{"id":104,"date":"2009-09-19T12:50:03","date_gmt":"2009-09-19T12:50:03","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/msftechnologies.com\/www.ww\/?p=104"},"modified":"2013-01-31T16:48:14","modified_gmt":"2013-01-31T16:48:14","slug":"how-to-optimize-my-web-site","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/msftechnologies.com\/www.ww\/how-to-optimize-my-web-site\/search-engine-optimization\/09\/19\/","title":{"rendered":"How to optimize my Web Site"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>10 steps on how to optimize your WordPress powered web site in Google search engines.<\/h2>\n

Google is the most preferred search engine by most of the people according to\u00a0statistics. More than 60% of Google users don\u2019t click on the \u201csponsored links\u201d\u00a0and more than 80% don\u2019t go to search results page 2 or 3. Having this in mind it\u00a0is very important to have a good ranking and to be well positioned in search\u00a0engines, not to mention that organic growth can make the difference between the\u00a0success and failure of your online business.<\/p>\n

SEO<\/strong><\/span> (search engine optimization) is very complex <\/strong><\/span>process which takes a lot of time<\/strong><\/span> and can be achieved by making\u00a0right some several steps. Best part in search engine optimization is that it can\u00a0be made also for free with very good results. Let\u2019s get started!<\/p>\n

First major rule is defining you keywords! I will say it again, DEFINE YOUR\u00a0KEYWORDS. You cannot even start thinking about search engine optimization\u00a0without defining your keywords. For those who don\u2019t know, keywords are some\u00a0several words or combination of words related to what your site is about and\u00a0basically the whole content should be built based on those keywords. You should\u00a0not have more the 20 keywords for not confusing the search engine. Think about\u00a0explaining something to a 5 years child. To be understood well you have to be\u00a0very precise. One important thing is that keywords should be frequently used\u00a0search terms by your targeted users.<\/p>\n

Let\u2019s say you have a website about soccer. Your keywords can be: soccer,\u00a0soccer shoes, soccer jerseys, soccer balls, soccer cleats, soccer boots, soccer\u00a0gear, soccer equipment, soccer footwear, goalkeeper gear, team uniforms, soccer
\nstore, soccer apparel,…..<\/p>\n

Once you have decided about what our site is about and choused our keywords,\u00a0you have your site up and running powered by WordPress, take in consideration\u00a0following the next 10 steps to optimize your site in search engines:
\n1. Validate your WordPress theme<\/strong><\/p>\n

<\/strong><\/p>\n

To not confuse your visitors because a buggy code can be displayed quite\u00a0strange in some browsers and to be understood well by search engines, you should\u00a0use a valid (X)HTML and CSS theme. Your theme can be checked\u00a0here<\/a> if it\u2019s valid or not. All\u00a0TimeCafeThemes<\/a> are validated.<\/p>\n

2. Use tags for search engines<\/strong><\/p>\n

<\/strong><\/p>\n

Most of the WordPress themes are not containing tags for search engine\u00a0optimization. Open the header.php from your template folder and insert the\u00a0following tags in the HEAD section in case they do not exist. (ex. <head> Your\u00a0Tags Goes Here <\/head>)<\/p>\n

<meta name=\u201drobots\u201d content=\u201dfollow, all\u201d \/> Tell Google to follow your site.<\/p>\n

<meta name=\u201dlanguage\u201d content=\u201den\u201d \/> Tell Google what language you are using\u00a0for targeting those language speakers.<\/p>\n

<meta name=\u201dAuthor\u201d content=\u201dThe Author\u201d \/> Not so critical, but tell who is the\u00a0author of the page.<\/p>\n

<meta name=\u201drevisit-after\u201d content=\u201d1 day\u201d \/> Ask the search engine robot to\u00a0come back depending on how often you update your site<\/p>\n

<meta name=\u201ddistribution\u201d content=\u201dglobal\u201d \/> *<\/p>\n

<meta name=\u201drating\u201d content=\u201dall\u201d \/> * These tags will help you to target a\u00a0specific audience for your website.<\/p>\n

3. Define Your keywords<\/strong><\/p>\n

<\/strong><\/p>\n

I know, I have sad this before, but it is SO important! One tricky thing is\u00a0to find out what are the most frequently used search terms, here are some good\u00a0sites where you can do keyword researching:
\n
\nhttp:\/\/tools.seobook.com\/keyword-tools\/seobook\/<\/a> and\u00a0http:\/\/www.quintura.com\/<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Another good tool for finding out the volume of search of specific terms and the\u00a0cost per click in Google adwords campaigns can be found\u00a0here<\/a>.<\/p>\n

