SEO Statistics
- Searching is the second most popular online activity, right behind emailing
- 75% of all searchers never look further than the first page of results on search engines (Source: Georgia Institute of Technology)
- 66% of U.S. adults research online before buying (Source: TNS market research firm)
- 55% of U.S. adults research online to find the best price (Source: TNS market research firm)
- More than 80% of all internet users find new web sites through search engines like Google and Yahoo! (Source: Georgia Tech/GVU Users Survey)
- Search engine users are some of the most qualified and motivated visitors to your website you will ever have. After all, they have taken the initiative to hunt for online resources on a certain topic. And then they clicked your link to learn more.
Introduction to Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
The marketing of a website via Search Engine Optimization is an excellent way to increase profits substantially if you have a product worthy of advertising. With access to millions of people, it appeals to people actively seeking you and in a position to purchase. Internet security is quickly coming to par as billions of dollars a day are exchanged over the world wide web with a large portion attributed to search engines such as Google, Yahoo!, AOL, MSN, and more. With so many advantages that Search Engine Optimization can offer, it's amazing there is so much prime real estate still available for advertising. It does take a lot of work to design a winning ecommerce site and then make sure it gets on the front page, but the rewards far outweigh any time and investment once a system is established. We believe that the grassroots of any such campaign begin with a good understanding of SEO fundamentals, and the way web sites are viewed by search engines.
Every day, search engines send out spider robots to crawl the web and record everything they find. During the initial phases of website planning, it is essential that your website hierarchy is structured in a friendly manner so they can pass through cleanly and index every page (or any page you would like them to). The internal linking structure should be interwoven well with a sitemap to guide these bots. Once all your pages are indexed, they are available to be found in a Google search, Yahoo search, and etc. But how they are found is of utmost importance.
Content Development for a website takes more than a good writer. Statistics that track what people search for are used to identify which keywords and keyword phrases are essential to Search Engine Optimization success. Many people realize too late that targeting the wrong words is one of the biggest reasons website fail. Keyword research consists of uncovering which words people search most frequently to find what you have to offer. You must include these words within the names of your website files, folders, meta tags, link text, coding, and content so that it has optimal keyword density. The algorithms that search engines use are very intelligent and are built to weed out spam, so SEO experts aim to keep their keyword density between 5-10% of the total words on the page. This makes it look natural so the search engine robot has a clear understanding of what the web page is about, without looking spammy or gauded with hard to read sentences. Having impleminted a theme to the site, you're now ready to market pages that target specific search phrases consistent with web surfers ready to buy. Make your content suck (users in, of course).
Chances are if you're considering optimizing your web site for search engine performance, you have some competition. Finding out how your competitors managed to get on the front page is a terrific way to gain insight and build a strategy of your own. Rightfully so, SEO consultants are now able to track the legwork of competitors to see exactly how organized and well-equipped their operations are. Often we can estimate roughly how much time and resources need to be devoted for a campaign to blossom. Better yet, we can get an estimate of how many visitors they receive from which search terms, and then proceed to dominate them. Scouting opponents is also a great way to gain insight into the user's experience in order to better service your visitors.