In the competitive world of Search Engine Optimisation, optimisers (and I include enotions in this) are forever saying that you must aim to be number one in search engines for related searches. I have always supported this theory, but I have recently started to question whether or not getting to the top spot is actually what you want to do.

Research has started to show that actually users are beginning to distrust top ranked sites and plum for the second or third placed sites first. The reason for this is users are realising that a lot of money is being spent (unnecessarily I hasten to add) to hit the top spot and the sites doing this, won’t usually give the information the user is after.

The reason for this is because, rather than focusing on genuine quality site content and the needs of the user, the sites are often just packed with key words, paid high ‘page rank’ sites for referral links and consultancy to use site tags to optimise effectively.

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Every one wants more traffíc. Whilst I would argue that more traffic isn’t always the best thing you need (more GOOD traffic is what you really want), when the usage stats go up, up up and your server starts to whirr, you get a warm glow all over knowing that people are visiting your site, viewing your products or reading about your services.

The web is full of ‘experts’ telling you, usually for a fee, how to increase search engine traffic. And usually their advice involves you spending even more money on pay-per-click advertising, twisting your meta data on your pages or reciprocal link programs. Well please read this - YOU DO NOT NEED TO SPEND ANY MONEY TO GET MORE TRAFFIC TO YOUR SITE!!

Online advertisers hate enotions

In a nutshell, the job of the search engine is to provide, accurate and meaningful search engine results that are related to the search terms or phrases. Therefore, to ensure you get the most from search engines, you must think quality of content.

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Search engine visibility is probably the single most important aspect for our clients’ web sites. On this blog we’ve already talked about things you can do with titles, meta data and content to make sure you can be found. However, it is also worth making sure that search engines can properly ’spider’ your site.

The key to good spiderability generally lies with two things; true hyperlinks and all pages within the site reachable within 2-3 clicks from the home page.

Hyperlinks. What are they and what are good hyperlinks?
Hyperlinks are links that you click on to surf around the web, within sites and between sites. Most links are textual or graphical but some, and these are the problem, are hidden behind so called ‘clever bits of code’; Javascript or Flash. They might look very clever to the user, and the developer who’s put them there, but they are invisible to search engines. Search engines simply sweep on past them. Why is this a problem? Web site ‘page’s ranking’ is determined by links, so you want to make sure that each and every link works well.

Three clicks to satisfaction.
I have bored for Britain about making sure users can get to any page within your site within three clicks. It’s not only users who like it. Search engines like it too. The more clicks it takes to reach a page, the less chance there is that the search engines will index that page. For really big information sites, consider a site map so that users (and search engines) can, within a single click reach any page within the site.

If I had a pound for every time a client had said, “But you need to spend loads of money to get on the first page of Google”, I’d be able to afford an iphone.

The definitive answer is that you DO NOT have to spend money to get on the first page of Google. Those who tell you you do are either after something or don’t understand search engines, or both!

Search engine optimisation is really very simple.

1) Make sure you have a unique title for every page. Make sure the title contains specific keywords and phrases that you want to be found on, divided by commas. Make sure that these keywords are found within the content as close to the top of the page as possible and that you have a maximum of 12 words in any one title

2) Make sure you have a meta description directly below the title within your markup language and the description mirrors as many of the key words and phrases as within the title

3) Make sure you have a meta keywords line directly below the description within your markup language and the keywords contain all the keywords and phrases, and combinations of, within the title

4) Look for reciprocal links from other sites. You can debate which sites for hours. Just get as many sites linking to you and you to them as possible.

5) Update your site once every six weeks. This could be as insignificant as a text change or a title shuffle. But make sure you make an update so that Google knows you’re a living, valid site.

6) Never frame your site. This should be a policy regardless of whether you want to achieve good search engine results or not as frames are grotesque for usability and general good web design.