4. Set up Google friendly links to your site<\/strong><\/p>\n

<\/strong><\/p>\n

With WordPress you can use SEO friendly links, meaning links like http:\/\/www.yourpage.com\/article-name\/
\ninstead of http:\/\/www.yourpage.com\/?p=45. For this, go to WordPress dashboard \u2013\u00a0Settings \u2013 Permalinks and check the option Custom Structure. Here you can change\u00a0into this \/%postname%\/ to show links like in the example or you can change into\u00a0this \/%category%\/%postname%\/ if you want the category to appear in the link\u00a0structure.<\/p>\n

5. Use keywords and description tags smart<\/strong><\/p>\n

<\/strong><\/p>\n

I am mentioning the keywords and description tag separately because they are\u00a0so important. Lucky for us, we have a tool for this to do it in the smart way.\u00a0You can use a WordPress plugin called \u201cAll in One SEO Pack\u201d and can be
\ndownloaded from\u00a0here<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Install and activate the plugin and insert the keywords and description of\u00a0the site in the plugin option fields. For the articles the plugin will generate\u00a0description based on the content of the posts and will generate the following\u00a0tags:<\/p>\n

<meta name=\u201ddescription\u201d content=\u201dSite Description \/><\/p>\n

<meta name=\u201dkeywords\u201d content=\u201dKeywords \/><\/p>\n

6. Build a sitemap for your site<\/strong><\/p>\n

<\/strong><\/p>\n

Help search engines to understand better the site structure of your page and\u00a0the importance of each individual pages. We have another WordPress plugin to\u00a0help us to build a sitemap called \u201cGoogle (XML) Sitemaps Generator\u201d and can be
\ndownloaded from\u00a0here<\/a>.<\/p>\n

7. Check what you have done up to this point<\/strong><\/p>\n

<\/strong><\/p>\n

Before going further you want to make sure that all you have done up to this\u00a0point is ok. You can find a tool for this
\nhere<\/a>.\u00a0Now go to Google (and make an account if you don\u2019t have one) and Google\u00a0Webmaster Tools here<\/a> because at this point you are a webmaster, right?<\/strong><\/p>\n

8. Set the ping Update Services in WordPress<\/strong><\/p>\n

<\/strong><\/p>\n

WordPress have an amassing tool called Update Services. WordPress send and\u00a0information to http:\/\/rpc.pingomatic.com every time you write a new post. Make\u00a0this list larger from your WordPress dashboard \u2013 Setting \u2013 Writing and look in\u00a0the bottom of the page Upade Services and add the following list:<\/p>\n

