Key Words on Keywords

So... a Search Engine Optimization (SEO) company has contacted you and told you they can get your website listed high on search engine rankings including Google. They tell you that the MOST important thing for you to do is to pick keywords related to your industry and they will make sure your website meta tags, especially your keywords meta tags, include the keywords you feel are most related to your industry. Of course, they will also require a fee for this service.

Before you succumb to the siren's lure of the holy meta tag keywords, did you know that Google DOES NOT even use the keyword meta tag in its search result rankings?

Don't believe it?

Hear it directly from Google Software Engineer, Matt Cutts, on YouTube.

You may also read this for yourself at Matt Cutts' own website.

Why is this so important?

At this time Google, by far, dominates the search engine market.

Want to know what search engines really use for ranking?

1. Size Matters

The larger the site, the better the chance a search engine will list it well. This is not often an option for the small business owner. However, if you have several services, say, household moving, packing, crating, etc., instead of listing all your services on one page, create a page for each specific service. This will increase the size of your site and help with Key Words.

2. Content is King

Key Words are important, but not so much in meta tags as they are in the body text of your web pages themselves. For example, if your business is located in Tustin, Orange County, California, then you should have your address in text on EVERY page of your website. Make sure you include City, County, State, and Zip as search engines will try to place pages based on any of these items. County and State are important especially in combination because California, Florida, Indiana, New York, North Carolina, Texas, Vermont, and Virginia all have an Orange County. This is the case with many county names.

More importantly, search engines, especially Google, scan the pages looking for words RELATED and RELEVANT to your business. It is critical that each page of your site contain the key words related to the product or service that the page is describing.

Also, many sites we review have a very plain SERVICES page with a sentence or two then a long bullet list of services. Google, and most search engines, do not place much value in bulleted or numbered lists. Those sites should break up such a page and create one page for each service listed. Not only will this develop content, it will also increase the size of the website (refer to the number 1 item in this list).

3. Update Frequency

The more frequently a site is updated the better it will list. This is due to the fact that search bots look for fresh content. If a search bot visits your site and sees new information, it will re-index your site. If it sees that nothing has changed, there is no reason to re-index the site. The longer the length of time between updates, the lower in the search engine index your site will be listed.

4. Inbound Links

The more links inbound to your site from external sites, such as industry organizations and membership organizations such as chambers of commerce, the better. Especially if those sites are large and already list well in generic search phrases associated with your industry. Think about clients, vendors, and suppliers that also have sites and may be willing to link to your site from theirs.

5. Site Map

Search engines need to know all of the pages of your site. While they can follow the links found in you website's menu, it is very helpful if you provide them a single page with links to all the pages in your site. Most search engines look for a single special page called SITEMAP.XML. This is a specially designed page written in Extensible Markup Language that makes it easier for a search bot to find all of the pages in your site.

6. Key Words and Meta Tags

This one item is the most overstated, overrated, and under-utilized item in this list. An SEO will tell you that you MUST have meta tags on a page for it to list well. This is NOT true. Case in point, our opening statement regarding Google.

A site should have at least the following META TAGS:

• Title

• Description

• Key Words

• Key Phrases

These meta tags should NOT be exactly the same on each page. They should be tailored for the content of the page in which they are imbedded. Then, throughout the page where the tags are placed, the Key Words and Key Phrases should appear in the text of the page at least once.

The MOST IMPORTANT meta tag is actually the TITLE tag. This tag is what each web browser uses as the display text in the title bar of a website.

The Title is used by all search engines and should include your address if you focus on selling products and services to a mainly local market.

Tech Tip

View more webpage area in Internet Explorer

If you have ever wanted to see more of a web page and less of the menu bars when browsing the internet using Internet Explorer, simply hit the F11 key. This will place IE in Full Screen mode. To get out, simply hit F11 again.

For a complete list of keyboard shortcut keys for IE, visit Microsoft's Keyboard Shortcut Page.

