Onpage Search Engine Optimization
Every website on the internet is created using a programming language called "html". In orderto see the "html code" that is used to create a webpage, we must click "view", then "source"within our web browser as shown below:This will open up a text file for us to have a look at and see if this website is actually optimizingtheir "Onpage Optimization factors". For example we are doing SEO of a "weight loss site" and we have selected our main 3 keywords:
weight loss story
weight loss picture
safe weight loss
Notice that all of the keywords contain the word "weight loss". This will make things easier forus when we begin to optimize our offpage ranking factors which you'll learn about later.Let's Optimize Our Webpage:-
Step 1: The first thing we need to do is select a page Title for our website.
The page title should:Include ONLY our main keywords. The least amount of words you can place in the title,the more weight Google will give to each of the keywords and the higher you will rank.When creating your page title, it should not look like this:
Welcome to our website!
It should not even look like this, which does contain our main keywords, but contains anunnecessary number of words: weight loss story and weight loss picture and safe weight loss Although that title isn't horrible and does contain all of your main keywords.
you should do acouple of things to cut down on words used. This would be a perfect title for your webpage:
Weight Loss Story Safe Weight Loss Picture
Notice that I've: Taken out all of the "ands" Replaced one of the "ands" with a "" character Note: This character is located on the keyboard directly above the "enter key".
Combined the keywords "Safe Weight Loss" with "Weight Loss Picture”Always Combine Your Keyword When Possible to cut down on the total number of words thatare in your title!
Step 2: Add h1 header tags, Next we'll need to add h1 header tag and place our most important keyword there. The header tag should be as far towards the top left hand side of the page as possible. When Google reads a webpage, it views the text from the top left hand side of the page, andthen follows down to the bottom right hand side of the page. So, it's best to place your h1 header tag on the top left hand or top/middle portion of your page. It's ideal if you can include ONLY yourmain keyword within the h1 header tags. "Weight Loss Story" would be a perfectheader tag.
Step 3: Add h2 header tags, Next, we'll need to create an h2 header tag. This can be thought of as a sub heading for our webpage. You should place your 2nd most important keyword in the h2 header tag. It's ideal to place your primary keyword here within the h2 header tags. "safe weight loss" would be a perfectheader tag.
Step 4: After we've done this, we need to actually create the content for our webpage. When writing the content, try to evenly sprinkle your main keywords throughout the copy.Note: Don't overdo it though. If you simply repeat your keyword over and over like this:weight loss story about weight loss story that I have a weight loss story and weight loss story...Google will immediately see your website as search engine spam and you will not rank well.So, try to keep in mind that you're creating your website for the eyes of REAL people. Try to mention each keyword in a natural way as you are writing, but be sure to include at least one of the keywords per 1-2 paragraphs, depending on how large your page is.
Step 5: Make sure to mention your main keyword at the very top left and the very bottom right hand side of the webpage. A trick I like to use is to include this in the copyright information line at the bottom of the website. For our example, this would be a good example:
Step 6: Bolding, italicizing and underlining ...Once we've finished writing the copy, we should go through and bold, underline, or italicize some of the keywords only 1 time each, maximum. Only do 1 per keyword or it will hurt you more than it helps.
Step 7: Properly include alt image tags ...Next, add an alt image tag to the very top image of your webpage (This is usually your website's header graphic). Use the "alt" image tag using the text "weight loss story header".
Step 8: Google reads your webpage from top left, to bottom right? Well, in general they do, but because most websites contain a left hand column which contains all of their navigation links, as shown below: Google WILL View all of the text in the left hand column Before The Body of the webpage. This isn't good for us, because we want Google to actually read our content first! You should create a table that looks like this, where Google will read the top left hand row/column first (This is labeled "emptycolumn") but will see that it is empty, so it will then read the body text of your webpageand then read the 2nd left hand row/column which contains your navigational links!
In summary, I really want to point out the fact that, although good onpage optimization issomething you'll really want to do, it is NOT how you make dramatic changes in your searchengine ranking!
