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How Search Engines Work

Let's say you have a sports equipment website that you've been ignoring for awhile but now you decide you want to be ranked number one in google for the keyword phrase "soccer ball."

That's a very noble goal, but can it be realistically accomplished?

A search on Google for "soccer ball" produces over 45 million results. So how does Google decide which page to place above 44,999,999 others? And how do you get near the top?

All about the algorithm

All of the major search engines use an algorithm to determine the order of the rankings you see when you perform a search. The algorithm gives a different weighting to a multitude of different factors.

For more information, read this complete discussion of over 100 search engine ranking factors.

According to the previous article, here are the generally accepted top ten factors affecting your ranking:

1. Title Tag
2. Anchor Text of Links
3. Keyword Use in Document Text
4. Accessibility of Document
5. Links to Document from Site-Internal Pages
6. Primary Subject Matter of Site
7. External Links to Linking Pages
8. Link Popularity of Site in Topical Community
9. Global Link Popularity of Site
10. Keyword Spamming

The different search engines give different factors different weightings. In addition, the individual search engines are constantly tweaking and updating their algorithms.

In the end, you can't control what the search engines and what your competitors are doing. There is no ethical way to guarantee a top ranking for a competitive keyword.

But all is not lost!

Content is king over the long haul

By following an ethical search engine program, you can improve your rankings across the board and greatly increase the traffic driven toyour site via search engines.

You can create a search engine friendly page that contains your most important keywords in strategically important places.

You can create content that is valuable and gets linked to by a variety of external sites.

Over several weeks and months, you will see tremendous gains across the board.

Rapid results are possible

If you're a bit impatient, there are some strategies you can use to see instant traffic increases.

You see, there are two sections on every page that Google reserves for special cases. One of them is sponsored results. The other are for news items.

A pay-per-click campaign can get you instantly on the first results page. Though you have to pay for the traffic, by designing an effective landing page, you can see an instant return on your investment.

Pay-per-click is great, but even better might be generating traffic through the news section. You do that by creating press releases that are accessible on the wire via press release distribution services.

And if the release is picked up by a newspaper, magazine or other media outlet... well... that's all the better!

A complete strategy

In the end, creating search engine friendly pages filled with useful content is the best long-term strategy to use to avoid the ups-and-downs of algorithm changes.

You can improve your natural search rankings, though you may have to adjust your expectations and focus on more specific keyword phrases.

Call us today for a no-hassle pre-consultation at 570-756-2945.