subject: Essential Off Page SEO Principles You Should Follow [print this page] Essential Off Page SEO Principles You Should Follow
The value of off page search engine optimization is something every internet marketer and webmaster knows. Even though having the right kind of content is important on your website, without proper off-page SEO, it'll be impossible to have your site ranked in the search engines. Here are some of the important SEO factors that you need to consider.
To begin with, your site needs a certain number of backlinks to get recognized by the search engines. If you don't have quality backlinks, your site will never be ranked for your keywords if you have any competition at all. Whatever niche you may be in, look up the number of backlinks your competitors have, and you'll find that those who rank the highest tend to have the most links. The best way to build backlinks is gradually, so make this a daily task and build up the number of links you have over time. Acquisition of high quality backlinks is one of the most important success criteria for off-page SEO.
Another important SEO factor is your site map, which should have anchor text that contains your main keywords. Having a site map on your website is important because it gives the search engine bots the path to discover all the pages on your site without any confusion. A site map is what the search engines use to navigate your site and discover everything you want them to see. This should be one of your first tasks when it comes to optimizing your site. One issue that's sometimes debated in SEO circles is how large a website should be. On the one hand, with a larger site you have more pages and content to rank for, yet many site owners who know what they're doing also manage to rank their small sites highly too.
You may be able to rank well with a smaller site, so you could start out this way and see what happens. In some cases you may do fine with a small site, but if you find that you can't rank highly this way, then you can always add more content and pages to it. The more you test, the better.
You should also ask yourself if your website has a theme or whether there are many unrelated keywords and topics on it. You boost your chances of getting ranked for your targeted keywords when you create a tightly themed website. Creating a focused website makes it easier to let the search engines know what keywords you want to be ranked for. It's not good to confuse or mislead the search engine spiders. This is why you should have your website's pages revolve around one single theme without deviating.
The above tips can help you improve your site's ranking with the search engines; you should utilize both on and off page optimization. While it does take time and regular effort to achieve a good rank with the search engines, if you're diligent in your efforts, you're sure to see the results you want sooner or later.
