What is Search Engine Optimisation?

It’s tough getting noticed on the Web. A web page can provide relevant information about a particular subject in an interactive and engrossing way, and still fail to attract a significant number of visitors. One of the most reliable ways to rectify this is to improve traffic to your site by achieving a high ranking on the search engine results’ pages (SERPs). That is where search engine optimisation (SEO) is so valuable.

What is the purpose of SEO?

Imagine that you’ve created the definitive website on a certain subject; let’s use river rafting as an example. Your site is new and as such it is not yet listed on any search engines. In this scenario, your first step would be to submit your site to search engines. The web pages on your river rafting site include all of the latest information available on river rafting, impressive photographs as well as helpful links guiding visitors to other sites that contain useful facts about river rafting. However, even if your site features the best content about river rafting on the web, it still may not crack the top page of results on major search engines such as Google, Yahoo or MSN. Search engine optimisation strives to put your website into the top results and, even better, to keep it there. It is a collection of techniques used to improve a site’s search engine ranking.

How does Search Engine Optimisation work?

There is an immense number of websites indexed on search engines. A search engine will “examine” your website to find specific content and keywords. It will then assign keywords to each article which are relevant to the content. When the search engine has finished crawling through your website, the content from your website will be indexed in a large database where users can retrieve your content by searching with keywords using the search engines. As a marketing strategy for increasing a site's relevance, SEO considers how search algorithms work and what people search for, and thus will determine which keywords are relevant to your site. The insertion of specific keywords in your websites content will therefore, help you to achieve the highest possible ranking for your site. However, just because a site uses keywords well does not mean that it will be considered a good resource on the web. Search engine optimisation is concerned with all of the aspects of your site. This includes looking at elements such as how your site is built, if it is constructed in the best possible way for a search engine spider to read it, where it is linked from and whether users will find your site easy to navigate.

How will your website benefit from an SEO campaign?

While it may be possible for your site to make it into the top pages of a search engine on its own, it could take a very long time. And there is still no guarantee that it will ever make it to the top. For anyone who uses the Internet as a way to make money, site traffic is crucial. Whether you earn money by selling products on your site or through hosting web advertisements, more visitors translates into more money. SEO also optimises the amount of traffic to your site and it eliminates your website’s exposure to risk: For instance, paid advertising is subject to click fraud risk and increasing costs per click. However, if you are using white hat search engine optimisation techniques for your website, they can only enhance your business, unless you make obvious mistakes or are guilty of spamming. Using SEO techniques will also make you less reliant on pay- per- click advertising, which will enable you to spend less money in this area. SEO also creates brand awareness and builds trust. If a website has a high ranking it will allow more people to see the name of the company and become familiar with the business and its products and services. Search engine optimisation improves targeted traffic to your site, facilitating the transformation of visitors into buyers. Find out more about Purple Cow’s comprehensive SEO packages.