32677
103
3
html
<p><strong>Choose your hosting provider carefully</strong></p><p>1. If you're targeting one specific region, say the UK, ensure that the physical IP address is country specific which will improve the likelihood of ranking in the UK</p><p>2. Always opt for a fixed IP address even if it costs slightly more</p><p>3. Run an IP address search to ensure the IP address hasn't been black listed before. Domain Tools are an excellent source for quick <a href="http://whois.domaintools.com/">IP address lookup</a></p><p>4. Ensure the server returns accurate response:</p>
<ul>
<li>200 OK The request has succeeded - As an example you should see this server response for your homepage (www.sitename.com)</li>
<li>301 Moved Permanently - As an example you should see this server response for your non www version of your homepage (sitename.com)</li>
<li>302 Found - Use this server response only if you are redirecting temporary</li>
<li>404 Not Found - Always display a correct 404 response so you can get an indication when a page is broken for better user experience</li>
</ul>
<p><br /><strong>Increase crawl rates because you can never get enough of Google</strong></p><p>5. To check when your site was last crawled and indexed, search for site:sitename.com and play with “date range” advanced search options</p><p>6. Update the site's content as often as possible. For online retailers, new promotions and offers offer a fantastic opportunity to update their content</p><p>7. Ensure pages are loading quickly by analyzing your code, content and images. Web Page Analyzer is an excellent source to <a href="http://www.websiteoptimization.com/services/analyze/">analyze a page load time</a></p><p>8. Fix duplicate content issue such as having two versions of your homepage, for example www.sitename.com and www.sitename.com/<strong>index.php</strong></p><p>9. Add an XML site map and submit it to the major search engines</p>
<p><strong><br />Ensure image optimisation across the site to enjoy traffic from Google image search</strong></p>
<p>9. Keep images on a folder level rather than a subdomain so sitename.com/<strong>images</strong>/ is better than images.sitename.com</p><p>10. Use a descriptive name for the image, such as the product name</p><p>11. Use alt text for all your images and use a descriptive name again for the image alt text name</p><p>12. Use caption by placing a small description directly under, on top or on the side of your image</p><p>13. When possible save the image as jpg format</p><p>14. Use a free tool such as <a href="http://home.snafu.de/tilman/xenulink.html">xenu</a> to find images with no alt text</p>
<p><br /><strong>Ensure metadata optimisation to get high level of qualified traffic </strong></p><p>15. Ensure that every page has unique metadata in terms of page title and page description</p><p>16. Limited page title to 70 characters and page description to 150 characters</p><p>17. Don't bother too much about keywords, do something else</p><p>18. Optimise each page around <strong>one</strong> key term</p><p>19. Place the most important term first, followed by a soft (non spammy) call to action and brand</p><p>20. For product pages, opt for an auto generate metadata solution based on <product title> + <call to action> at <site name></p><p>21. Use AdWords ads to test the best text for better CTR by creating a few ad variation in AdWords which include your key term</p>
<p><br /><strong>Content is truly king</strong></p><p>22. Every page should have unique content which reads well for users (and therefore for the search engine spiders as well)</p><p>23. Don't repeat the key term more than 3 times so to avoid keyword stuffing</p><p>24. Place the key term in the page H1 title, image alt text and once in <strong>bold</strong></p><p>25. Use "recommended products" to link between similar products to increase their relevancy</p>
<p><br /><strong>Apply essential URL and coding tweaks</strong></p><p>26. Use robot.txt to block parts of the site you don't wish the engines to index</p><p>27. Offer an HTML site map which is auto updated based on the XML site map</p><p>28. For sites running on PHP use an .htaccess file to avoid content duplication</p><p>29. Use breadcrumbs navigation across the site for better user experience and SEO</p><p>30. From time to time, view your site using a text browser such as <a href="http://www.seo-browser.com/">SEO Browser</a> to "see" how spiders are likely to find your on page content </p><p>31. If your site architecture has more than three levels, restructure it so to m
ake the information more accessible to both users and spiders</p><p>32. Keep URLs short for better SEO and to create a better viral effect as short URLs are more memorable</p><p>33. Include your key term such as a product title in the URL</p>
<p><br /><strong>Apply essential maintenance from time to time</strong></p><p>34. Fix all your 404 errors and consider redirecting to a more appropriate page</p><p>35. When products are removed from stock or discontinued ensure that a 301 is placed to the main category or to a similar product</p><p>36. When linking to another site, consider checking whether you're linking to a bad neighborhood using a free tool such as <a href="http://www.bad-neighborhood.com/text-link-tool.htm">text link checker</a></p><p>37. If you have multiple domains unify around one domain using a 301 redirect taking into account links pointing to each domain, domain age and the domain name</p>
<p><br /><strong>The Google PageRank issue</strong></p><p>38. Don't pay too much attention to Google PR as it won't effect your ranking</p><p>39. If you want to control page rank, use a nofollow HTML attribute on pages such as "terms and conditions", "privacy policy" etc</p>
