Manipulating Search Engines

There's one more topic to touch on before this chapter is finished. SEO is about manipulating search engines to an extent. Beyond that, ...

There's one more topic to touch on before this chapter is finished. SEO is about manipulating search engines to an extent. Beyond that, the manipulation becomes something more sinister and you run the risk of having your website removed from the search engine rankings completely. It's true. It happens.

So what exactly can and can't you do? There's a list. Here is part of it.

You can:

■ Create a website that contains metatags, content, graphics, and keywords that help improve your site ranking.

■ Use keywords liberally on your site, so long as they are used in the correct context of your site topic and content.

■ Include reciprocal links to your site from others as long as those links are legitimate and relevant.

■ Encourage website traffic through many venues, including keyword advertising, reciprocal links, and marketing campaigns.

■ Submit your website to search engines manually, rather than waiting for them to pick up your site in the natural course of cataloging websites.

You can't: 

■ Trick search engines by embedding hidden keywords in your website. This is a practice that will very likely get you banned by most search engines.

■ Artificially generate links to your site from unrelated sites for the purpose of increasing your ranking based on link analysis. Most search engines have a built-in mechanism that will detect this type of deceptive practice.

■ Artificially generate traffic to your website so that it appears more popular than it is. Again, there are safeguards in place to prevent this from happening, and if you trip those safeguards, you could end up on the banned list for many search engines.

■ Force your web site to appear in search engine rankings by submitting the site repeatedly for inclusion in the rankings. A good general rule of thumb is that you should submit your site once and then wait at least six weeks before submitting it again. Submitting it repeatedly will, again, only lead to something nasty like being banned from the search engine.

■ Expect search engines to automatically rank you at the top of your topic, category, or keyword as soon as the site is picked up. It could take a little time to build the "status" that you need to reach a high search engine ranking. Remember, SEO is a process.

■ These are just basic rules for putting search engines to work for you. There are many more, which you will discover in the coming chapters. As you get started, however, keep these in mind, because you'll see them over and over again throughout the course of this book and any other research that you might be doing on search engine optimization.