword list focused will keep your site focused. If your site is focused, you’ll rank higher for the phrases that will produce the highest return on investment.

Testing
Test your phrases. If there is any debate about whether a search phrase is worth targeting, it’s often a good idea to test the conversions through pay-per-click engines. Set up an account with a PPC engine and bid on the phrases that you would like to target.

You have to remember that the PPC engines do not provide for the same amount of traffic as the natural engines. Test the initial phrases, test alternative phrases, and see which produce the best results. Something else to keep in mind is that PPC are not natural engines. If your ROI is not as high on more costly phrases, that doesn’t mean they won’t produce the higher return on the natural engines where a top ranking does not cost money-per-click.

In the end you will have confirmed a solid list of keyword phrases and, if the PPC campaign is providing a good return on investment, you might as well keep it running and enjoy the “bonus” traffic that it provides.

In part two of our “Ten Steps to an Optimized Website” series we will be covering content. This will cover everything from the optimization of existing content to the creation of new content for your website.

By Dave Davies

The keywords and phrases you use in your Meta description tag don’t affect your page’s ranking in the search engines (for the most part), but this tag can still come in handy in your overall SEO campaigns.

What Is the Meta Description Tag?
The Meta description tag is a snippet of HTML code that belongs inside the section of a Web page. It usually is placed after the Title tag and before the Meta keywords tag, although the order is not important.

The proper syntax for this html tag is:

I used to believe that the purpose of the Meta description tag was twofold: to help the page rank highly for the words that were contained within it, as well as to provide a nice description in the search engine results pages (SERPs). However, today it appears that, similar to the Meta keywords tag, the information you place in this tag is *not* given any weight in the ranking algorithms of Google, and only a tiny amount of weight in Yahoo’s.

In other words, whether you use your important keyword phrases in your Meta description tag or not, it won’t affect the position of your page in the SERPs for the words that are important to you. In fact, you could easily leave it out altogether. But should you?

Well, if you’re already happy with the “snippets” of text that the search engines post from your page in any given search query, then there’s no reason to have a Meta description tag on your pages. However, it’s important to note that the snippet the engines use will vary, depending on what the searcher typed into the engine.

Let’s take a step back and look at what the search engines show in the SERPs. It can get a little bit confusing, but if you try out your own searches in the various engines, you’ll have a better idea of what I’m talking about. The search engines are constantly changing this sort of thing, plus they all behave in slightly different ways, as you’ll see in my examples.

At Google, if you search for a site by URL like this: www.highrankings.com, the snippet you see is the first instance of text on the page. Interestingly enough, on my home page, an image alt attribute tag is the first instance of words “on the page,” and that’s what shows up as part of my “snippet” for this particular search. (The image is a clickable image, so this jibes with my other theory of Google indexing the words in the alt attributes of clickable images. See this forum thread from Dec. 2003.

For this type of search, Yahoo displays the Meta description info. It’s important to note that generally the only people searching using URLs are site owners trying to see if their pages are indexed. Therefore, you shouldn’t worry too much about what you see under those circumstances.

So let’s try something that a real person might search for when looking for what I have to offer — how about “SEO copy”?
In Google, my Nitty-gritty handbook page shows up second in the results with the following snippet:
“… techniques: Search engine optimization (SEO) consultants who need to edit the existing copy of their clients’ sites as a matter of course. …”

Not the best of snippets, to say the least.

In this case, I don’t have the phrase “SEO copy” in my Meta description tag, nor is it anywhere on the page as a complete phrase. Because of this, Google has simply found instances where the word SEO and the word copy were near each other, and used the surrounding text as the snippet.

So, if I felt that “SEO copy” was a viable keyword phrase that people might be searching on, I may want to adjust my page accordingly so that the phrase appeared in my Meta description tag as well as somewhere in the body text. Again, this is not because it would help it to rank highly, but because I would receive a more suitable description that was more in tune with what the searcher was looking for. One can surmise that they might be more inclined to cl�ck on my listing in that case.

