Who is King of the Castle?

No matter how you chose to communicate it, when it comes to SEO, content is king! Back in the day, using meta keywords was the way to go. Unfortunately, as tends to happen, people took full advantage of this and abused the system, so life is no longer that simple.

Basically, how search engines work is they send their little buddy, the crawler/spider, out into the "World Wide Web" to collect a virtual photocopy of every page of every website. It is very important to remember--the crawler/spider reads text or content! He does not see pictures, nor does he watch video, so you want to make sure you describe these things to him using alt tags.

It is also very important to remember that the crawler/spider is doing a lot of work and needs to stay very organized, so he likes to work on a schedule; therefore, you should, too. Updating your existing content or adding new content will show the crawler/spider that you are staying fresh and make him want to come back. Updating and adding new content at regularly timed intervals will help the crawler/spider schedule his next visit, meaning that you and he can work together to get your site indexed and fairly ranked in the search results. Now, like I said, Content is King, but you will want to remember some very key things:

• Create a useful, information-rich site, and write pages that are easy for human beings to follow.
• Think about the words users would type to find your pages, and make sure that your content actually includes those words within it. Remember, no "REALTOR® speak." You want to think like the average Joe.
• Use descriptive text with any images you include.
• Every page should be reachable from at least one link.
• Keep the links on a given page to a reasonable number.
• Check for broken links.

Now that your content is created, you will want to title and give a brief description for the search results and make the crawler/spider's job a bit easier. You will do so using Meta Tags:

• Title Tag: A title tag tells the public and the crawler/spider what the topic of a particular page is. You should create a unique title for each page of your site.
• Meta Description Tag: A page's description tag gives the crawler/spider and other search engines a summary of what the page is about.
• Web Page Address: Creating descriptive addresses for each page on your website can not only help you keep your site better organized, but it could also lead to better crawling of your documents by the crawler/spider. Also, it can create easier, "friendlier" URLs for the public.

All of these things being said, you need to keep in mind that even though the crawler/spider can fetch thousands of different pages simultaneously, it does not mean he is going to pay you a visit as soon as your website goes live. Nor does it mean he will visit often. All of these things will take time. Just keep improving your existing content and adding new content on a regular schedule, and things will come together.

To view the original article, visit the Lone Wolf blog.