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Because I spend a lot of my time tweaking and optimizing for the search engines my own sites as well as client sites, I have a good sense of the various strategies and tactics being discussed by SEO professionals as well as business owners interested in finding an edge. Generally the strategies for achieving good results on the search engines are well known – produce quality content for a human audience, produce it regularly and figure out ways (tactics) to get other web sites to link back to you using descriptive link text. I currently own or manage over 100 web sites and blogs, many of which appear on the first page of search results for several relevant keywords (search phrases)
The marketplace of tactics is a lot more fluid – methods to achieve your strategic goals change frequently. Ten years ago, most web sites contained pages titled “recommended links” and there was even software available to automate this process. Today, we know that Google and other search engines ignore pages that exist solely to exchange links and a much better tactic involves guest posting articles with links embedded therein.
One set of tactics that has proven evergreen are the basic “how to’s” that Google readily reveals in a 32 page booklet that may be found at the Google webmaster tools area. Click on the link to download this free guide. This guide offers a solid, basic explanation of how to build your web site or blog to rank well in Google for your desired search terms. I bookmark this guide and review it every few months as a reminder – Google does update this booklet periodically and it will remind you to double check your sites for easy optimization mistakes. I currently own or manage over 100 sites and I inevitably find that this guide serves as a valuable reminder for me.
