Search Engine Optimization - What are Search Engines looking for?

In order to have visitors in your own website is important to have it highly ranked on search engines. As I promised before, here are a few guidelines about what Search Engines are looking for (Google in this case). Be aware that I’m not the author of this exact list but it has the majority of the bullet points to be mentioned.

The List Of Some Things Search Engines Look For:

1. Title tag - You need a relevant title, not just “Home Page” Use it for 5 key words.
2. Headings - The search engines view <> tags as being terms of emphasis - they give weight to the words within them. Put key terms in them.
3. Bold - Of lesser importance than <> tags. the <> tags still emphasize terms of importance.
4. Alt text - Use descriptive short sentences in your alt tags. If it’s a picture of a rose, and you’re a florist try “Red Rose - Available at ‘name’ Flower Shop”
5. Email addresses on page - if you put up an address, make sure the domain name in the address matches the web site domain. The search engines look at it as ‘cheesy’if you don’t.
6. Keyword metatags - Some engines use them directly, some check them as part of a validation process - “do they match the content” If they don’t then is this a spam site?
7. Meta description tag - Most engines look at this tag. Use distinct ones throughout your site, and distinct ones for each page. Make them particular to that page.
8. Key term placement - Terms that are higher up on a page are more heavily weighted.
9. Key term proximity - Terms that are close together are probably related, and thus the site will show up in searches for those terms.
10. Comment tags - Some engines use comment tags for content. Most engines look for them in graphic rich / text poor sites.
11. Page structure validation - proper coding is likely to be of better overall quality, and thus rewarded.
12. Traffic/Visitors - The search engines do keep track of how many people follow their links.
13. Link Popularity (PageRank in Google’s case).
    • How may other web pages around the Internet point to your web site?
    • Do these other pages relate?
    • Are they considered valuable resources?

      

14. Anchor Text of inbound links
    • Does the link to your web site have relevant keywords in it?
    • Do the keywords used match keywords in your content?
15. Rating of pages linking to this page
    • Even if it is not directly relevant, a web page that is important that links to your site will still help your web site.
    • Having relevant links helps more with search engines like Teoma.
16. Presence on marked authority pages. (DMOZ)
17. Url quotation - i.e. when a page mentions the site by url but doesn’t link to it. This commonly occurs in news articles that mention web sites. While it doesn’t count as a link, it does count as a reference.
18. Number of links on pages linking to this page. If the link to your web site is the only one from a page, it’s viewed as being more valuable than being one link among 100.
19. Freshness of links on pages linking to your web site. While the engines will count all links, a link from a web site that has not been updated in a year or two will be less valuable than from one that is updated daily. It indicates activity / interest levels.
20. Page Last Modified (Freshness)- just like the last point a page that is updated frequently is favoured.
21. Reciprocal Links- Search engines like to see a closed loop - that a referring site as also used as a reference. So when you are giving away a link, ask for one back. It will help both websites.
22. Keyword frequency across all pages. Does the content really talk to the subject which the page and the web site is supposed to be about?
23. Keywords in the url
    • Using keywords in the url does have an effect for the search engine algorithms.
    • You can use keywords in the filename. For example if the page is about ford parts, then call it “http://www.sitename.com/ford-auto-parts.html“
    • use dashes “-” and not underscores “_” to separate words in filenames.
24. Response Time - If your site is fast, it’s favored.
25. Server Downtime - If the search engine robot comes by and frequently can’t connect sometimes, they penalize your site.
26. Page Size - The engines tend to weigh content at the start of a document more than content further down. If a page is long, look at breaking it into sections. If a page is over 50k, then it’s too long.