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Once you have established the keywords for which you should optimize your site
for the search engines, it is time to figure out how you can get a high ranking
in the search engines for those keywords. The solution is to create Keyword Rich
Pages (KRPs) - pages which provide good content and in which a particular keyword
is repeated a number of times so that the page gets a top ranking for that keyword.
This article is focused on how you should create these KRPs. I am assuming
you have a working knowledge of the different HTML tags like the Title tag,
the Meta Description tag, the Meta Keywords tag, the Heading tags, the Alt Tag
etc. If you don't, just go to http://www.utoronto
.ca/webdocs/HTMLdocs/NewHTML/htmlindex.html for a good introduction to such HTML
tags.
Now, let us assume that your company sells packaged tours to Australia, and
that you are targeting the keyword "travel to australia". Here's how
you create the KRPs:
The Title Tag:
The first and most important tag to consider is the Title tag. You should always
begin the Title tag with the keyword that you are targeting. Also remember that
the search engines are going to display the Title tag while they are displaying
the results of a search. Hence, you need to make the Title tag attractive to
humans as well.
Here is one Title tag that I may have used: "Travel to Australia and discover
its scenic beauty". Have a look at the Title tag - it uses the keyword
right at the beginning and also tells people how beautiful a place Australia
is.
Of course, all Titles need not be like the one I used. The Title that you use
depends on the subject matter of your site. However, you should follow all the
general rules that I have outlined here.
Meta Description Tag:
The Meta Description tag is used by many search engines to provide a short
description of the page that is listed in the search results. Hence, like the
Title tag, it is important that the Meta Description tag be keyword rich as
well as attractive to humans.
The rules for the Meta Description are more or less the same as those for the
Title tag. However, the content of this tag will generally be longer than that
of the Title. Here's what I may have used in the Meta Description tag:
"Travel to Australia - We take care of all the details of your trip so
that you can travel with complete peace of mind."
Note how this description repeats the keyword and also the benefit that it
stresses - it says that the customer will be able to travel without having to
worry about the intricate details of the trip - you will take care of them.
Meta Keywords Tag:
The Meta Keywords tag has become less and less important as far as search engine
optimization is concerned. In fact, you can get top rankings without having
anything in the Meta Keywords tag at all. However, just to be on the safe side,
you would want to include some keywords in the Meta Keywords tag. You should
also include some of the common upper/lower case variations of the keyword.
The rules for the Meta Keywords tag are pretty simple - don't repeat any keyword
in the Meta Keywords tag more than three times and don't repeat any keyword
one after the other. Here's what I may have used in the Meta Keywords tag:
"Travel to Australia, tourism, travel to Australia, Down Under, TRAVEL
TO AUSTRALIA"
Note how I have introduced "tourism" and "Down Under" just
to separate the different instances of the keyword.
Body of the page:
Now we come to the actual body of the page. Begin by getting hold of a nice
(but not too large) picture which is applicable for the page that you are creating.
In the present case, I might include a picture of the lotus shaped Sydney Opera
House. Place this picture at the top of the page. In the Alt tag for the picture,
just mention your target keyword once, i.e. the Alt tag would be "Travel
to Australia". You can include other words in the Alt tag, but it should
start with the keyword you are targeting.
Once you've put up the picture, it is time to create a Heading for your page.
Use the H1 tag to do so. Again, in the H1 tag, mention your target keyword once,
i.e. like the Alt tag for the picture, the H1 tag could be "Travel to Australia".
Again, like the Alt tag, you can include other words in the heading, but the
heading should start with the keyword you are targeting.
Now it's time to create the actual text of the page. The way you create the
text of your page would depend largely on what you want the visitor to do after
reading this page. In some cases, you may simply want the visitor to go to the
home page or another specific page in your site after reading this page. In
this case, you should write the text in such a way that the visitor is attracted
to the page that you are targeting. You would also want to provide links to
the home page or the specific page that you are targeting at strategic places
in the KRP. Or, you may want the visitor to click on the link to an affiliate
program that you are a member of. In this case, you would stress the benefits
that the visitor gets by purchasing the product or service that the affiliate
program is selling. You would also want to provide links to the affiliate program
at strategic places in the page and/or at the end of the page. Whatever it is
that you want your page to do, there are some general rules to follow:
1) The first thing to remember is that some search engines don't recognize
the Meta Description tag. These search engines will often simply take the first
few lines of text in the body of your page and display that as the description.
