Try some of these (or all) straight forward easy SEO strategies to maximize your website's chances of being indexed. I've collected these throughout my web design ventures. :)
Most important guideline to keep in mind before you start is that to rank high one must focus on building a great site, which to search engines it has nothing to do with pretty flashy stuff but instead: finding the right search words and getting the right people to link to you – (aka: build a search engine-friendly site, right keywords and right inbound links). As a side note I should add that BLOGS rank very well with search engine... just fyi... but moving on...
o Inbound links and the keywords found within those links have a greater effect on rankings than actual keywords on your site.
o Keywords should be contained within the visible text of any incoming link (aka anchor text).
o Also the length of time a good incoming link has pointed to your site makes a difference. The longer the better.
o Choosing the right domain name: when possible, generate a domain name that incorporates your keywords. Three benefits to this:
* First: When another site links to you and they are using your keywords in the anchor text, then they are in essence using your domain name which makes it easier for them.
* Second: When searching people are more likely to click on domain names containing the keywords they are searching for. This is particularly the case for those with slower internet connections who rather invest their “downloading” time sparingly.
* Third: Search engines may assume your domain to be slightly more relevant to those keywords.
o No more than one dash domains recommended and the shorter the better: cell-phones.com, etc.. (too many dashes are harder for customers to remember as well). Definitely no double dash domains recommended.
o When possible, purchase your domain with and without dashes (for competition safety).
o Register as many keywords that relate to your services as domain names. Sort of a future investment tactic for later use as needed. Can set them up specialized sites in the meantime for search engines to find.
o Write well formatted HTML: broken code can make it harder for spiders. The easier you make it for spiders to process the code, the better.
o Avoid old html or one proprietary to a single browser (i.e.: Netscape’s tag.
o HTML that is so new that spiders don’t recognize it yet (i.e.: many XML tags)
Remember that SEO is not about just following all of these and BAM your site is #1. It takes TIME, it takes trying different things and I recommend continuing your research on other tactics. These have helped me with my websites rankings greatly, but not everyone is claiming the same keywords! And of course, posting on forums like this Magnetic Sponsoring Forum (right on Mike!), as well as other popular ones such as Squidoo, Face Book, Direct Matches, etc... will also help your posts rank high on Google :).
Hope these SEO tips help get your sites noticed out there! If you don't own the html to your website, then get a blog going and try some of the same tactics on it ;).
