Module III: Optimizing Your Site for Organic Search, Part 1 – The Theory
Congratulations! You just created your first niche website. You have a fancy domain, a fresh content management platform, and tons of dreams. Now it’s time to make your site organic search friendly.
Pay close to attention to everything in this module and read it from start to end. We’re going to focus on theory this module, and application in Module IV, where we will actually start populating our website and applying the principles we’ve learned.
First, you’ll need to understand the basic philosophy behind a search:
1. Searcher experiences a need for information.
2. Searcher decides to use their favorite search engine to answer said question.
3. The query is formulated from a string of words that captures the essence of the topic. The selected words are known as the keywords.
4. The query is executed at the searcher’s favorite search engine.
5. The searcher browses through the results for a potential match.
6. The searcher scans the website for answers.
7. If the answer isn’t available, the searcher continues scanning the search results.
8. If the information doesn’t meet the searcher’s needs, a new search is executed after refining the original query.
[CP1] You’ll want your website to appear as high as possible in the SERPs since searchers correlate higher placement with authority.
There are a number of key elements to optimizing your site for organic search. Each element is all equally important, as every element is a complement to the others. Understanding the importance of each element is vital to the success of your website.
Before starting, you’ll want to sign up for the free tools offered by the search engines.
Google’s Webmaster Tools, available at http://www.google.com/webmasters/ provides insight on how they view your website. You’ll find useful information like crawl errors and broken pages, alongside analytics like which keywords people use to find your website.
Bing offers a similar service called “Webmaster Center,” available at http://www.bing.com/webmaster/.
Yahoo’s Site Explorer, located at http://siteexplorer.search.yahoo.com/ is arguably a lesser offering than Google Webmaster Tools and Bing Webmaster Center, but still provides powerful tools to tweak your website for organic search.
I. Indexable Content
Search engines spiders have a hard time reading anything other than text and HTML. Images, javascript, ActiveX, Silverlight, and other non-text elements are often invisible to the search engine spiders.
Google’s search engine spiders are more sophisticated than their competitors’. According to Google, their spiders can index the following types of files:[CP2]
- Adobe Portable Document Format (.pdf)
- Adobe PostScript (.ps)
- Autodesk Design Web Format (.dwf)
- Flash (.swf)
- HTML (.htm, .html)
- Google Earth (.kml, .kmz)
- Microsoft Excel (.xls, .xlsx)
- Microsoft PowerPoint (.ppt, .pptx)
- Microsoft Word (.doc, .docx)
- Microsoft Write (.wri)
- OpenOffice text (.odt)
- OpenOffice presentations (.odp)
- OpenOffice spreadsheet (.ods)
- Text (.txt)
- Portable Document Format (PDF) (.pdf)
- Postscript (.ps)
- Rich Text Format (.rtf, .wri)
- Shockwave Flash (.swf)
- Text (.ans, .txt)
- XML (.xml)
- Wireless Markup Language (.wml, .wap)
However, many of the aforementioned technologies, such as Microsoft Word documents and Excel spreadsheets are proprietary and closed source, therefore no one can say for sure just how well Google can index their contents. In most cases, it’s safer to simply recreate the contents in text.
Attaching alt-text to images can assist the spiders by providing them with a description of the image, but otherwise, it’s best to plant your keywords in your text.
VOCABULARY: Alt text – HTML attribute used to define a picture in order to describe it. First, let’s look at organic search friendly URLs. Since images are generally invisible to search engine spiders, alt text is commonly used to provide them with information on the image. Creating keyword-rich alt text is a commonly strategy employed by organic search marketers.
When dealing with video and audio media, providing a transcript will at least allow the search engines index the text, and allow another opportunity for keyword stuffing.
Also, search engine spiders can’t fill out and submit forms. Any content locked behind login, search, and other types of forms are inaccessible to the spiders.
SEO-Browser.Com is a great tool to see how spiders view your webpage. Use it to identify content that’s not being indexed.
II. Content
II. Organic Search Friendly URLS
By default, content management systems like WordPress and Joomla create what’s called “dynamic pages.”
VOCABULARY: Dynamic Page - A kind of web page that has been prepared with fresh information (content and/or layout), for each individual viewing. It is not static because it changes with: the time (ex. a news content), the user (ex. preferences in a login session), the user interaction (ex. web page game), the context, or all of them.
