How can I improve the search engine results for my site?
You've asked a great question! It is actually one of the top questions of this century, at least where website development is concerned.
While there isn't any singular solution, there are several things you can do to improve your search engine results ranking including the following:
- Understand that search results rankings can change regularly due to the algorithms that search engines use to compile the search data. So, your site might be number 5 in the list of results for a particular search now and number 19 later and vice versa.
- Make sure that your site contains content written for the average person. Try to avoid using unexplained acronyms, jargon, and slang terms. This way, when someone searches for a particular word on a search engine, your site won't be missed because you are using a lesser-known version of that word.
- Utilize the tools you have available to you through your site's Control Panel, including the SEO Settings tab of the Pages Manager and the search title and search summary fields in the setup options of your pages, events, and other items throughout your site. Incorporate important keywords and phrases throughout your site content. Be as descriptive as possible when writing search titles (i.e. "About Grace Church, South City, Tennessee" instead of "About Us"). Search titles and summaries should be written in sentence format and readable by the average person. If you try too hard, it will be obvious that you've written these items for the search engines as opposed to humans. The search title, search summary, and contents of each of your pages should complement one another well.
- Contact any organizations similar to yours as well as those you have affiliations with to have a link to your site placed on theirs. Also apply this concept to local search engine sites, chambers of commerce, etc. Google expressly states that having a large number of high-quality inbound links to your site is one of the best ways to improve your search engine rankings.
- If you have money budgeted for advertising, consider earmarking some of it to buy search results space from the major search engines such as Google Adwords, Yahoo Search Marketing, and Microsoft AdCenter. This is generally known as "Pay-Per-Click" search marketing.
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