The world of search engine optimization has changed a lot over the past couple years. Matter of fact it has changed a lot in the past few months. Five years ago no one designed their sites to be search engine friendly. Webmasters who did know a little bit about search engine optimization may have added some keywords into the meta tags but this was the extent of SEO. Now days without proper search engine optimization your web site will not get found by the general public. This will be the death of your e-business and you if you rely solely on the internet for your income. Search engine optimization will not happen to your web site over night. Instead it can be a long hard process. Given enough time you will see the fruits come to bare from the effort you put into it. Here are 5 things to do to help get you the rankings you need to survive:

1. Outbound linking- place outbound links to some sites that have authority and that are relevant to the data you have. You do not have to send a link to a main competitor but look for a site that fits your general category. For example if you run a website selling shoes why not link to a site that sales womens purses. This way you get the relevant material (Fashion) without sending your potential customer to your main competition.

2. Inbound links- Get sites that have a higher or same PR as your self (download the Google toolbar to see what PR sites are). In search engine optimization who you link with becomes your neighborhood and just like real life you want to live in the best neighborhood possible. Have your good Inbound links pointing to interior pages of your site. By pointing to interior pages you are saying to the search engines that my site is deep with content, I am relevant. By placing all of your links to your home page you are saying sorry my site is very shallow and the only relevant content I have can be found on my home page, this is bad.

3. I know Google and some other search engines do not or are not supposed to use meta tags. You know what, who cares. Use your meta tags to the best of your abilities. Google may not want them but there are other search engines out there that do. For each of the search engine that do use meta tags when they index you guess what? There is a good link to your website from a site with authority which Google will see. And they say meta tags dont help with Google.

4. Alt Tags- Yes, the alt tag. Whether you have one picture on your site or many, the alt tag is a must in search engine optimization. Search engines can not see the pictures you have on your site (They may in the near future however as the are starting to read .PDF files and the like). So if you have pictures on your site and little content, say goodbye to getting any rankings. In general you want 3 times the amount or more content then you have in pictures but, if you have to have your pictures then use the alt tag on them. The alt tag is the one way you can make search engines get the idea about your pictures. Use a keyword in the description of each alt tag.

5. Content- Inbound/outbound links are essential to getting ranked but, content is still King of the internet. You need to make use of all the information in your industry. Content is the best way to get good solid search engine optimization. When copywriting your content make sure you use the proper amount of keywords. Make sure you are using correct grammar as search engines will know if you are just trying to do some keyword stuffing. Writing keyword rich, search engine optimized content can be very tough. Some require out sourcing it to specialized copywriters.

These are only the first 5 steps of good search engine optimization. There are many other things that need to be done to get you the best rankings possible but this is a good start and you will not obtain high rankings without these steps.

Here at Blackwood Productions www.blackwoodproductions.com we handle search engine optimization, Copywriting, web design and more. The holidays are coming and the time to be seen on the major search engines is now, so you can get that Christmas rush. If you own a site and it is not being seen and you dont know enough about search engine optimization we are ready to serve you. Drop by our web site or give us a call toll free: 1-877-823-1543

This article was posted on November 21, 2005