Software how-tos | Google optimisation (the positive way)

Technical stuff

• add site to google.com
• avoid java and other spaghettic code generators
• metatags: description of site and keywords (not more than 20 words or phrases separated by comms, page specific.
• page Titles specific: Jet Set Graphic Design | Contact details
• heading tags: H1, H2, H3 tags to be headings including the keywords, if using css use the word head in name of style
• embolden and link: keywords and keyword phrases, and link to their own page, e.g. take an IQ test links to IQ test.html called IQ Test.
• alt text: is essential for every image - the more descriptive the better
• robot.txt that tells googlebot what folders not to bother with for what time period because you aren't updating them regularly
• all pages must have global or navigation links
• sitemap essential, include global or navigation links to sitemap on every page
• copyright statemet essential, include global or navigation links to copyright statement on every page and a meta tag with the statement on every page
• don't use black hat optimising techniques - it will upset google
• have user interaction - message board
• have site statistics
• have counter
• have rss feed
• no dead links

Content

• 30+ pages
• what are your competitors doing and why
• concise
• conversational
• spell check - American or European English irrelevant
• content specific: not just a office supplies, specific 'leather arm chairs' and brand 'Nike, Reebok' - plan around the keywords that people will look for and put the keywords into headings
• short paragraphs with headings
• quality information
• update, update, update - minimum twice a week 500 words
• faqs
• samples
• newsletter or column
• press releases

Information architecture

• landing pages must have keyword Titles: Leather Arm Chairs
• anchor links specific: not just click here, but click here to go to our daily newsletter about dogs that hold onto blue cats, anchors to contain keywords
• clean design that is information oriented
• make navigation easy
• 9 landing sections or less

Robert Reeve's SEO notes

Domain Factors

• Domain Age
• Length of Domain Registration
• Site Top Level Domain
• Sub Domain or Root Domain
• Past Domain Records
• Past Owners of the Domain
• Keywords Contained In The Domain
• Domain IP and it's neighbours
• Domain Mentions (External)
• Geo-Targeting Settings (set in Google Webmaster Tools)

Page Specific Factors

• Meta Tags (description and keywords)
• Age of the Page
• Page Freshness
• Degree of Internal Duplication
• Page Load Time
• The Type of Page (contact us/ content/ forum)
• Internal Popularity Of The Page

Keyword Usage

• Keywords Within The Page Title
• Keywords in the Alt Tags
• Keyword Usage in Internal Links
• Keywords in Bold/ Italic
• Keyword Prominence
• Usage of Keyword Synonym's
• Keywords in Filename
• Keywords in the URL
• Use of Keywords in HTML Comment Tags
• Keyword Density

Page Content

• The Language of the Content
• The Uniqueness of the Content
• Content Levels (number of words)
• Text to Code Ratio
• Unlinked Content Density
• Content Topic
• Text In Images
• Malicious Content
• Grammar and Punctuation
• Unique Phrase Usage

Site Architecture

• URL Structure
• HTML Structure
• Semantic Structure
• Use of CSS Files
• Use of Javascript Files
• General Website Structure
• Website Usability
• Use of Canonical URL's
• Correct HTML Code (W3C Compliant)
• Usage of Cookies

Website's Servers

• The Geographical Location of the Server
• Server Reliability
• Server Uptime

General Website Factors

• Site Freshness and Update Frequency
• Overall Site Size
• Age of The Site
• Website Robots.txt File
• Type of Website (blog/ educational/ government)
• XML Sitemap (html/ xml)
• Site Trust
• Page Rank (Home Page/ Internal Pages)
• Proper Usage of 404 and Other Error Pages
• Proper Usage of 301/302 Redirects

External Links

• Quantity of External Links To Home Page
• Quantity of External Links To Internal Pages
• Relevancy of Sites Linking To Website
• Relevancy of Pages Linking to Website
• Quality of External Links to Website
• Quality of Web Pages To The Website
• Quality of the Website Linking To Your Website
• Relevancy/ Quality/ Quantity of Backlinks From The Linking Website
• Backlinks from the Network Sites
• Link Profile Diversity
• Anchor Text Diversity
• Variety of IP Addresses of Linking Sites
• Geographical Locations of the Linking Sites
• Variety of TLD's
• TheTopical Diversity
• Variation of Linking Sources (Directories/ Blogs/ Article Websites)
• Link Placement Diversity
• Link Authority of Linking Website
• Reciprocal Linking Ratio
• Social Media Links Ratio
• Social Bookmarking Links Ratio
• Backlinks Trends (sudden spikes Vs constant links)
• Historical Links (New Links Vs Old LInks)
• Dmoz Citation
• Authority of TLD
• Location of The External Link
• Anchor Text (Relevancy and Variation)
• Title Attribution of Link

Outbound Links

• Quantity of Outbound Links (domain/ page)
• Quality of Pages the Site Links To
• Links to bad Neighbourhoods
• Relevancy of Outbound Links
• Ratio of 'dofollow' Vs 'nofollow'
• Variation of Outbound Links

Website Visitor Behaviour

• Number of Visits
• Demographic of Visitors
• Bounce Rate
• Visitor Trends & Patterns
• Click Through Rate From Search Engines
• Website Load Time
• Website Usabaility

Search Engine Penalties

• Hidden Text
• Keyword Stuffing
• Link Buying
• Link Selling
• External Spamming
• Cloaking
• Duplicate Content (Internal and External)
• Past Penalty History
• Re-direct Flags (re-direct loops etc)

Source: Search Engine Optimisation

{Tanya Pretorius' Bookmarks: Computers, Software how-tos, Google optimisation (the positive way)}