Web Optimisation Tutorial

Here we are going to look at how we can increase the ranking of our driving school website to gain increased traffic and new business via web optimisation. The website used has been established a number of years but has not been optimised for any focused keyword or key phrase.

The website was already showing up in the Google.co.uk results at position 21 so a dramatic increase may not be seen. However, If you apply these techniques to website that is a lot further down the rankings (or not ranked at all!) a massive improvement will be seen.

In its simplest form, the process of web optimisation or SEO is about focusing a webpage for a given phrase that you wish to be found for and then ensuring the search engines are very clear that your page is about that phrase. This is called Onsite Optimisation.

The second stage is to get links pointing to your webpage that contains your key phrase as the anchor text. This is Off-Site Optimisation.

We are only going to look at one page but you will want to look at each individual page of your website and follow the process for each. Whilst we are optimising a driving school website, the process will be no different for any other type of website.

Video 1 - Web Optimisation - Keyword Choice

Decide which key phrase to target.
See where you website is currently placed in the SERP's (Search Engine Results Pages).
Check what level of competition already exists.
See what text Google have cached for the webpage you are going to optimise.

Video 2 - Website Optimisation - Critique of All-Drive.co.uk

Understand how the search engines read a web page.
The importance of:
- Meta Tags (Title & Description)
- Heading Tags (h1, h2 etc)
- Bold Text ()
- Italic Text (
- Underlined Text ()
- Alt Tags (alt="keywords")
- Keyword Density (3 - 5%)
Don't fall into the trap of telling the search engines that your website is about 'home', 'welcome', 'website name', 'driving school name'. etc.

Video 3 Part 1 - Search Engine Optimization Tutorial - Fix The Website

Video 3 Part 2 - Search Engine Optimization Tutorial - Fix The Website

Alter / Optimise your webpage.
Only optimise for 1 - 2 key phrases per page.
Ensure key phrases naturally form part of your content.
Don't 'stuff' your page with keyword / phrases.
Remember, your page is primarily for your visitors and not the search engines.

Video 4 - Progress 2 Days After On-Site Optimisation

Ranking increased from 21 (25?) to 15 – A 27.5% increase.
Ranked #3 for exact search term.
Webpage announced on a blog to get the SE’s attention quickly.
Numerous SERP’s double entries for this key phrase – The web page is actually the 9th website listed.

Video 5 - Off-Site Optimisation - Link Building & Social Bookmarking

Video 5 - Addendum

Link building is an ongoing and probably THE most important process.
Social bookmarking is a great way to start off the process.
Use your key phrase as the anchor text.
As the process continues, vary your anchor text - this will look very natural to the SE's
Don't be tempted to buy 1,000 backlinks for 25 bucks! That will hurt you. If your website only has a few inward links, it is unlikely that you would attract that many links overnight from other websites. This would set off alarm bells with the SE's. Grow your links steadily so that they look natural.

Video 6 - On-Site Linking Strategy

Internal linking is equally important as obtaining external backlinks.
Link to your pages using your keyword phrase as anchor text.

Video 7 - Link Building Continued

Obtaining backlinks is an ongoing process.
It is the most time consuming but also the most important process.
Get backlinks by:
- Submitting to directories
- Posting relevant comments on blogs
- Posting entries in forums - use your backlink as part of your signature
- Request other websites link to you (one way or reciprocal links)
Make sure your link building strategy looks natural.

Video 8 - Day 9 Review

Now position 11 in the SERP’s.
Number 1 for exact phrase match.
Backlinks and internal linking yet to take effect.
Ranking likely to fluctuate until links etc. become established and your website has gained search engine trust.