My few SEO tips

[Philip Brewer]

I don't really focus on SEO--Wise Bread has a guy who does that. However, I've picked up a few things along the way. Here's what I've figured out:

1) Don't pick titles that sell. Pick titles that search.

You may get a few extra clicks off the main page with a title like "Seven sensational ways to surge sales," but a title like that doesn't bring in any search traffic. Once your post is off the main page, it vanishes. Much better for search traffic: "Seven ways to increase sales" or "Seven ways to boost sales" or "Boost! Seven ways to increase sales!" Basically, figure out the search string someone would use if what they wanted to find was your page, and then make that your title.

2) Use alt text, titles, and captions on your pictures. Make them relevant to the post, but also clever.

Wise Bread gets a significant amount of traffic from image searches. And yet, I see lots of blogs out there where the picture titles are either blank or something useless like the IMG1079.JPG. The alt text should be a useful description of your picture--something that a blind person could read in place of seeing the picture. The title and caption can be something more clever. All those words are ways that searchers can find your post--use them!

3) Link to other great content.

Linking to random stuff does no good. Linking to the stuff that everyone else links to doesn't do much good either. But if you can find good content out there that's not widely linked, linking to it boosts the value of your site. You may also draw links back from the people you link to, but that's not the point and it shouldn't be a quid pro quo. Making your site a resource that people go to to find the best outgoing links is its own good thing. Link to specific stuff, not just to the front page (although it's okay to link to that as well). Use the links to add value to your own content.

4) Become a member of the community

Linking is part of this. Commenting is another part. Participating in the greater conversation is the key, though. Everybody is reading everybody else's posts and then writing their own posts with an awareness of the larger conversation. Being a participant--linking to their posts, commenting on their posts, but most particularly writing good, relevant stuff that advances the conversation--is what will draw in-bound links, and that's what will give your site the SEO ranking that will put your traffic at the top of search results.

[Pinyo]

Thank you for the tips. These are on point and helpful.

[khorrell]

Thanks, Philip. Those are great, usable tips that don't confuse me (too much!)

[MoneyMagnets]

Also know how SEO works for the software that you are using on your blog / website.
My website uses Joomla and I didn't realise at first that joomla performs SEO differently that standard websites.

Also if you're using joomla rather than word press make sure you have SEO enabled so that the article web title makes sense rather than simply id numbers. That makes a difference in searching.

I absolutely agree on having search 'keywords' in titles so that people can find your articles - very good point that is sometimes over looked.

Regards,
Karen

[dallaskid]

thanks for the tips phillip, i'll definitely have to work on alt texts

[Writer's Coin]

That is one of the things that's tough about writing good titles. You want the people that are exposed to it to click on it and you want the search engines to pick it up.

A great tittle does both.

[Financial Blogger]

I have edited a lot of my title when I include images and you are right; you can get a lot of traffic through image search. I wonder how they convert into loyal readers though....

[Ryan6]

I wrote a free SEO guide on my Money 2K blog. If you're interesting in working Google - check it out here.

Some good tips although I don't think linking out to sites will pass value, other than perhaps if it was to be reciprocated IF they happen to later find you! The problem when linking out to sites is that you are sending them free traffic when your ambition should be to keep them on your page for as long as possible; if you send them out to get free tools, services etc then of course it is a good idea. I agree that Google Image Search is great, although not a big fan of the ALT tags. I see good enough results via keyword-rich titles, image quality, the size etc.

[calicocash]

Thanks for the tips!

[SurferTiki]

Thanks! I like learning about all of this SEO stuff.