While this SEO technique remains somewhat controversial and tested on a limited basis, I have seen numerous reports that validate it now matters how you name your files. What this means is that you should, if at all possible, include keywords in any files on your site. This includes your .html templates, .php files, .css files, etc. 

 

For example, let's say you are optimizing your site for the keywords “used cars Chicago Il”. You might want to name your files as follows:

 

 

... I think you get the point. One thing to note, if you change any files names, make sure you update any references to that file so your site continues to function. 

 

Unfortunately for those of you who already have a domain name, your domain name plays a big role in SEO. Having a domain name that contains your keywords is a fairly powerful SEO strategy. Now this is not to say its the be all end all. However, if you have not purchased your domain name or can move it, you should seriously consider this point.

 

Basically, this means if you can have a domain name, using the Chicago used cars example, that contains your keywords, do it.

 

In the case of the Chicago used car dealer, the ideal domain would be as follows.

 

http://www.chicago-used-cars.com / or /

 

What's up with the hyphens? Unfortunately at the time I am writing this, according to most SEO experts, Google is unable to parse domains. What this means is that Google fails to see www.chicagousedcars.com as three separate words. As a result, www.chicagousedcars.com as a domain is unlikely to help you much when someone searches for “chicago used cars”. That is unless you separate the keywords with hyphens as in the examples above.

 

 

Now here's the good news if you already have a domain name set up. When creating keyword dense, optimized pages you still have the opportunity to include keywords in your url. And while they will not be as effective, they can still give you an added boost. 

 

Let's stick with the used car example. Let's say your web address was already http://www.johnsusedcars.com . Let's assume you already get sizeable traffic, have optimized the site, have marketing materials with it included and numerous other reasons not to change your web address. 

 

You could create a sub page, perhaps optimized specifically for the keywords “chicago il used cars”, that talks about your location and how you have the best used cars in the Chicago area. 

 

You could then place this page at a subdomain on the site http://chicago-used-cars.johnsusedcars.com or on a page http://www.johnsusedcars.com/chicago-used-cars . Either one would work. 

 

The technique of optimizing the url at the subdomain or page level is particularly helpful when you want to optimize different pages or parts of the site for different things. It is also helpful when you add content to your site and want to specifically optimize the content or information on that page.

 

Another great application for this is on an ecommerce site. By creating a page url with the product in the header, you can further increase the chances that someone looking for that product will find the page. 

 

Will this really help? Depending on who you ask, its an even split. However, to me, anything with a 50% probability of impacting your search rank is an advantage that you cannot pass up. Especially when Google, Yahoo, MSN and Ask all support the use of XML site maps. 

 

Note: Where an XML sitemap is not really going to help you is when you have a small, five to ten page site that rarely changes and is already indexed by Google or other major search engines.    On the other hand it can dramatically help newer, constantly changing sites with fresh content rank higher, quicker.

 

Interestingly enough, at this juncture in time, XML sitemaps have replaced the old SEO tactic of submitting your site to search engines. To me, that is a clear sign that you should use them... but lets continue to discuss. 

 

XML site maps are basically a search engine friendly list of all page URLs on your site, how often they are expected to change – which may be never, the date each page was last modified and the relative importance of each page on your site. 

 

XML site maps can benefit any type of site but are particularly useful when optimizing large dynamic sites with lots of content, sites using lots of Flash or Ajax and poorly coded sites with major W3C validation issues.

 

In all cases, XML site maps will help search engines recognize, index and rank you for recent changes to your site quicker than if you did not have one. 

So are you ready and willing to create one? Yes, I hope... Blackwood Productions offers a free, dynamic XML site map creator (spydermap). The tool will constantly re update your XML site map for you, again free, after you create the initial version. This is probably the easiest way to go. 

Once you have it built, it is simply a matter of letting search engines know it is there. In Google this can be accomplished, once you have uploaded the site map to your server, through the Google site map console available via your Google account. Just enter your top level domain where it says, “add site.”

 

I can't say enough about this one. If your site is poorly or improperly constructed, it will be extremely difficult to achieve your SEO goals. Even an XML site map can only partially save you. Therefore, you always want to make sure you site HTML is W3C validated. Its pretty simple.

 

 

301 redirects are only important if you move pages. Basically, when moving a page, a 301 redirect lets the search engine know that your page still exists and points it in the right direction. They are also useful if you register several domains – mysite.com, mysite.org, mysite.net, etc... They can then point all secondary domains to the primary domain where the site is hosted. In addition, if your company sells several products, you may want to use 301 redirects to point each registered product domain back to the product page on your main site.

 

And while there are several ways to redirect a page or domain, including meta-refresh, javascript redirects, parked domains, 301 redirects, and 302 redirects, the preferred method for all search engines, which will prevent your primary domain from being penalized, is the 301 redirect. 

 

To 301 redirect an old URL, simply go to your hosting or site control panel, and choose the redirect option. You can then set up the redirect effective by filling in the blanks. And be sure you select the permanent option. 

 

To 301 redirect an additional domain (not an existing page on the site), you need to set it up as an add on domain with your web host. 

Yes, how you name you logo file and the alt text you assign to the image does matter, more so than you might think. And while the process is the same as creating image tags, described below in page element six, your logo is a macro level element. Therefore, while we will not explain the process (again refer to the image tag section below) it is important to note that you should optimize it at the site macro level. And you should optimize both the file name and the image tags using on the most important, site wide keywords – since the logo and its associated optimization will appear on every page.