In Parts 1 and 2, you learned how to develop your online business proposition and how to generate a keyword ingredient list for your site optimization activity. You were also introduced to our legendary Doug (selling antique doors, door handles, knockers, doorbells or handles and fitting services) in Windsor, UK.
Now is the time to start your optimization activities and I am going to start with a clear message. If you already have a site and this is your first time taking a serious look at SEO, then I would recommend starting over from scratch! Create a new site from the top down, and when you’re done, migrate from your old site to the new one. Don’t worry about losing custom or other site links – there are ways around that which I’ll show you in (final) part 10.
(a) Domain name optimization
A breaking news for you. By far the most effective way to optimize for keywords is to have them in the full URL of your page. The most valuable part of that URL is the domain name itself.
I know what you’re thinking. All the good domain names are already gone. Well, you might be surprised (as you’ll soon see with Doug). His second concern might be that he would prefer to use your company name as his URL. We will address these two concerns (in reverse order).
Try typing “search” into Google and you might expect to see Google placed first in the results, or Yahoo. However, search.com comes out on top! I stay with my case. Domain names matter (whatever nonsense you may read on SEO forums).
Try http://www.laserpointers.co.uk and see what you find. If you do some research, you’ll find that the company behind this site (and several others) is Blue Sky Marketing.
At http://www.blueskymarketing.co.uk you will find their company website, but guess which of the two sites gets a top five ranking in Google UK for a search for ‘laser pointers’?
The bottom line is that (after all the other pieces of optimization have been done correctly) your domain name selection is perhaps the one area where you can further differentiate yourself from your competitors. As such, it may be your only realistic chance (in this increasingly mature market) of achieving a top 10 ranking for some of your key search terms, and believe me, the impact on traffic (and business) that this has is literally amazing.
Now, the “all the good domain names are gone” problem. Doug pays a visit (as you should) to the excellent Keyword Domain Name Lookup Tool and even though plurals are out (sorry), he discovers that the following two options are still available for his best-selling product and the highest traffic possible:
[http://www.antiquedoorknocker.com;] Y
[http://www.antique-door-knocker.com]
If you use your top three keywords as a combination, chances are you’ll also find a decent available domain (unless you’re operating in a highly competitive area like real estate).
So which of these two should Doug choose? To split the domain name or not? There is more disagreement on this among webmasters than on any other issue in SEO. In practice, this means that there is evidence to support both options… and as such, your choice is not critical. However, in general (and without boring you with the details), I’d suggest hyphenating your domain name if you have another option (if only to help you with your page titles – more on that later).
(b) URL name optimization
You’ll remember that I suggested a separate page for each key product, service, or information. Well, you’d also have a separate directory for each product or service category (limiting the directory name to two hyphenated keywords). As such, Doug settles on three directories, covering his three main categories:
[http://www.antique-door-knocker.com/door-hardware/]
[http://www.antique-door-knocker.com/antique-doors/]
[http://www.antique-door-knocker.com/door-fitting/]
I wouldn’t go down to the subdirectories below this unless you have a large number of products in your catalog (and thus recognizable subcategories). Too many keywords will reduce the overall density of any given word within the full URL.
(c) File extension optimization
For your file (page) name, you would use up to three keywords, again with hyphens. For the file extension, I would always go for static .html file extensions when possible. Dynamically generated file extensions (including “?” or “%” in the query string) have been shown to confuse search engines.
Expanding on Doug’s example, he presents 45 different pages under hardware, of which the following five are examples:
../door-hardware/brass-doorknobs.html
../door-fittings/iron-door-knobs.html
../door-hardware/doorbell-handles.html
../door-hardware/door-chime.html
../door-hardware/brass-knockers.html
In some cases, you have duplicate products on different pages. For example, everything on the doorbell page also appears on the door removal page. Doug discovered during his keyword analysis phase that Americans tended to search with bells, while the British used pulls. Therefore, he needs both covered in this level.
(d) Navigation, Internal Linking and Sitemap Optimization
It may come as a shock to some (particularly those who focus too much on Page Rank), but your home page – or “index” – has very little SEO value. A well-ranked root index page is the exception rather than the rule. My advice is to treat the home page as a pretty sitemap, pretty because it should impress human directory reviewers and a sitemap so that it directs search engine bots quickly to your sub-content.
To optimize the sitemap, imagine a fallen banana at the top of your page (slanted to the left side). This banana zone is where both human eyeballs and search engines will look the most. Make sure your links use keywords for anchor text only and link directly to your second and third level. A truncated example version (for Doug) would sit in the top left corner of your home page and look like this:
door hardware
brass door knobs
iron door knobs
door bell sweaters
door bells
brass knockers
old doors
edwardian doors
victorian doors
door adjustment
Surrey Door Fitters
Middlesex door fitters
More value is attached to internal links (with good anchor text) than many people seem to realize. I’m often amazed at how many people spend years trying to protect incoming links from other sites (more on that later) but don’t have decent, keyword-rich navigation within their own site (where, after all, everything is under your own control).
Search engines use the anchor text in incoming links to determine the relevance of the landing page. In fact, Google even has a special operator: ‘allinanchor:keyword’, which collects text only from the anchor text of indexed pages. Try comparing any direct Google search to its allinanchor equivalent. For example, “swimming pools” vs. “allinanchor:swimming pools”.
You’ll probably notice that the top-ranked direct search site is invariably the top-ranking allinanchor site (while others further down the list can vary substantially). Don’t forget to focus on this area in your SEO strategy!
Next, we turn our attention to on-page optimization…
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SEO Experts Guide – Keyword Analysis (part 3/10)
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SEO Experts Guide – On Page Optimization (part 5/10)
