SEO Facts & Fiction.
With the evolution of search engines and "Search Engine Optimization Companies" radical changes have taken place. We thought we would clarify a few SEO facts.
Facts & Fiction
Mega-Meta
There is no bigger myth than that of the meta-tag. If anyone tells you that the secret to high search engine rankings is with meta-tags. This is fiction.
A meta-tag is in the head of your HTML and contains keywords and a description of the page. The code looks like this for the page you are reading:
<head>
<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN">
<html>
<head>
<title>Search engine optimization - Facts & Fiction Logical WebWorks</title>
<meta name="description" content="Logical WebWorks - Web Design Company based in Orlando FL. Specializing in web site design & redesign, graphic design, icon design and logo design.">
<meta name="keywords" content="orlando web design, search engine optimization, web design orlando, web page design, website design, web site design company, web design company, orlando website design, web design florida, graphic, logo services, orlando, fl usa">
<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=windows-1252">
</head>
There was a time when meta-tags were created for just search engines. All that a crafty web designer would have to do to spam the search engine would be to add words to their meta-tag keywords and trick visitors into visiting their site. Some search engines still figure your meta-tags into their algorithms so do use them. More often, the search engines will display your meta-description under your link so spend some time writing accurate descriptions of each page.
Hidden Content
As the average bandwidth and connection speed increased, web designers were afforded more freedom in their designs. More images could be used and then came the advent of Macromedia Flash which allowed a designer to use graphics to create animations. All of this was wonderful except the search engines couldn't see any of it and the image/Flash laden sites started to lose their grip on high rankings.
About this time, another little trick-of-the-trade was born. Web designers would fill the page under the flash movie or image map with content masked in the same color of the background. The visitor couldn't see the content but the search engines didn't know the difference and - they were back in the top ten.
But remember what we learned in lesson one about content? The search engine algorithms are designed to provide the best content to their users. Providing content that the visitor can't see is useless. Therefore, the best search engine algorithms were programmed to look for this type of spam.
What's more, not only will most search engines dismiss a site's feeble attempts to spam with hidden content, many will penalize the site and even exclude it from their index. There are a lot of sites out there looking for the same business you are. Sometimes, you are competing with large advertising budgets. Take your search engine rankings seriously and devote a great deal of time in climbing up the rankings ladder. Make partnerships with other sites that offer similar content.
Join forums and mail lists. If you can offer expertise on a subject, get out there and offer advice to people. Lastly, offer useful and relevant content on your site.
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