In my previous article I have shared some tips on search engine optimization, focusing more on the content and external tools. Today I want to share some technical details that helps search engines index your site better and get a better ranking. Here I will try to list some of the more important parts of a website that you should focus on. But always remember, the main content always matters the most.
General Tips
Before I go trough a list of tags and places to focus, remember not to overdo it. Tricks like placing too many keywords in one place, putting long portions of similar text just to trick search engines and such will only get you penalized. And any good rating you might get out of that will be short lived.
Page Title
Page title is one of most important tags in a page, this is the first thing a search engine sees and it is an important factor. Use a relevant and explanatory page title for your pages, do not make it too long. Do not make it a list of keywords. Not only the page title affects your site ranking, it is also the first thing a user sees on a search results page. People don't click on links with a list of keywords, they follow links that are human readable.
Use different page titles for different content, having a simal title for too many pages might get you penalized.
Meta Description Tag
Meta tags keep non user readable data. Users who browse your site won't see them, but search engines and browsers will. Try to use a descriptive text here, again not a list of keywords. Google uses meta description data in their search results. Meta descriptions don't affect your ranking much, but it could be the first thing a user sees on a search results page. Try to make it a short summary of your page, and keep it as short as 200 characters. Meta description is added between <head> tags:
<meta name="description" content="A description of the page" />
There are other meta tags that can be useful, instructions for robots, browser instructions etc. Google has a short list of meta tags that the search engine understands, any other tag will be ignored. You might notice that meta keywords tag is not in the list. In fact the keywords tag has no affect on your ranking and is ignored by Google.
The description text does not need to be in sentences or any given format. Just think of what the user would want to know about the page before they visit. You can read more about it in Google help pages.
Page Url
The page url is another important piece of data that affects your ranking. Try to include a few keywords about the page in your url, like product name. Like everything else, keep it short. Having your product name in the url not only helps get a better ranking, it also let's user now what page they are going to see when they follow a link.
Using a directory style url is encouraged. Using a url in the general form of category/product will help Google understand that this is a product under this category.
Link Text
When you are linking to other pages within your site, or posting links to your site on other websites, use a descriptive text for the link text. This is an important piece of information the search engine will use.
If you are using images in your links, you won't have this descriptive text, like in menus and such. Instead you can use the "alt" attribute of the image. This way search engines will have additional information about the link. It will also let your visitors see a text until the image is loaded, which helps them save time instead of looking at a loading page.
Site Speed and Performance
One of the things that Google keep a track of and factor into rankings is the site speed. If your site takes too long to load, it will be penalized. Make sure to check your site speed and make sure it is not too slow.