Let’s look at Yahoo for the same phrase. They’ve ranked the page at #3, and used the following snippet:
“Learn SEO copywriting with Jill Whalen’s special report — The Nitty-gritty of Writing for the Search Engines.”

That’s a good snippet! Well, guess what? That’s my Meta description tag for that page. Even though the exact phrase wasn’t in the tag, and neither was the word “copy,” Yahoo still chose to display it for this search query. I’m guessing this is because that phrase is actually nowhere on the page, other than in the Title tag. So with Yahoo, having a decent Meta description tag was very worthwhile in this instance.

More Tests
I also recently discovered that when I tested a nonsense word in the Meta description tag of a page (with the word not appearing elsewhere on the page), Google did not find it. But when I added the word to the visible text copy on the page, Google would bring up the test page when the nonsense word was searched for. Not only that, but it displayed that part of the Meta description tag where the nonsense word appeared.

In Yahoo, my nonsense-word test page was found, even if the word appeared only in the Meta description tag and nowhere else on the page. Interestingly enough, however, Yahoo didn’t display the part of the tag where the word was placed. They displayed only the beginning of the description, and cut it off after about 45 words. I purposely placed my nonsense word deep into my description tag to see if it would get picked up. In this case, the word appeared as the last of 138 words in the tag. I’ll probably add even more words at some point to see if there’s any cut-off point where Yahoo will stop indexing.

Other Engines
I also tested a few searches at Teoma and MSN. Each engine is slightly different in how they display the Meta description tag. Teoma seems to find the words in the tag, but doesn’t necessarily display them. When I searched for a unique sampling of text from one of my tags, Teoma found the page, but chose to display the first sentence on the page instead. Not surprisingly, the current MSN search worked the same as Yahoo. However, MSN’s search technology preview (which is the new engine they’re working on) behaved similarly to Google on all tests regarding Meta descriptions.

My new recommendation for this tag is not to worry too much about it. If you have some great call-to-action statements utilizing your keyword phrases on your Web pages, they will probably show up in your snippets at the engines. But since it’s easy enough to create a compelling sentence or 2 that incorporates your main keyword phrases, you might as well do this for your Meta descriptions.

Certainly, the more control you have over your listing in the SERPs, the more click-throughs you should see. If your Meta description tags can help with that, then it’s certainly worth the time to create compelling, keyword-rich ones.

By Jill Whalen

Of the modes of persuasion furnished by the spoken word there are three kinds. The first kind depends on the personal character of the speaker; the second on putting the audience into a certain frame of mind; the third on the proof, or apparent proof, provided by the words of the speech itself. –Aristotle, “Rhetoric”

Whether it’s e-mail or a Web site page, copy that’s persuasive, easy to read, and measurable maximizes results. Save customers’ time and bolster your bottom line by writing and laying out content that works online.

If visitors arrive on your site and don’t read what you’ve written and don’t take the action you desire them to, your marketing and Web development dollars have been wasted.

Harnessing the Power and Profit of Words
By words the mind is winged. –Aristophanes
Words, despite their considerable seductive power, are largely overlooked on Web sites, large and small. Many companies eager to spend tens of thousands of dollars on photography, graphic elements, coding, even Web analytics nevertheless shell out very little to improve copy.

Persuasive copy has an explosive effect on conversion. XGaming, builder of X-Arcade, an industry-grade game controller and product line, enjoyed a conversion increase of over 200 percent, due largely to improved site copy.

Knowing X-Arcade’s customer base was key to improving the copy. That information reveals relevant benefits to feature and highlight. It also helps determine the appropriate tone and attitude for copy.

X-Arcade, Before and After
The home page copy before:

Play Thousands of Arcade Classics on Your PC
Relive your favourite classic arcade games, like Ms. Pac-Man, Space Invaders, Robotron, Galaga, Donkey Kong and Street Fighter! The X-Arcade Kit includes all the hardware and software you need to play thousands of arcade classics on your PC for free!

Never Purchase another Arcade Controller Again
The X-Arcade separates itself from the crowd with the video game industry’s first lifetime warranty, indestructible parts and support for any video game system or PC. These great benefits will ensure the X-Arcade is the last joystick you will ever need to buy!