Dynamic pages are created from a relational database (like the one you configured last module) on the fly. Whenever you save a page in the CMS’s page builder, the CMS usually assigns the page a numerical ID, called the “page ID.” For a number of reasons, such as a major revision of the page, the CMS will often change the page ID. As a result, the URL of the page will change to reflect the page ID change. This is called a “dynamic URL.”
Example: http://www.testdomain.com/blog.php?pageid=493845
Notice how the URL is structured. “Testdomain.com” is the base domain. “Blog.php “ is the module of the CMS that pulls the page, but it can’t display a page unless it’s fed the page’s ID.
The string “?pageid=493845” is the command that tells “blog.php” which page to pull.
After a major revision of the page, the URL could become: http://www.testdomain.com/blog.php?pageid=4938456
The CMS updates the page ID to reflect the change to the page.
Search engines hate dynamic URLs. If a search engine indexes a page, and the webmaster edits it and causes the page ID to change, the link on the search engine is now broken. It won’t lead anywhere. Who wants to use a search engine full of broken links?
So, how do we fix this problem? It’s very easy – we’ll use a function called “URL rewriting.”
VOCABULARY: URL Rewriting – A method of modifying a web URL’s appearance (URL rewriting). Rewritten URLs (sometimes known as short, fancy URLs, or search engine friendly – SEF) are used to provide shorter and more relevant-looking links to web pages.
URL rewriting takes the dynamic URL and “rewrites” it into a static URL of your choosing.
The main organic search marketing benefit of URL rewriting is the ability to plug keywords into the URL.
Example:
If http://www.testdomain.com/blog.php?pageid=493845 is a blog on “Basic Organic Search Principles,” you can rewrite the URL to read:
http://www.testdomain.com/basic-organic-search-principles.html.
The new, rewritten, static URL will never change, no matter how many times the page is edited UNLESS you choose to change it.
WordPress comes with automatic rewriting functions. All you have to do is turn URL rewriting on and tweak the settings.
Let’s take a look at how to configure static urls in WordPress:
STOP! Watch the video “Configuring Static URLs in WordPress” and follow the directions before proceeding.
III. Site Structure
Having an organized site structure provides your visitors with a logical path of information to follow, allows your website to focus its message and assists search engine spiders in indexing your content.
VOCABULARY: Site Structure – The framework that shapes a website and defines its navigation scheme.
The following diagram depicts a hierarchal site structure, found on most pages on the web.
A spider can easily crawl and index the pages in the example because every page is linked to another. Remember, spiders crawl the web through the use of hyperlinks. If a page has no link to it, a spider can’t reach it. A page without another webpage linking to it is called an “orphan.”
VOCABULARY: Orphan – Web pages not referenced or linked to from another web page.
The following diagram illustrates how orphaned pages are created:
Notice that our homepage, “A,” has links to both B and E. C and D, however, have no pages linking to it, leaving them completely inaccessible by the search engine spiders. Simply put, to the search engines, these pages do not exist. In fact, they might as well not exist to humans also – the only way for a human to find C and D is by directly entering the page’s URL in their browser.
Pages that link to another page are called “parent” pages. The page being linked to is called the “child.”
VOCABULARY: Parent Pages – Pages being linking to another page in which the information is related.
VOCABULARY: Child Pages – Pages being linked to from another page in which the information is related.
In the above example, page “A” is the “parent” of B and E. Likewise, “B” and “E” are the “children” of “A.”
A page can both serve as a parent AND child. The following diagram will help illustrate:
In this example, “B” is the parent of “C” and “E” is the parent of “D.” However, “A” is still the parent of both B and E.
The terms “parent” and “child” usually apply only when the information on the “child” page is a continuation of a specific piece of information on the “parent.”
Returning to our example page “Basic Organic Search Principles,” located at:
http://www.testdomain.com/basic-organic-search-principles.html
We want to elaborate on a specific aspect of basic organic search principles, such as URL rewriting. We would create a new page, “URL Rewriting,” and designate it as a child of “Basic Organic Search Principles.”
The URL for our new page is:
http://www.testdomain.com/basic-organic-search-principles/url-rewriting.html
In this scenario, the “parent” is our “Basic Organic Search Principles” page, and the “child” is our “URL Rewriting” page.
