Ten Steps To A Well Optimized Website - Step 4b: Site Optimization

Special Text

"Special text" (as it is used here) is any content on your page that
is set to stand out from the rest. This includes bold, underlined, colored,
highlighted, sizing and italic. This text is given weight higher than standard
content and rightfully so. Bold text, for example, is generally used to define
sub-headings (see above), or to pull content out on a page to insure the visitor
reads it. The same can be said for the other "special text" definitions.

Search engines have thus been programmed to read this as more important than
the rest of the content and will give it increased weight. For example, on our
homepage we begin the content with "Beanstalk Search Engine Positioning
…" and have chosen to bold this text. This serves two purposes.
The first is to draw the eye to these words and further reinforce the "brand".
The second purpose (and it should always be the second) is to add weight to
the "Search Engine Positioning" portion of the name. It effectively
does both.

Reread your content and, if appropriate for BOTH visitors and search engines,
use special text when it will help draw the eye to important information and
also add weight to your keywords. This does not mean that you should bold every
instance of your targeted keywords nor does it mean that you should avoid using
special text when it does not involve your keywords. Common sense and a reasonable
grasp of sales and marketing techniques should be your guide in establishing
what should and should not be drawn out with "special text".

Inline Text Links

Inline text links are links added right into text in the verbiage of your content.
For example, in this article series I may make reference to past articles in
the series. Were I to refer to the article on keyword selection rather than
simple making a simple reference to it as I just have it might be better to
write it as, "Were I to refer to the article on keyword
selection rather …"

Like special text this serves two purposes. The first is to give the reader
a quick and easy way to find the find the information you are referring to.
The second purpose of this technique is to give added weight to this phrase
for the page on which the link is located and also to give weight to the target
page.

While this point is debatable, there is a relatively commonly held belief that
inline text links are given more weight that a text link which stands alone.
If we were to think like a search engine this makes sense. If the link occurs
within the content area then chances are it is highly relevant to the content
itself and the link should be counted with more strength than a link placed
in a footer simply to get a spider through the site.

Link "special text" this should only be employed if it helps the
visitor navigate your site. An additional benefit to inline text links is that
you can help direct your visitors to the pages you want them on. Rather than
simply relying on visitors to use your navigation bar as you are hoping they
will, with inline text links you can link to the internal pages you are hoping
they will get to such as your services page, or product details.

Keyword Density

For those of you who have never heard the term "keyword density"
before, it is the percentage of your total content that is made up of your targeted
keywords. There is much debate in forums, SEO chat rooms and the like as to
what the "optimal" keyword density might be. Estimates seem to range
from 3% to 10%.

While I would be the first to admit that logic dictate that indeed there is
an optimal keyword density. Knowing that search engines operate on mathematical
formulas implies that this aspect of your website must have some magic number
associated with it that will give your content the greatest chance of success.

With this in mind there are three points that you should consider:

1. You do not work for Google or Yahoo! or any of the other major search engines
   (and if you do you're not the target audience of this article). You will never
   know 100% what this "magic number" is.


2. Even if you did know what the optimal keyword density was today, would
   you still know it after the next update? Like other aspects of the search
   engine algorithm, optimal keyword densities change. You will be chasing smoke
   if you try to constantly have the optimal density and chances are you will
   hinder your efforts more than help by constantly changing the densities of
   your site.


3. The optimal keyword density for one search engine is not the same as it
   is for another. Chasing the density of one may very well ruin your efforts
   on another.

So what can you do? Your best bet is to simple place your targeted
keyword phrase in your content as often as possible while keeping the content
easily readable by a live visitor. Your goal here is not to sell to search engines,
it is to sell to people. I have seen sites that have gone so overboard in increasing
their keyword density that the content itself reads horribly. If you are simply
aware of the phrase that you are targeting while you write your content then
chances are you will attain a keyword density somewhere between 3 and 5%. Stay
in this range and, provided that the other aspects of the optimization process
are in place, you will rank well across many of the search engines.

Also remember when you're looking over your page that when you're
reading it the targeted phrase may seem to stand out as it's used more
than any other phrase on the page and may even seem like it's a bit too
much. Unless you've obviously overdone it (approached the 10% rather than
5% end of the spectrum) it's alright for this phrase to stand out. This
is the phrase that the searcher was searching for. When they see it on the page
it will be a reminder to them what they are looking for an seeing it a few times
will reinforce that you can help them find the information they need to make
the right decision.

Final Notes

In an effort to increase keyword densities, unethical webmasters will often
use tactics such as hidden text, extremely small font sizes, and other tactics
that basically hide text from a live visitor that they are providing to a search
engines. Take this advice, write quality content, word it well and pay close
attention to your phrasing and you will do well. Use unethical tactics and your
website may rank well in the short term but once one of your competitors realizes
what you're doing you will be reported and your website may very well
get penalized. Additionally, if a visitor realizes that you're simply
"tricking" the search engines they may very well decide that you
are not the type of company they want to deal with; one that isn't concerned
with integrity but rather one that will use any trick to try to get at their
money. Is this the message you want to send?

Next Week

Next week in part five of our "Ten Steps To an Optimized Website"
series we will be covering internal links strategies and best practices. This
will cover everything from image links and scripts to inline and basic text
links.