<p><br /><strong>Content is king, so start blogging</strong></p><p>40. Place your blog on a directory level so www.sitename.com/<strong>blog</strong>/ rather than a sub domain blog.sitename.com</p><p>41. Blogging at least once a week will help increase your crawl rate</p><p>42. Read <a href="http://yoast.com/articles/wordpress-seo/">The Definitive Guide To Higher Rankings For Your Blog</a></p>
<p><br /><strong>Get more links, otherwise no one will see you</strong></p><p>43. If you're considering directories as part if your link acquisition, focus on quality reviewed directories such as <a href="http://uk.dir.yahoo.com/">Yahoo</a> and <a href="http://www.botw.org/">Best of the Web</a></p><p>44. Don't pay for links, you'll get caught at some point</p><p>45. Help your customers help you by placing on each page an easy way to share content using a sharing tool such as <a href="http://www.addtoany.com/">AddToAny</a></p><p>46. Ask for links take 1 - place a nice soft request in your website sale confirmation email to link back to your site</p><p>47. Ask for links take 2 - ask your suppliers and contractors for a link</p><p>48. Give blogger prior notice of new products and ask for a review</p><p>49. Offer great products at competitive prices and the links will come organically</p><p>50. Kick off a social media strategy to encourage discussion (and links) on social networks and other user-powered sites</p>
<p><strong>Choose your hosting provider carefully</strong><br /><br />1. If you're targeting one specific region, say the UK, ensure that the physical IP address is country specific which will improve the likelihood of ranking in the UK<br /><br />2. Always opt for a fixed IP address even if it costs slightly more<br /><br />3. Run an IP address search to ensure the IP address hasn't been black listed before. Domain Tools are an excellent source for quick <a href="http://whois.domaintools.com/">IP address lookup</a><br /><br />4. Ensure the server returns accurate response:</p>
<ul>
<li>200 OK The request has succeeded - As an example you should see this server response for your homepage (www.sitename.com)</li>
<li>301 Moved Permanently - As an example you should see this server response for your non www version of your homepage (sitename.com)</li>
<li>302 Found - Use this server response only if you are redirecting temporary</li>
<li>404 Not Found - Always display a correct 404 response so you can get an indication when a page is broken for better user experience</li>
</ul>
<p><br /><strong>Increase crawl rates because you can never get enough of Google</strong><br /><br />5. To check when your site was last crawled and indexed, search for site:sitename.com and play with “date range” advanced search options<br /><br />6. Update the site's content as often as possible. For online retailers, new promotions and offers offer a fantastic opportunity to update their content<br /><br />7. Ensure pages are loading quickly by analyzing your code, content and images. Web Page Analyzer is an excellent source to <a href="http://www.websiteoptimization.com/services/analyze/">analyze a page load time</a><br /><br />8. Fix duplicate content issue such as having two versions of your homepage, for example www.sitename.com and www.sitename.com/<strong>index.php</strong><br /><br />9. Add an XML site map and submit it to the major search engines</p>
<p><span style="font-weight: bold;"><br />Ensure image optimisation across the site to enjoy traffic from Google image search</span></p>
<p>9. Keep images on a folder level rather than a subdomain so sitename.com/<strong>images</strong>/ is better than images.sitename.com<br /><br />10. Use a descriptive name for the image, such as the product name<br /><br />11. Use alt text for all your images and use a descriptive name again for the image alt text name<br /><br />12. Use caption by placing a small description directly under, on top or on the side of your image<br /><br />13. When possible save the image as jpg format<br /><br />14. Use a free tool such as <a href="http://home.snafu.de/tilman/xenulink.html">xenu</a> to find images with no alt text</p>
<p><br /><strong>Ensure metadata optimisation to get high level of qualified traffic </strong><br /><br />15. Ensure that every page has unique metadata in terms of page title and page description<br /><br />16. Limited page title to 70 characters and page description to 150 characters<br /><br />17. Don't bother too much about keywords, do something else<br /><br />18. Optimise each page around <strong>one</strong> key term<br /><br />19. Place the most important term first, followed by a soft (non spammy) call to action and brand<br /><br />20. For product pages, opt for an auto generate metadata solution based on <product title> + <call to action> at <site name><br /><br />21. Use AdWords ads to test the best text for better CTR by creating a few ad variation in AdWords which include your key term</p>
<p><br /><strong>Content is truly king</strong><br /><br />22. Every page should have unique content which reads well for users (and therefore for the search engine spiders as well)<br /><br />23. Don't repeat the key term more than 3 times so to avoid keyword stuffing<br /><br />24. Place the key term in the page H1 title, image alt text and once in <strong>bold</strong><br /><br />25. Use "recommended products" to link between similar products to increase their relevancy</p>
