On Page SEO Best Practices

Posted in Busby SEO Challenge, Optimize And Monetize, SEO by DB

Search Engine Optimization can be broadly classified into On Page Optimization tactics and Off Page Optimization. Let’s take a close look at the former today. While there are many techniques that are situation specific, there are quite a few generic rules of thumb that one must employ to rank high on the search engine result pages (SERP’s)

So what are these On Page optimization techniques? Let us look at some basic On Page factors in no order of priority. Let’s save the more specific ones for another day.

  1. Title TagPerhaps one of the most important aspects of On Page optimization. Having your main keyword as part of your page title is a must. The title tag is one tag that is often abused by novice SEO consultant and companies. You will often come across title tags that are a thesis in itself. Either the SEO in charge does not realize that there is a limit to the number of characters or they have no clue which keyword to target for that page. All classic examples of bad SEO.
  2. Header TagsStill considered to very important part of On page optimization. Usage of the header tags must be done with care. The most ideal would be to have a single H1 tag that contains the main keyword for that page followed with 3 - 4 H2 tags that contains the secondary keywords for that page. Not much importance given to H3 and further.

    Another point that is generally considered a good practice is to order the Header tags in increasing importance. So always have the H1 tag coming first followed by the H2 tags and so on.

  3. URLHave your keyword in your domain/sub domain or file/folder is always a plus and a good SEO consultant will ensure that your page/folder URL contains your most important keyword. Avoid too many parameters as this is guaranteed to confuse the search bots though these days the bots are getting more and more adept at it.
  4. Keyword densityHaving the right keyword density is another aspect of On Page optimization that is often abused by novice SEO’s. Keyword stuffing can get you into trouble but I’ve seen sites that have built authority getting away with stuffing to a fair degree. While I will not quote percentages, the target should always be to pass any visual inspection that might occur with ease.
  5. Meta ContentMost search engines have reduced the importance of the meta description and keywords. Keyword stuffing is these tags is so outdated that if you find a SEO company doing this then you should simply move on because the SEO company is still employing tactics that are years out of date.

    That said, the meta description is easily overlooked and can be very important and if often the difference between your site getting clicked on or overlooked on the search engine results. Remember that this is what is often showed to the user when a search result is displayed and the description in there is crucial in converting a potential visitor

While there are many more on page optimization techniques one can employ, they are all specific to the CMS or niche itself. For example, there are tons of additional things you can do with a blog running Wordpress that will optimize your site in addition to the above.

Take for example the Busby SEO Challenge that is currently in progress. A quick look at some of the various competitors in the Busby Challenge will throw up various On Page optimization techniques that the participant believes in very strongly. Some are a little far fetched like using the same blog theme as Matt Cutts ( :) like that will help) since they obviously believe that the theme is search engine optimized to the more plausible use of images and video on the blogs.

Another factor that can be considered as an On Page Optimization factor is the content itself. No I’m not taking about keyword positioning or density. I am referring to the frequency of fresh content that is added to a site or blog. If I again use the Busby SEO Challenge as an example, you will find two camps. One that firmly believes that fresh content is key and the other group that is more than happy with a more spaced out content strategy. The SERP’s itself throws up many contrasting examples on this particular point. I firmly believe that this cannot be viewed in isolation. This particular point has to be examined with many other factors, domain authority, the topic niche. More on this in a later post.

Ok folks, I’m going to end this post here. Do not forget to subscribe to this blog for more tips on website hosting and search engine optimization and yes, take some time to read through my Busby SEO Challenge entry and looking forward for your support in helping me winning the SEO challenge from Busby.

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