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On-Page Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
Definition
"On-Page" Search Engine Optimization (SEO) refers to editing the content and contextual elements of all of the web pages on a given website so that the various search engine can effectivly index the site. After indexing a site each search engine uses proprietary, secret formulas to "rank" the site for each searchable word and term on the site.
Once a given search engine has indexed and ranked a website then visitors to that search engine who search for words or terms that are located on the indexed website will be presented with a link to the page on the site where the word or term exists. The better the ranking of the website, the higher on the search results the link to the indexed site will appear.
On-Page Elements
On-Page Elements refer to the html tags within the page. They include Heading Tags (<H1>), Title Tags, Bold Tags, Italic tags on your web page. Below is an example of phrase "SEO Company" used in a Heading (<h1>) and Bold (<b>) Example:
SEO Company
SEO Company
SEO Company
Notice the difference?
In the HTML Source, The search phrase "SEO Company" Was placed between <h1> tags.
<H1>SEO Company</H1> HTML Tags
In the second version, It was placed between bold tags.
<b>SEO Company</b> HTML tags.
In the third version, it was placed between emphasize tags.
<em>SEO Company</em> HTML tags.
Natural On Page SEO
Your Search Phrases should be emphasized in a natural way for both the visitor and the search engine spider. Do not repeat phrases over and over again in your web page in an attempt to make them appear in the search engine more frequently. This is referred to as "keyword stuffing," and will usually result in a lower search engine ranking, moving your site LOWER in the results.
Some important On-Page techniques to use are descriptive, searchable page titles and headings, unique descriptive text on each pages, effective use of "alt tags" on images, and careful use of "on-site links" to highlight important pages.
Unethical On-Page Techniques
There are several different techniques known as "black hat" or "unethical" On-Page Techniques. Some SEO companies engage in these type of activities and should be avoided. The ranking system used by all of the popular search engines are programmed to detect these unethical techniques and the result will be your site being demoted or banned by the search engine. Note that all of these techniques were widely-used and popular at one time, and may some bad SEO consultants still use them.
Negative ON-Page SEO Techniques Include
- Avoid Using "hidden" or invisible text on your page for the purpose of higher search engine placement. For example the words/text for search phrase "Widget" in the html, the font color has been set to White. The background of the page is also white. Therefore the textual content is actually there, however the words are "hidden" from the surfer. This is frowned upon by search engines and frequently results in your site being penalized.
- Avoid Using Negative <div> html tags. Unscrupulous SEO services may insert them into your page with negative x/y coordinates to place content outside of the visible page for the surfer, but the text itself is in the html page. The search engine finds the keywords in the text, yet the surfer does not see it. Again a technique to be avoided and not recommended under any circumstances.
- Avoid Cloaking or Sneaky Redirects. Cloaking refers to serving up 2 different types of content based on the visitor who is visiting. Is the visitor a regular web surfer, serve up this page. Is the visitor a search engine spider? Serve up this OTHER page specifically for the search engine spider. The other page being served up is typically garbled textual content with no meaning to a human, and is stuffed with various keywords and search phrases. Again this technique is not recommended and will likely get your site penalized or banned from search engines.
- Avoid duplicate content. Duplicate content means you create one web site, with content on topic a, and then repeat the content over and over again on multiple web sites. In theory you could create one web site, achieve high ranking on it, and then clog up the search engines with the same content duplicated on multiple domains. Again this is not recommended and should be avoided.
In Summary "On-Page" SEO is still the most important aspect of optimization, and requires the most time and effort to be used effectively. On-Page SEO should be considered at the outset of any web design project, and should be an key part of any SEO or web redesign project.
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