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1. The State of Your Site Prior to the
Optimization - Your web site can have many
different attributes that contribute to its ability to
rank well. For example, your PageRank is very
important. If your PageRank is 0 out of 10, or 1 out
of 10, it will take much longer and a great deal more
work to get your site to a point where it can rank
well. If your site is poorly designed, contains frames,
or is written entirely in Flash, most likely a redesign
will be required to make your site "search engine
friendly". If your site has very few incoming links, a
fair amount of link development will need to be done
in order for you to accomplish rankings in top
positions. A web site that's been around for a while,
with a high PageRank, a search engine friendly
design, and obtains links on a frequent basis, will be
much easier to optimize and more capable of
reaching a top position quickly.
2. The Keywords You Are Targeting - If you
search Google for a keyword or keyword phrase,
you'll see a number at the top of the page indicating
how many web pages are listed for that keyword.
That is the number of web sites that are competing
for that particular phrase. Obviously some keywords
are less competitive than others. You'll need to keep
this in mind as you define the keywords you want to
compete for. For example, the keyword phrase "web
design" has approximately 2 billion web pages listed in
the results, whereas if you search for my name in
quotations, "tom vaught", you will see that there are
only 453 web pages listed in the results. It's
obviously much easier to rank well for keywords that
are not highly competitive. For this reason, you
must choose your keywords wisely. With tools such
as wordtracker.com, you can find out approximately
how many searches are performed for a given
keyword or keyword phrase. The number of keywords
wanted, and how competitive they are will be a big
factor in determining cost and time required to
optimize your web site.
3. The Size of Your Target Market - If your
site is targeting a global market, it will take
significantly more effort to reach a top ten position
than if your site is targeting a regional or local
market. It also depends on what kind of market
you're targeting. If your site sells a product that only
a small population is interested in, it will be much
easier to optimize. Conversely, if your site sells a
product or service appealed to the global population,
it will be more difficult, more expensive and take
longer. For instance, the keyword phrase "real
estate" would require much more effort to reach top
page placement than "Indiana real estate"
or "Indianapolis real estate".
4. Competitors- You might find that once
your optimization campaign is under way, your site
may rise and fall several times. This is normal and
can be due to many things including SEO efforts
made by your competitors. If your competitors are
aggressively optimizing their sites, they can be
achieving new rankings and displacing your site. This
brings us to our final point...
5. Your Own SEO and Link Development Campaign
- Your own link development and SEO campaign
should be thorough, covering all the aspects of a well
optimized site and utilizing all your resources for
obtaining incoming links. If your SEO campaign isn't
approached properly, your competitors can surpass
you in the rankings fairly easily and acquire business
that should be yours. You'll need to be aware of your
competition and adjust your efforts accordingly.
In summary, there are numerous things to consider in
making your site unique and determining the services
required for getting your site in a top position. Some
sites can reach top page placement by simply
changing a title tag, while others can take 6 months
just to get listed in Google. The bottom line is, SEO is
important, sometimes difficult, and many times
needed to achieve top placement. If you're
interested in learning more about an SEO program for
your website, contact Narrow Gate Media today and
speak with our SEO expert, Corey Wenger, "Mr. Key
Position!"
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