Search Engine Optimization Articles

Submitting your business website to DMOZ
Today more than ever, in the field of search engine optimization, there is a very important step that needs to be taken in order to help a website's visibility in the major search engines. That important step is to submit it to DMOZ, or sometimes called the Open Directory Project or simply ODP. DMOZ provides a lot of search results for a good percentage of the most important search engines and directories, most notably Google. First, DMOZ is NOT a robot-driven crawler but rather a large, human-edited directory of the Web. For any submission to be successful, a few important points need to be taken ahead of time.

Understanding search engines and how they work
Most likely, you have probably used a search engine such as Google, MSN or AltaVista, or a search directory such as Yahoo, DMOZ or Global Business Listing, in order to help you find specific information on the Internet that is of interest to you. Did you ever stop and wonder how exactly do search engines find that information? If you are like most people, you are curious in finding out more, hoping to learn additional techniques or ways that can be used in order to have your site get better visibility and popularity on the Internet. I will explain that to you in this article.

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Nine steps to better optimization for the search engines
If you need to write for your visitors and the search engines too, the following nine important tips can be of great help to your business website. Always remember that all search engines are like humans: all they want is good relevant content that will help everybody in the end. If followed carefully, these nine steps can make a big difference in your overall search engine optimization campaign. More than ever, if your site does not incorporate the right technology or isn't search engine-friendly, your competitors sites' will appear in the results pages instead of your's.

Is it OK to lease or buy links? Is it safe to do it?
The subject of buying one-way links is a controversial subject at best. A lot has been said about it in the past, especially now after Google’s Florida and Austin updates. Depending to whom you talk to, you are likely to get opinions that range from “don’t do it” to “it’s now OK to do it”. So what’s the average site owner or small business to do? Look at it from a business perspective point of view. If some search engines look at it from an advertiser’s point of view, then maybe that’s how you should look at it too. In the last two months, we have had (and continue to have) an increasingly higher number of clients and people that contact us to buy one-way links from other sites. So the question is: Should you do it? Is it ‘safe’ to do it in this conjecture?

Is Google Page Rank™ still important? Can it make such a big difference?
Since 1998 when Sergey Brin and Larry Page developed the Google search engine, it has relied (and continues to rely) on the Page Rank™ Algorithm. Google’s reasoning behind this is, the higher the number of inbould links ‘pointing’ to a website, the more valuable that site is, in which case it would deserve a higher ranking in its search results pages. If site ‘A’ links to site ‘B’, Google calculates this as a ‘vote’ for site B. The higher the number of votes, the higher the overall value for site ‘B’. In a perfect world, this would be true. However, over the years, some site owners and webmasters have abused the system, implementing some ‘link farms’ and linking to websites that have little or nothing to do with the overall theme or topic presented in their sites.

The Ten Commandments to Successful SEO
Even if Google has been tweaking and fine tuning its search engine algorithms almost daily since it started two of its largest updates ever in November 2003 and in January 2004, one thing remains constant: there are things in SEO that you need to do and others that you absolutely need to avoid. As fast and furious as Google dances have been lately, these 10 commandments have, to this day, kept my clients out of trouble while helping them to continue enjoying priority rankings in the results pages. I strongly believe that if you practice “safe SEO” such as the ones described in these ten commandments, then you should get equally positive results.

The top 7 most common SEO myths
There are 7 top SEO myths and misconceptions we encounter everyday, out of the more than 20. In the real, true world of Search Engine Optimization techniques and methods used to obtain higher rankings, there are no shortcuts and certainly no free lunches. Since 1997 when Rank for Sales actually started optimizing web sites for its clients until today, we constantly see, read or hear exaggerated claims or inflated numbers that claim to keep you on top of everybody else in the engines. If it would be that easy, any person or company that owns a website could probably optimize it themselves and all professional SEO firms would be out of business. In this section, we will show you the 7 top SEO myths in the industry. Some are almost as old as the Internet itself. Yet, Rank for $ales strongly disapproves any of the following seven techniques.

The best SEO tips to significantly improve your sites' rankings
This SEO article is meant to help our readers better understand the world of search engines, as they relate to the proper positioning of websites. For much more detailed information on this important topic, please consult our SEO articles and resources section, which is constantly updated on a regular basis. Additionnally, it is recommended that you subscribe to our free weekly SEO newsletter, published on every Saturday of every week. Did you know that, before search engine users visit a specific Web site, they already have made four separate and distinct choices: Choice number one: They elected to use the Internet to find a specific product or service, to research an issue of interest to them or solve a problem, as much in their professional careers as in their personal lives.