| A few months ago I was looking through the search | | | | Defense as a Keyword, the phrase "Self Defense |
| engines to see if my website was even found for | | | | Your city" will be more effective an appropriate. |
| certain keywords. Well it wasn't. I knew something | | | | People 1000's of miles away form your location will not |
| needed to be done, because I was losing potential | | | | be taking classes at your location. Your goal is to |
| customers to my Martial Art and Self Defense | | | | maximize and be # 1 for your geographical area. |
| Classes. As the Internet grows exponentially, the | | | | Regardless if you have no direct local competition, |
| important of a web presence is important. | | | | search engines will create competition for you if in the |
| After reading countless articles, spending hours | | | | real world none exist. |
| optimizing every aspect of my site, I finally started to | | | | Once the Meta tags are optimized it time to review |
| see the results. Targeted geographical keywords hit # | | | | the content of your page. Website with tons of picture |
| 1 in Google. The name of my company has over 9 | | | | and graphics and smaller amounts of text content, |
| million references on keyword searches for that name | | | | may look nice, but are not search engine friendly. If you |
| and My url is currently number 7 out of 9 million. Not | | | | have java scripts, tons of graphics, and few words |
| bad huh? | | | | then you need to re-design your page. The more |
| Well lets take a minute to discuss the basics of SEO | | | | words the better, the more KEYWORDS that you |
| (Search Engine Optimization). | | | | can naturally included in your content even better. |
| Search engines like Google, MSN, and Yahoo use | | | | Spread the graphics to other pages. Your homepage |
| spider-web crawlers to seek out text content of | | | | should be content rich, graphic light, and summarize |
| WebPages. Spiders also follow links both internal to a | | | | your "product". |
| site and external of the site to gather their information. | | | | Once you have a well written, keyword friendly |
| The information they gather is used and to create the | | | | content on your site, must make sure the internal linking |
| information you see when you do a search in a | | | | and navigation is optimized. The entire website should |
| search engine. A complex logarithm based upon | | | | have a site map, that is linkable from each page. |
| textual content, keyword density, inbound and | | | | Additional WebPages should have natural linking |
| outbound links, alt text, meta tags, etc are used to | | | | between topics and links back to the homepage. |
| determine the SERP's (Search Engine Results). | | | | These Internal Links should be descriptive. Instead of |
| Step one to Optimize is reviewing your Meta Tags. | | | | classes, it should be "self defense classes" etc. Links |
| Meta tags tell the search engines spiders what | | | | and the wording of the links are the most important |
| information to report, rather than the spider guessing. | | | | aspect in order to achieve your goals. |
| Review your meta tags for Title, Description & | | | | Finally after your web page is internally optimized, your |
| Keywords. | | | | focus must shift to external sources to improve your |
| Your Title should be somewhat descriptive of you | | | | results via search engines. Here are several Key steps |
| website or product, rather than jus the name of the | | | | 1)Submit to DMOZ (Open Directory Project). Submit |
| company. Instead of Joe's Dojo as the title of the site, | | | | only once. It may take 6-9 months before you get |
| it should be something like Joe's Martial Arts Dojo in | | | | listed, but wait 6 months before submitting |
| XYZ, USA. This title will also act as a "keyword" to | | | | again.2)Submit to "free search engines", do this |
| match a search engine inquiry for "Martial Arts XYZ | | | | manually rather than the "submit to 10K for X $"3)Look |
| USA". | | | | for link exchange partners to do reciprocal links.4)Write |
| The Meta Description should also use significant words | | | | and submit articles. 5)Use signature tags in all emails, |
| to describe your style, geographical location, as well as | | | | Forum post etc that include your URL.6)Keep updating |
| the name of your website. This description also acts | | | | content, adding new pages, and getting links. |
| as "keywords" to match a search engine request. | | | | If you follow these basics, do additional research on |
| Keywords are words that you wish your site would | | | | the term SEO, then your Martial Arts website will be |
| be referenced when someone does an Internet | | | | seen in the search engines, increase your web traffic |
| search engine inquiry. Your keywords should phrases | | | | and your website could bring you customers to your |
| that include geographical locations. Instead of Self | | | | Martial Arts Location. |