<p><br /><strong>Apply essential URL and coding tweaks</strong><br /><br />26. Use robot.txt to block parts of the site you don't wish the engines to index<br /><br />27. Offer an HTML site map which is auto updated based on the XML site map<br /><br />28. For sites running on PHP use an .htaccess file to avoid content duplication<br /><br />29. Use breadcrumbs navigation across the site for better user experience and SEO<br /><br />30. From time to time, view your site using a text browser such as <a href="http://www.seo-browser.com/">SEO Browser</a> to "see" how spiders are likely to find your on page content <br /><br />31. If your site architecture has more than three levels, restructure it so to m
<script src="http://econsultancy.com/javascripts/tiny_mce/themes/advanced/langs/en.js?1249994178" type="text/javascript"></script>
ake the information more accessible to both users and spiders<br /><br />32. Keep URLs short for better SEO and to create a better viral effect as short URLs are more memorable<br /><br />33. Include your key term such as a product title in the URL</p>
<p><br /><strong>Apply essential maintenance from time to time</strong><br /><br />34. Fix all your 404 errors and consider redirecting to a more appropriate page<br /><br />35. When products are removed from stock or discontinued ensure that a 301 is placed to the main category or to a similar product<br /><br />36. When linking to another site, consider checking whether you're linking to a bad neighborhood using a free tool such as <a href="http://www.bad-neighborhood.com/text-link-tool.htm">text link checker</a><br /><br />37. If you have multiple domains unify around one domain using a 301 redirect taking into account links pointing to each domain, domain age and the domain name</p>
<p><br /><strong>The Google PageRank issue</strong><br /><br />38. Don't pay too much attention to Google PR as it won't effect your ranking<br /><br />39. If you want to control page rank, use a nofollow HTML attribute on pages such as "terms and conditions", "privacy policy" etc</p>
<p><br /><strong>Content is king, so start blogging</strong><br /><br />40. Place your blog on a directory level so www.sitename.com/<strong>blog</strong>/ rather than a sub domain blog.sitename.com<br /><br />41. Blogging at least once a week will help increase your crawl rate<br /><br />42. Read <a href="http://yoast.com/articles/wordpress-seo/">The Definitive Guide To Higher Rankings For Your Blog</a></p>
<p><br /><strong>Get more links, otherwise no one will see you</strong><br /><br />43. If you're considering directories as part if your link acquisition, focus on quality reviewed directories such as <a href="http://uk.dir.yahoo.com/">Yahoo</a> and <a href="http://www.botw.org/">Best of the Web</a><br /><br />44. Don't pay for links, you'll get caught at some point<br /><br />45. Help your customers help you by placing on each page an easy way to share content using a sharing tool such as <a href="http://www.addtoany.com/">AddToAny</a><br /><br />46. Ask for links take 1 - place a nice soft request in your website sale confirmation email to link back to your site<br /><br />47. Ask for links take 2 - ask your suppliers and contractors for a link<br /><br />48. Give blogger prior notice of new products and ask for a review<br /><br />49. Offer great products at competitive prices and the links will come organically<br /><br />50. Kick off a social media strategy to encourage discussion (and links) on social networks and other user-powered sites</p>
2009-03-24T18:55:39+00:00
65
2
html
<p><strong>SEO for online retailers is the process of improving a website
potential in order to gain more organic non-paid traffic from the major
search engines. Normally, SEO uplift doesn't happen overnight and it
can take a long while to rank well for non brand key terms. </strong></p>
<p>The rule of
thumb is this: the more competition a relative term has, the harder you'll
find it to rank for the term. With that said, you've got to start
somewhere and there at least 50 ways I can think of to improve your SEO. </p>
<p><strong>SEO for online retailers is the process of improving a website
potential in order to gain more organic non-paid traffic from the major
search engines. Normally, SEO uplift doesn't happen overnight and it
can take a long while to rank well for non brand key terms. </strong></p>
<p>The rule of
thumb is this: the more competition a relative term has, the harder you'll
find it to rank for the term. With that said, you've got to start
somewhere and there at least 50 ways I can think of to improve your SEO. </p>
false
3559
<p>Econsultancy has published an <a href="http://econsultancy.com/reports/search-engine-optimization-seo-best-practice-guide">SEO Best Practice Guide</a>, a comprehensive report about search engine optimization written by Dr Dave Chaffey which has been described as an "SEO Bible". We have also published an <a href="http://econsultancy.com/reports/online-retail-2007-checkout-special">Online Retail Checkout Special</a> which may interest retailers. </p>
<p>Econsultancy has published an <a href="http://econsultancy.com/reports/search-engine-optimization-seo-best-practice-guide">SEO Best Practice Guide</a>, a comprehensive report about search engine optimization written by Dr Dave Chaffey which has been described as an "SEO Bible". We have also published an <a href="http://econsultancy.com/reports/online-retail-2007-checkout-special">Online Retail Checkout Special</a> which may interest retailers. </p>
50 SEO tips for online retailers
false
2009-03-25T14:35:00+00:00
50-seo-tips-for-online-retailers
2009-04-30T05:12:37+01:00
2009-08-11T23:50:16+01:00
22507