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SEO Web Design Secrets: Search Engine Optimization Tips for Beginners
By Peter Nisbet (c) 2008

SEO web design is a skill that can be learned, though most
search engine optimization for beginners courses dwell too much
on linking strategy as opposed to web site design per se. There
are many ways for most normal people to get an improved search
engine ranking, and secure a high search engine listing, and
while linking is important, good on-site SEO is also necessary.

Although it might not seem like it, getting a good listing on
Google or any of the other search engines is not as difficult as
many like to claim. There are rules to follow, and if you play
the game properly then the outcome should be in your favour. The
tips provided in this article are not really secrets as such;
although many people offer to divulge marvelous secrets to you,
all they are giving you is stuff that people have been using for
years.

So you won't get any secrets here. I have nothing hidden away
that I don't want anybody to know, and if I had I wouldn't tell
you about it! Would you? If you had some secrets that were so
valuable that they were making you money, would you give them
away free in an article like this one? Of course you wouldn't!

So here are my not-so-secret tips on getting a good listing in
Google and improving your search engine ranking. You likely know
a fair bit about meta tags, and have been informed that most are
not used by search engines. Well let me tell you something. If
you 'Google' Article Services you will finds my website right at
the top in the #1 position for that keyword. Check the
description that Google provides right under the title: that is
exactly as it is in the 'Description' tag that I have on the
site. So don't let anybody tell you that Google doesn't use the
Description tag, because they do. So do Ask and MSN (now Live
Search), and Yahoo also uses it, but not the whole thing exactly
as written.

The Keyword tag is another matter. Google isn't interested in
what you tell them the keywords are: they decide the relevance
of the page themselves from the text and Alt tags on the page.
Google no longer needs keyword repetition to understand what you
are writing about: they have the LSI algorithm now, that will
determine the meaning of your page from the character strings it
contains. The algorithm is programmed to calculate a relevance
factor from the vocabulary you use in relation to the rest of
the vocabulary on the page. However, back to SEO web design, and
some search engine optimization tips for beginners.

In addition to the Description meta tag, the HTML tags you
should use are:

1. The Keywords meta tag. Although little used it only takes a
second to put in, and does no harm. There is evidence that some
search engines might use it. The rest of the meta tags are
pointless.

2. The TITLE tag. This is the title of your web page, and should
contain the primary keyword for the page. Each page should be
written round one primary keyword that relates to the subject of
your website or niche.

For example, if your niche is costume jewelry, the primary
keyword for your home page would be 'costume jewelry'. You could
then have a number of 'silos' with a main page title for each.
The title of one main silo page could be 'simulated diamonds'
and the first page title of that silo could be 'garnets'. All of
these are the primary keywords for their respective pages.
Another silo could be 'colored gem stones', with that as the
primary keyword for the main silo page, and that for your first
sub-page in that silo could be 'citrine'. And so on.

Each page must have one primary keyword, and it should be
included in the Title tag for that page. The Title tag does not
appear in the body of the article, but in the HTML between the
two HEAD tags in your html.

3. The H tag. These are heading tags, with H1 being the most
important. The heading for each main section in your page should
be contained within H1 tags, and many pages have only the one
set of such tags. Subheadings, containing secondary keywords,
should be contained within H2 tags, and so on. Thus, in the
example above, the heading or your garnets silo could be could
be 'Garnets in Costume Jewelry' in H1 tags.

After an introduction to garnets, you could then have an H2
heading containing 'The Source of Garnets: Where Garnets Come
From', then another passage of text headed 'How Garnets are Cut
for Costume Jewelry', again held in H2 tags.

 4. The ALT attribute. Use 'Alt = ' within the Img tags of your
images and graphics. This lets the search engines know what the
graphic is about: search engines do not read graphics, and the
Alt attribute offers you the chance to use your graphics
meaningfully with respect to SEO web design.

Text Formatting

That's all you have to worry about regarding the HTML tags. Your
text formatting can be used to emphasize to search engines what
the important text on your page is. Thus, if you use bold text,
underscoring or italics, they indicate the important words and
phrases. Thus, use the  and  html tags in your
heading.

Write Naturally

Don't worry too much about your keyword density (KD), other than
having too much. Too high a KD could harm you if Google thinks
you are making unnecessary use of them. Write naturally for
human readers, and not robots. If your text reads well and makes
it clear what the subject of the passage is about, then you will
be fine. In my writing I ignore the concept of KD altogether. I
use my keywords as indicated above, and also in the first and
last 100 characters on the page (or at least in the last
paragraph somewhere).

Good SEO web design is not keyword fixated, but contains good
contextually related vocabulary that the LSI algorithm can use
to target the relevance of the page to the search term being
used by somebody using the search engine to find information.
That's all a keyword is: a term used by somebody looking for
information. If you cannot work without a target KD, then I
would go for a max of 1 not 3%)

None of these are web design secrets, and I doubt if there are
any such secrets left any more. I suppose the only thing even
approaching a secret here is that my description meta tag is
copied exactly by Google in the listing for my #1 placed
website. That allows you to determine how Google users see the
description of your site in the listing.

I have several more SEO web design tips to offer, but these will
be the subject of another article. In the meantime if you
implement these search engine optimization tips for beginners,
then you should soon see an improvement in your website's search
engine ranking.
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If you want more SEO web design tips, you will find Part 2 of
this article with more search engine optimization tips for
beginners on Seocious Tips 2
(http://www.improved-search-engine-rank.com/seocioustips2.html)
along with a free gift for everybody from me, Pete Nisbet of
SEOcious.
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