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Optimising a page for Search Engine Results Pages
Return to text blog entriesArticle date: Mon, 22 Sep 2008 08:32:02 GMTSo you've done your keyword research, your website's up and running, it's even appearing in searches, but it's not performing as well as you had hoped. This is the next step.
Your appearance on a Search Engine Results Page should not be undervalued, the combination of words that appear here are the most important advertising feature your site has.
First of all there's the page title. This appears at the top of the browser, it's also the first piece of information that the visitor will review in the search results - it should contain two pieces of information, the main keyword or phrase from the page and the brand.
It's arguable as to whether the brand should come first or the keyword. Personally, I prefer to see the keyword first.
This should be in the form of a proposition.
When appearing in the Search Engine Results Pages (SERPs) this is the section of your webpage that will appear most prominently.
I'll use Text Internet Marketing as an example:
Get Search Engine Optimisation from Text Internet Marketing
Or
Get Corporate Video Production from Text Internet Marketing
Use capitalization of the first letters of the words you want the searchers to view - don't use all capitals, this is considered a spamming technique by many search engines. You get around 65 characters to make this count.
You can of course use the Brand name first, as you mustn't underestimate the value of brand recognition in generating visits and repeat visits to your site.
If I were to use the two above examples the opposite way around it may look like this:
Text Internet Marketing can help you with Search Engine Optimisation
Or
Text Internet Marketing can produce your Corporate Video
Personally I think it's more important to include the keyword or phrase in the first half, as when the reader is skimming over the SERPs you don't have a lot of time to grab their attention.
The META Description is also important, Search Engines don't put as much weight on this as they used to, but it is still considered, and more importantly it provides the searcher with a chance to receive a reaffirming message that just may sway their decision to enter your site.
For example:
Get Search Engine Optimisation from Text Internet Marketing
In need of Search Engine Optimisation? Loosing valuable traffic to your competitors? Find out how Text can help your business now.
It's important that the language you use creates a sense of urgency and plays on primal business urges, so make the searcher think that they could be losing money to their competitors by not dealing with you.
If your website is more consumer orientated then this sense of urgency is still required, although the message has to be more direct.
For example:
Looking for that new [product]. View our special discounts to see how much we can save you today!
The main stumbling block people come back with when thinking about this aspect of optimisation is generally that the page is orientated around more than one keyword, product or service, and generally there is an attempt to pack these sections with more than one keyword or phrase. There is of course a simple solution to this - change the copy and create a new page - after all this gives you twice as much chance of appearing in the rankings - remember the more space you take up in the SERPs the better chance you have of getting visitors to your site.
Once you've optimised this aspect of your site it's time to look at the copy on the page. I'll save that for another day!!
Keep an eye out for my next blog. I'm going to be looking at some of the elements that make up a good Google Adwords campaign.
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Jonathan, 2008-09-23 18:09:21
In terms of leading a title text with brand name or key words it often depends whether your brand is actually strong enough to be searched for more often than the generic key phrases that relate to your service.
I agree that it is a great way to instil a brand for a user. However, if you are able to find web stats that show the volume of visits from a brand search versus a product search, the product will win in the vast majority of cases. I know that 'dedicated hosting' sends more traffic than UKFast and as such I follow your advice and put the key phrase first. But there must be good examples that work the other way?
