Sastrugi Marketing - Search Engine Optimization

How does a search engine (Google, Yahoo, Bing, etc.) determine the order of results for a specific term? Let's say you search for "Littleton Colorado Pizza Place." First, it will look for sites that contain the words Littleton, Pizza, Colorado or Place. This will be billions of pages, so preference is given to sites containing all four words, and more preference to sites containing the words in precise order: "Littleton Colorado Pizza Place."

Search Engine Ranking Algorithm

Search Engines give higher rankings to pages deemed "more important." Importance is primarily determined by the number and importance of other websites that links to page ("Off-Page Factors"). For example, a seldom visited personal blog page in which the author says "I went out to a Denver Pizza Place last night" will have little importance compared with a national pizza chain which may have thousands of inbound links (online yellow pages in every city, etc.) The search engine will then consider and weight these two factors through a complex formula, and rank the search results.

Of course, you want to be at the top of the search results. For most searches, people only look at the first page. Generally, the first page will contain a variety of answers to the consumer's problem.

The Value of Good Search Results

The top of the search rankings implies a a positive business reputation. Building a large site, and acquiring many inbound links takes time. Who tops the search list for "Denver Grocery Stores?" As of this writing, the biggest grocer in Colorado. The higher you rank, the better you look.

A closely related field to Search Engine Optimization is Online Reputation Management (ORM)..

So, the obvious question facing business owners is: How to I get on the first page, preferably near the top? Short answer: Contact Sastrugi Marketing! We'll be happy to explain to you the services we can provide to improve your search rankings.

SEO tip: To build inbound links, and publicity, you can write an article for Ezine, or a similar site. Here's an article that I wrote, and received a link for.

User-Friendly Websites are Good SEO!

Nobody likes a slow website. And, Google penalizes sites that load too slowly. Headings that clearly identify the subject matter of page sections help readers scanning a a page for specific information. And, Google uses those headings to help generate search results. Concise writing is easy to read and has a higher keyword density than verbose text. Alternative text to describe photos helps visually impaired visitors and it helps Search Engines determine the subject matter of a page.

A site map helps users find pages they've visited before; and a site map helps search engines find pages. Navigation that provides a link to all important pages from every page on a site promotes good user experience, and helps search engines understand which pages the site designer considers most important.

A website that is "people-friendly" will almost always have good on-page SEO.