Hence, you must ensure that the first few lines of text in your page are attractive
to human beings.
2) Ensure that as many sentences as possible in the page contain your target
keyword once. The keyword shouldn't just be placed on an ad hoc basis - the
way the keyword is placed in every sentence should actually make grammatical
sense and the repetition should be such that your human visitors do not feel
that you have deliberately repeated a particular phrase throughout the page.
This is not only important from the point of view of ensuring that your readers
don't get a bad impression of your site, but also from the point of view of
search engine optimization - the search engines may penalize your page for spamming
if they find that you have randomly repeated the keyword throughout the page.
Also, while repeating the keyword in the page, try to repeat the keyword once
near the top of the page and once near the bottom.
3) Make sure that your paragraphs are not too long - each paragraph should
be no more than 3 or 4 sentences long. This is because people on the web simply
don't have the time or the inclination to read long paragraphs.
4) Try to ensure that the page contains links to other pages with the keyword
being present in the text under the link. This can often lead to a higher ranking
for your page.
5) If possible, link to other pages which have the keyword in the file names.
This can again lead to a higher ranking for your page.
6) There is no hard and fast rule regarding the total number of words that
should be present in the KRPs. As a rule of thumb, try to ensure that there
are between 500-600 words. However, if the number of words falls a bit short
of or exceeds this limit, don't worry too much.
Once you have created the page, ensure that the name of the file in which it
is saved contains the keyword and that the individual words of the keyword are
separated by hyphens. In this case, the name of the file would be travel-to-australia.html.
This will get you a higher ranking in the few search engines which give a lot
of emphasis on the keyword being present in the file name.
That's it! When you want to target another keyword, simply create another KRP
for it using the procedure outlined above.
After you have created the KRPs, you cannot simply upload them to your site
and submit them to the search engines. This is because the search engines take
a rather dim view of pages which only contain outgoing links to other pages
but do not contain any incoming links from other pages. The search engines may
penalize sites which have such pages.
What you need to do is to directly or indirectly link the KRPs with your home
page. If you are going to create many KRPs for your site, it will be impractical
to link the home page directly with all the KRPs as this will needlessly clutter
your home page. Hence, what you should do is to create a separate page in your
site called a Sitemap page (name it something like sitemap.html). Add links
to all the KRPs from the Sitemap page. The text that you use to link to a particular
KRP should be the same as the keyword that the KRP is being optimized for. Hence,
the link to the travel-to-australia.html file should say "Travel to Australia".
Now, some search engines refuse to spider pages which only contain links to
other pages and nothing else. Hence, if the Sitemap page only contains links
to the KRPs but contains no other content, the search engines may ignore this
page. Hence, what you can do is to add a short description of the content of
each of the KRPs after you have added a link to that KRP in the Sitemap page.
This ensures that the search engines will not ignore this page.
After doing all this, simply link the home page of your site with the Sitemap
page using a text link. Then, submit your home page, the Sitemap page and each
of the KRPs to the search engines. When you are submitting these pages, to be
on the safe side, make sure that you submit no more than 1 page per day to any
search engine - otherwise, you run the risk of some search engines ignoring
some of the pages you have submitted. You can submit your site by going to the
individual "Add URL" pages of each engine. Or, in order to save time,
you can use our free submission tool which helps you submit your site manually
to the search engines, without having to go to the individual "Add URL"
pages of each engine. The tool is available at http://www.1stSearchRanking.com/t.cgi?
4901&submission.htm
Follow all the rules that I have outlined in this article and you can soon
see your search engine blues disappear for ever!
About the Author:
Sumantra Roy is one of the most respected search engine positioning specialists
on the Internet. To have Sumantra's company place your site at the top of the
search engines, go to http://www.the-easy-way.com/main.html
For more advice on how you can take your web site to the top of the search engines,
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