It’s notable the copy attempts to employ customer-focused language, evidenced in this case by generously using you and your.

The home page copy after:

Relive Thousands of Arcade Classics
X-Arcade is a line of bulletproof industrial quality game controllers and gaming products that inject the ultimate arcade experience into your PC, MAC or game console…

Install your X-Arcade and instantly relive those adrenaline-pumped moments in the arcade, battering the joystick, pounding the buttons, grinding your teeth, and tasting the thrill as you make your mark as the game’s top scorer. Your X-Arcade Kit arrives stuffed with all the hardware and software you need to play thousands of arcade classics on your PC.

The only thing missing is a place to drop in your quarters….

Here we applied “Frosting,” a technique named after Robert Frost. Frosting gives life to what would otherwise be dull copy. Instead of writing “gaming products that give you the ultimate gaming experience,” we wrote “gaming products that inject the ultimate arcade experience.” “That inject” brings the sentence into the present tense. It also adds spice and associative meaning to the copy.

More from the “after” home page:

Built like a friggin’ tank!
Flimsy plastic is swell for Tupperware and skirt hangers, but shouldn’t you be demanding MORE from your game controller?…

Every molecule of your X-Arcade product is constructed with industrial grade materials, no dollar store plastic. It literally feels like an arcade game machine.

This copy uses a technique called “Franking,” from the photographic style of Robert Frank. It requires you to select a few details and use them suggestively, rather than outright. What’s suggested here is the reader’s current game pad is woefully inadequate, reinforcing his motivation to move beyond the ordinary game pad onto the X-Arcade.

Volvo, Before and After
Even if your product doesn’t lend itself to a fun style like the X-Arcade, you don’t have to settle for boring, stiff corporate jargon.

Take a look at the Volvo Wheel Load copy before we took our pen to it:

Powered by the Volvo D4D high performance, low emission engine, this all-rounder provides high rimpull, excellent penetration and fast acceleration in whatever you do. With its superb low RPM performance, the Volvo engine responds immediately to the operator’s commands, making your operation more productive.

This is typical, dry, predictable, product-centric copy. Features such as low emission and low RPM performance mean little to the reader.

Here’s the rewrite. Note how it maintains a professional voice while still placing the customer at the center.

MOVE IT — WITH EASE, SPEED & COMFORT
It’s our job to help you do yours — no matter how big. And the full line of Volvo Wheel Loaders is always up to the task. Whether you move rock, earth, timber, sand or snow, a wide range of Volvo Wheel Loaders and attachment options are available to help you conquer the elements.

Dig deeper in this section to find the perfect Volvo Wheel Loader for your operation…

Climb into the cab of a Volvo Wheel Loader and get to work. Along with unmatched production and power, Volvo Wheel Loaders help you move it — with ease, speed, cost-efficiency and comfort.

A shortcut to improved copy is using more interesting verbs. Verbs add powerful association to your product. “Conquer,” “dig,” and “move,” add action, movement, and energy to copy.

Here’s more from that rewrite:

WORK MORE COMFORTABLY
* Double-filtered cab air system lets you breathe fresh and easy, even in dusty conditions.
* Improved noise insulation effectively blocks out external noise, keeping you alert and focused.
* Optional Comfort Drive Control minimizes fatigue and static muscle strain by switching operation.

The most effective means to tout product features includes a headline that first states the benefit. Each listed feature substantiates the claim by placing the reader in the copy, then offering specifics in customer-focused, present-tense language.

Improve Your Site’s Copy
* Frost the copy. Find interesting, unusual ways to say what might otherwise be dull.
* Use Franking to reinforce reader motivation. Obvious is boring. Hold interest by using few details and making strong statements in subtle ways.
* Pump up verbs. Replace conventional verbs with interesting ones that bring life and action to copy.
* Lead with relevant benefits. Use product features to substantiate the product’s claim. Specifics help people imagine using the product in the present tense.

By Bryan Eisenberg