Most WordPress themes have menus that automatically update when new pages are created. The menu will show the newly created child page as a dropdown menu from the parent menu item, allowing visitors to quickly find the child.
A website with an organic search friendly site structure will have just enough parent pages to fill the menu bar, with simple titles and descriptive child pages.
When dealing with WordPress a general rule to follow in order to keep your site visually pleasing, parent pages should be kept to a minimum. Remember, for every parent page you create, a new menu item is created on the theme’s main menu bar. Most themes max out around 5 parent menu items before undesirable aesthetic errors occur.
Ultimately, by having a clean site structure with properly configured URL rewriting functionality, we’ve accomplished three things:
1. Our URLs are clean, keyword rich and straight to the point. Anyone can look at our URLs and easily know what the page is about.
2. It’s easier for the search engine spiders to find and index the pages.
3. We’ve created a nice site structure for our visitors.
IV. Sitemaps
VOCABULARY: Sitemap – A list of pages of a web site accessible to crawlers or users. It can be either a document in any form used as a planning tool for web design, or a web page that lists the pages on a web site, typically organized in hierarchical fashion. This helps visitors and search engine bots find pages on the site.
Sitemaps provides spiders with a list of your website’s pages, making easier for the spiders to crawl and index. Most of the time, you have to manually submit your sitemap to the search engines, and submitting a sitemap doesn’t necessarily mean that the spider will index all of your pages. On the other hand, submitting a sitemap can help the spider find and index pages deep within your site structure.
Sitemaps are created in a special encoding language called XML that search engine spiders can easily interpret.
VOCABULARY: XML - A set of rules for encoding documents in machine-readable form.
Don’t worry; you won’t need to learn XML to create a sitemap. In the resources section, you’ll find a plugin for WordPress that will generate a sitemap and submit it directly to Google and Yahoo.
Overall, sitemaps help improve your rankings by making it easier for the search engines to find your website.
STOP! Watch the video “Submitting Sitemaps Using WordPress” and follow the directions before proceeding.
V. Title Tags
Title tags are one of the most important elements in optimizing a page for organic search.
VOCABULARY: Title Tag – The text, appearing in the browser’s title bar and the title area of a search listing that describes a page.
Your title tag will appear in two highly visible places.
1. The SERPs
2. The Browser Title Bar
Because of the title’s visibility and powerful effect on your rankings, great care must be taken in choosing a title tag for a page.
The title tag of a page should give an accurate description of the information on the page. Both your users and the search engine spiders will appreciate a concise, informative title.
The title of a page appears prominently on the SERPs:
Try to include at least one keyword in your title, and place it as close to the front of the title as possible. Placing the keyword in the front is beneficial to both your rankings and odds that a user will click your listing in the SERPs.
When creating your titles, remember that they are limited to around 70 characters. If your title goes beyond 70 characters, you run the risk of a truncated title. Truncated titles show an ellipsis (…) where the title was cut. Clean, strong titles, without cutoffs appear more “professional” in the SERPs. If you absolutely need to exceed the 70-character limit, try to do so with strong keywords.
For your new visitors, your SERP entry is the first interaction with your brand. You’ll need to leave a lasting impression if you want new visitors to become regular visitors. Compelling titles can create an emotional impact with all visitors – both new and old.
You may want to promote your brand within the title tag. Some companies place their website’s name at the start of every title. Others place it at the end. Whichever way you choose, be consistent.
Some prime examples:
Bankrate.com
Mortgage Rates Credit Cards Refinance Home CD Rates by Bankrate.com
Barnesandnoble.com
Barnes & Noble – Books, Textbooks, eBooks, Toys, Games & More
Amazon.Com
Amazon.com: Online Shopping for Electronics, Apparel, Computers …
Notice that Amazon’s title is truncated – they exceeded the 70 character limit.
WordPress allows you to easily set page titles from the administrator panel with the help of a plugin. You can download the plugin from the “resources” page.
STOP! Watch the video “Setting Page Titles with WordPress” and follow the directions before proceeding.
VI. Meta Description
VI. Things to Avoid
Flash intro pages (splash pages) – Your homepage is the #1 linked page on your website. This is prime real estate for your most competitive keywords. Search engine spiders have a difficult time pictures, flash elements, javascript, etc. You won’t want to waste your homepage on elements that can’t be indexed.