http:\/\/blogsearch.google.com\/ping\/RPC2<\/p>\n

http:\/\/1470.net\/api\/ping<\/p>\n

http:\/\/api.feedster.com\/ping<\/p>\n

http:\/\/api.feedster.com\/ping.php<\/p>\n

http:\/\/api.moreover.com\/ping<\/p>\n

http:\/\/api.moreover.com\/RPC2<\/p>\n

http:\/\/api.my.yahoo.com\/RPC2<\/p>\n

http:\/\/api.my.yahoo.com\/rss\/ping<\/p>\n

http:\/\/bblog.com\/ping.php<\/p>\n

http:\/\/bitacoras.net\/ping<\/p>\n

http:\/\/blogdb.jp\/xmlrpc<\/p>\n

http:\/\/blog.goo.ne.jp\/XMLRPC<\/p>\n

http:\/\/blogsearch.google.com\/ping\/RPC2<\/p>\n

http:\/\/blogmatcher.com\/u.php<\/p>\n

http:\/\/bulkfeeds.net\/rpc<\/p>\n

http:\/\/coreblog.org\/ping\/<\/p>\n

http:\/\/mod-pubsub.org\/kn_apps\/blogchatt<\/p>\n

https:\/\/phobos.apple.com\/WebObjects\/MZFinance.woa\/wa\/pingPodcast<\/p>\n

http:\/\/ping.amagle.com\/<\/p>\n

http:\/\/ping.bitacoras.com<\/p>\n

http:\/\/ping.bloggers.jp\/rpc\/<\/p>\n

http:\/\/ping.blogmura.jp\/rpc\/<\/p>\n

http:\/\/ping.blo.gs\/<\/p>\n

http:\/\/ping.cocolog-nifty.com\/xmlrpc<\/p>\n

http:\/\/pinger.blogflux.com\/rpc\/<\/p>\n

http:\/\/ping.exblog.jp\/xmlrpc<\/p>\n

http:\/\/ping.feedburner.com<\/p>\n

http:\/\/ping.myblog.jp<\/p>\n

http:\/\/pingqueue.com\/rpc\/<\/p>\n

http:\/\/ping.blogg.de\/<\/p>\n

http:\/\/ping.rootblog.com\/rpc.php<\/p>\n

http:\/\/ping.syndic8.com\/xmlrpc.php<\/p>\n

http:\/\/ping.weblogalot.com\/rpc.php<\/p>\n

http:\/\/ping.weblogs.se\/<\/p>\n

http:\/\/rcs.datashed.net\/RPC2\/<\/p>\n

http:\/\/rpc.blogbuzzmachine.com\/RPC2<\/p>\n

http:\/\/rpc.blogrolling.com\/pinger\/<\/p>\n

http:\/\/rpc.britblog.com\/<\/p>\n

http:\/\/rpc.icerocket.com:10080\/<\/p>\n

http:\/\/rpc.newsgator.com\/<\/p>\n

http:\/\/rpc.pingomatic.com\/<\/p>\n

http:\/\/rpc.tailrank.com\/feedburner\/RPC2<\/p>\n

http:\/\/rpc.technorati.com\/rpc\/ping<\/p>\n

http:\/\/rpc.weblogs.com\/RPC2<\/p>\n

http:\/\/rpc.wpkeys.com\/<\/p>\n

http:\/\/services.newsgator.com\/ngws\/xmlrpcping.aspx<\/p>\n

http:\/\/signup.alerts.msn.com\/alerts-PREP\/submitPingExtended.doz<\/p>\n

http:\/\/topicexchange.com\/RPC2<\/p>\n

http:\/\/trackback.bakeinu.jp\/bakeping.php<\/p>\n

http:\/\/www.a2b.cc\/setloc\/bp.a2b<\/p>\n

http:\/\/www.bitacoles.net\/ping.php<\/p>\n

http:\/\/www.blogdigger.com\/RPC2<\/p>\n

http:\/\/www.blogoole.com\/ping\/<\/p>\n

http:\/\/www.blogoon.net\/ping\/<\/p>\n

http:\/\/www.blogpeople.net\/servlet\/weblogUpdates<\/p>\n

http:\/\/www.blogroots.com\/tb_populi.blog?id=1<\/p>\n

http:\/\/www.blogshares.com\/rpc.php<\/p>\n

http:\/\/www.blogsnow.com\/ping<\/p>\n

http:\/\/www.blogstreet.com\/xrbin\/xmlrpc.cgi<\/p>\n

http:\/\/www.holycowdude.com\/rpc\/ping\/<\/p>\n

http:\/\/www.lasermemory.com\/lsrpc\/<\/p>\n

http:\/\/www.imblogs.net\/ping\/<\/p>\n

http:\/\/www.mod-pubsub.org\/kn_apps\/blogchatter\/ping.php<\/p>\n

http:\/\/www.newsisfree.com\/RPCCloud<\/p>\n

http:\/\/www.newsisfree.com\/xmlrpctest.php<\/p>\n

http:\/\/www.popdex.com\/addsite.php<\/p>\n

http:\/\/www.snipsnap.org\/RPC2<\/p>\n

http:\/\/www.weblogues.com\/RPC\/<\/p>\n

http:\/\/xmlrpc.blogg.de<\/p>\n

9. Tell the world about your cool website<\/strong><\/p>\n

<\/strong><\/p>\n

Everything is good up to this point, but the hard part is just coming. This\u00a0is where websites usually get stocked and didn\u2019t make it to top. Ignoring the\u00a0part explained until now can lead to same disastrous results\u2026<\/p>\n

Subscribe your site to web directories to get as many back links as possible. A\u00a0list of free directories can be found
\nhere<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Subscribe to forums, especially to those who have the same topics as your\u00a0website. You have the possibility there to use your website link in the\u00a0signature. Do NOT use SPAM though because spam comments are deleted usually
\nimmediately.<\/p>\n

I was telling that Google loves WordPress powered websites and I recommend to\u00a0use WordPress to all kind of sites, but for you is good not just using WordPress\u00a0but the fact that other millions are using it to. Open the Google page and start
\nsearching the following term exactly as it written, with brackets: [keyword\u00a0“powered by wordpress”]<\/p>\n

Instead of \u201ckeyword\u201d put a term related to your site topic. Google will find for\u00a0you all the pages powered by WordPress and indexed as related to that specific\u00a0topic. Go to that pages and leave comments to get links to your page from other
\nrelated sites. This is gold for SEO. Don\u2019t forget, DO NOT spam those pages! <\/strong>Try to leave a pertinent comment or they will be deleted and you just waste your\u00a0time and others.<\/p>\n

