Here are some of my personal sketch notes (in point form) for implementing SEO on a website.
- The <title> of the web site pages should use keywords with the following. Keyword > Category > Title (The <title> should consist of a short phrase).
- Meta Keywords should be individually categorized to the pages content.
- The <title> tag should not exceed more than 60 characters.
- Your Meta Description should not exceed more than 150 characters.
- No more than 100 unique links per page.
- Page should not exceed 150 kbs.
- Your page content should be written to use keywords.
- Use <h1> tags referencing keywords in meta (only one <h1> per page and should be used to form a phrase with those Keywords > Category > Title)
- Use <h2> Tags in a phrase using same structure as the <h1> tag used on the page.
- Use <h3>
- Use <strong> and <em> for Keyword phrases in page content
- Use alt tags on Images (including keywords > category > title, referenced in a phrase relevant to that image and page)
- Use title tags on links (including keywords > category > title, referenced in a phrase relevant to the page it links to and page the link is on)
- Use keywords and phrases for links directing to relevant content with in your own web site.
- URL Slug Formatting is essential an oversimplified example: Category > Title: business-law-services/trademarks-and-intellectual-property/
- Understanding how to use MicroData in your site and verifying your MicroData and HTML structure using Google is essential.
- Use well structured/formed HTML (http://validator.w3.org/nu/)
- Fix broken/unclosed HTML tags to be verified by the HTML validator.
- Design your site to be mobile friendly!
- Use opengraph meta tags for integration with Facebook, Twitter etc.
- Localization in Content/URLs/Title/Meta Tags can provide helpful results as well. Localization Example would be: www.theworld.com/USA/NewYork/New-York-Times-Newspaper (not a real link)
- Using the date in your URL can help provide relative content for the information people are searching for (for example a news web site).
- Remember who your target audience is when developing SEO. Not all traffic is good traffic.
Implement SEO Foundation
- Generate relevant keywords using Google Adsense Keyword tool
- Provide relevant content (using keywords) (Why should I visit your web site?)
- Determine the readability of your website content using a tool such as Flesh (http://flesh.sourceforge.net/) or using another online resource tailored to websites.
- Manually submit site to Google/Yahoo/Bing
- Add Google/Bing Web Master Tools
- Create a site map and submit to Google/Bing web master tools
- Add manual back links from web sites that relate to your content by posting comments, blog and news articles.
- Submit site to DMOZ
- Submit Site to Google/Bing/Yahoo Places
- Allow Google/Bing images/video to index your images/videos
- Create [301] redirects for pages which have changed or have been removed. You can check these using Google Web Master Tools.
Implement Continuous SEO
- Create a blog where you post articles pertaining to the business.
- Use Social networks to promote web site and blog articles
- Submit Articles to Blog Sites and News Sites
SEO Blog Guidelines
- Let crawlers post links and comments but don’t publish them
- Allow trackbacks.
- Only allow comments to be posted on posts not pages.
- Only approve relevant comments
Social Media SEO Guideline
- Same rules apply – Write relevant content including links to your website (and others with similar content).
Above all else POST RELEVANT CONTENT!