Building a successful web site takes a lot of planning. My definition of a successful web site is determined by the search engine ranking achieved from the top three engines (Google, Yahoo, and MSN) achieved by the web site. A search on one of the top three search engines will often return thousands if not millions of matching web pages, with only the first ten displayed. Most users will only look at the first few sites and then do another search. Very seldom do I look beyond the first fifty or so.
Tips and their evaluation on improving your ranking will be discussed in future articles. However these planing tips lay the foundation for a high ranking.
First decision is the selection of a domain name?. In simple terms your domain name is your web address. Each domain name is unique. Therefore there is a limited number of name combinations. For example when I recently decided to establish a service to develop inexpensive web sites for small businesses and professionals, I decided I wanted to use the domain name simplewebsites. When I tried to register this name I discovered that www.simplewebsites.info was the only one available, therefore I purchased this one instead of .com, .org, or .net which are more popular. There is a lot of information available about the technical makeup of a domain name but has little to do with web page development, therefore I chose not to discuss it in this article.
For a small local business or professional service getting your name, business name, or service as part of the domain name would be your goal. For example I am currently building a simple web site for a local dentist. He wanted his clinic name to be his domain name. He had to purchase www.avalondental.org because .com and .net were already purchased.
Very few people will search for your site by the domain name. Most will search with words or phrases (keywords) that are relevant to the service or product they are seeking. Anticipating these keywords and phrases are one of the most critical aspects of planning for a successful web page. Each page of your web site should have a different set of keywords. Initially we should think of 2-3 key phrases of two or more words in length to emphasize per page of your web site.
Positioning of these keywords is also very important. They should be in your "meta tags" such as "tile tag", "description tag", and "keyword tag". All of these will be discussed in more detail in a future article. Page content is very important and not only should the keywords appear frequently in the text of the page but need to be in prominent positions such as near the top of the page as headings. They should also be bold faced and emphasized in other ways throughout the page. For example, use them to name your pages and pictures.
The selection of Keywords, their placement on the page, and their repetition are a critical part of the search engine algorithms. The search engine algorithms are the calculations made by search engine software that determine how a website is ranked within a search result list. Each search engine (Google, Yahoo, and MSN) use a different set of algorithms (like the coke formula they are closely guarded secrets). Domain name and keywords are important factors along with the website's meta-tags and link popularity may be important in achieving a high search engine ranking. All of these will be discussed more fully in future articles.
The purpose of these articles are to lay a simple foundation of understanding of how to develop a simple web site and also how to analyze an existing site to improve search engine ranking so that more people will find your site.
These things can/should be considered prior to web site construction, however if your site is already up and running my advice is to make simple changes and then wait to see (analyze) how the search engines respond to your changes. Using free tools to analyze your site and your competitors or also critical in achieving and maintaining a high ranking. This to will be covered in more detail in the future. Have a great time building and/or improving your site.
About the Author
Charles King has over thirty years of experience working for computer manufactures, computer software companies, communication companies, and computer consulting firms. He also has a BS in physics and Mathematics with a Masters in Computer Systems. The importance of the above subject became apparent to him as he developed a site for Four Soils Ministry. Also you might visit www.simplewebsites.info if you have questions or need assistance.