Using this search string you can contact page owners and ask for link exchange\u00a0from those related websites. Why is that so important? Google ranks pages in\u00a0this way:<\/p>\n

If I have a page about soccer and 100 back links from pages about everything\u00a0else but soccer and you have a soccer related site also but with 50 back links\u00a0from soccer related sites, your site will rank better in search results because
\nyour soccer related keywords have been \u201ccertified\u201d that indeed soccer is the\u00a0site topic by other soccer related sites that links to you, in my case it will\u00a0be not so sure.<\/p>\n

10 or 100 comment does not mean a thing compared to millions of sites out there.\u00a0This is why I have told you that the hard part is just coming. Keep doing it and\u00a0the results will appear in a few month.<\/p>\n

Use services as FeedBurner<\/a> to keep your\u00a0readers updated and make them come back to your site.<\/p>\n

10. Page Content<\/strong><\/p>\n

<\/strong><\/p>\n

If you wish to approach topics that was approached by others also, and it\u2019s\u00a0hard not to, you should never copy-paste the content from others and put it in\u00a0your site. The content may be copyrighted and you\u2019ll get your self in trouble
\nand Google does not accept duplicated content. I don NOT recommend you to assign\u00a0the same article to two or many categories also. When Google will analyze your\u00a0site content, that article can be interpreted as duplicated content.<\/p>\n

Write unique content in your posts and try to use as many of your main keywords\u00a0as possible in it. Do not forget that you are addressing to people not just to\u00a0search engines so don\u2019t make articles like blah blah keyword, blah blah keyword.\u00a0Try to maintain a high quality of your content.<\/p>\n

If you have a page about flash games, videos or photos, add always a text\u00a0description to that content, search engines can \u201cunderstand\u201d text, not other\u00a0types of media.
\nClosing Note: <\/strong><\/em><\/span>These are the basic main steps for optimizing\u00a0a WordPress powered website from my perspective based on research I have made\u00a0trough years and with the best results. This is not black hat SEO, all steps are\u00a0legal to use and cannot harm to your actual rank in search engines. Black hat\u00a0SEO can get you banned from search engines and I don\u2019t recommend using such\u00a0technique. As you might have noticed, it\u2019s about a free way to get a better\u00a0ranking in search engines, paid campaigns can get you faster to your targeted\u00a0users, but this is why it\u2019s paid. I recommend you another WordPress plugin\u00a0called Cystats and can be downloaded from\u00a0here<\/a>. With this\u00a0plugin you can see what pages are interesting to your readers, what are the best\u00a0referrals, what search strings lead to your site externally, what people try to\u00a0find inside your site and how many visits you have in different periods.<\/p>\n

I also recommend you to download Clickheat from\u00a0here<\/a>. Clickheat is a\u00a0tool what helps you to find out what are the most clicked places on your\u00a0websites.<\/p>\n

With these tools you are able to understand your visitor\u2019s behavior, what is\u00a0interesting for them and what is not and you can take measures to improve your\u00a0site\u2019s quality constantly. You have to understand how to maintain a balance
\nbetween the visitors who are coming back and those who are finding your site in\u00a0search engine and try to make those from second category to come back to your\u00a0site. This way you will have a constant growth of visitors to your page.<\/p>\n

I will be pleased to hear about\u00a0your success stories<\/a>, if there where new information\u2019s here and in what way\u00a0applying them changed your perspective about SEO so please let me know.
\nIt’s\u00a0Time to follow me! >TimeCafeThemes.com<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

10 steps on how to optimize your WordPress powered web site in Google search engines. Google is the most preferred search engine by most of the people according to\u00a0statistics. More than 60% of Google users don\u2019t click on the \u201csponsored links\u201d\u00a0and more than 80% don\u2019t go to search results page 2 or 3. Having this […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[15],"class_list":["post-104","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-search-engine-optimization","tag-optimize"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/msftechnologies.com\/www.ww\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/104","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/msftechnologies.com\/www.ww\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/msftechnologies.com\/www.ww\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/msftechnologies.com\/www.ww\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/msftechnologies.com\/www.ww\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=104"}],"version-history":[{"count":14,"href":"https:\/\/msftechnologies.com\/www.ww\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/104\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":106,"href":"https:\/\/msftechnologies.com\/www.ww\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/104\/revisions\/106"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/msftechnologies.com\/www.ww\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=104"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/msftechnologies.com\/www.ww\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=104"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/msftechnologies.com\/www.ww\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=104"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}