Tech Term

Byte

A byte is a set of 8 bits that represent a single character in the computer's memory. Do not confuse this term with "bite," as in taking a bite of a cookie, because that is totally different. While bits are often used to measure data transfer speeds, bytes are used to measure file sizes, hard disk space, and computer memory. Larger amounts of data are measured in units such as megabytes, gigabytes, and terabytes.

Bytes (8 bits)

• 0.1 bytes: A single yes/no decision  (actually 0.125 bytes, but I rounded)
• 1 byte: One character
• 10 bytes: One word (a word of language, not a computer word)
• 100 bytes: Telegram; two punched computer (Hollerith) cards

Kilobyte
     1,024 bytes; 2¹⁰;
     approx. 1,000 or 10 ³

• 1 Kilobyte: Joke; (very) short story
• 2 Kilobytes: Typewritten page
• 10 Kilobytes: Page out of an encyclopedia
• 50 Kilobytes: Image of a document page, compressed
• 100 Kilobytes: Photograph, low-resolution

Megabyte
     1,048,576 bytes; 2²⁰;
     approx 1,000,000 or 10 ⁶

• 1 Megabyte: Small novel; 3-1/2 inch diskette
• 2 Megabytes: Photograph, high resolution
• 5 Megabytes: Complete works of Shakespeare; 30 seconds of broadcast-quality video
• 10 Megabytes: Minute of high-fidelity sound; digital chest X-ray; Box of 3-1/2 inch diskettes
• 20 Megabytes: Two boxes of 3-1/2 inch diskettes
• 50 Megabytes: Digital mammogram
• 100 Megabytes: Yard of books on a shelf; two encyclopedia volumes
• 200 Megabytes: Reel of 9-track tape; IBM 3480 cartridge tape
• 500 Megabytes: CD-ROM

Gigabyte
     1,073,741,824 bytes; 2³⁰;
     approx 1,000,000,000 or 10 ⁹

• 1 Gigabyte: Paper in the bed of a pickup; symphony in high-fidelity sound; broadcast quality movie
• 2 Gigabytes: 20 yards of books on a shelf
• 20 Gigabytes: Audio collection of the works of Beethoven; five Exabyte tapes; VHS tape used to store digital data
• 50 Gigabytes: Library floor of books on shelves
• 100 Gigabytes: Library floor of academic journals on shelves; large ID-1 digital tape
• 200 Gigabytes: 50 Exabyte tapes

Terabyte
     1,099,511,627,776 or 2⁴⁰;
     approx. 1,000,000,000,000 or 10 ¹²

• 1 Terabyte: Automated tape robot; all the X-ray films in a large technological hospital; 50,000 trees made into paper and printed; daily rate of EOS (Earth Orbiting System) data (1998)
• 2 Terabytes: Academic research library
• 10 Terabytes: Printed collection of the U.S. Library of Congress
• 50 Terabytes: Contents of a large mass storage system

Petabyte
     1,125,899,906,842,624 bytes or 2⁵⁰
     approx. 1,000,000,000,000,000 or 10 ¹⁵

• 1 Petabyte: 3 years of EOS data (2001)
• 2 Petabytes: All U.S. academic research libraries
• 20 Petabytes: 1995 production of hard-disk drives
• 200 Petabytes: All printed material; 1995 production of digital magnetic tape

Exabyte
     1,152,921,504,606,846,976 bytes or 2⁶⁰
     approx. 1,000,000,000,000,000,000 or 10 ¹⁸  

• 5 Exabytes: All words ever spoken by human beings.

Zettabyte
     1,180,591,620,717,411,303,424 bytes or 2⁷⁰
     approx. 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 or 10 ²¹

Yottabyte
     1,208,925,819,614,629,174,706,176 bytes or 2⁸⁰
     approx. 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 or 10 ²⁴

Not to be confused with Yoda Bite

HAVE A GREAT DAY!