Search Engine Optimization

Search engine optimization (SEO) is a method from online marketing to optimize the findability in search engines like Google.

Definition

Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is the term used to describe the measures taken to improve the ranking of a website in the organic search results of search engines, primarily in order to increase organic traffic.

An important part of search engine optimization is, among other things, the creation or optimization of relevant and uniquecontent, the use of appropriate keywords, title tags or meta descriptions, as well as linking (internally) on the website. Especially links from other pages that lead to your own are essential for a good ranking.

The leading search engine Google evaluates web pages using an algorithm according to the standards of a human reader. According to these criteria Google also creates the ranking.

Goal: Search engine optimization wants rank highly in the relevant search engines for significant search terms with authoritative websites. Apart from Google, Bing, Yahoo and Co., these can also be specialised search engines – for example Amazon (product search), Indeed (job search) or Trivago (hotel search). With a Snippet you motivate the user to click on the result, with the effort to meet the expectations of the user with regard to content congruence between search term, text and web page content.

In classical search engine optimization, a distinction is made between onpage SEO and offpage SEO:

Onpage SEO and Offpage SEO

Onpage SEO are the actions that you take on the website itself as compared to Offpage SEO. This includes first and foremost the creation of a page structure that makes it easier for search engine crawlers to find and index content, i.e. to classify it in the results(SERP’s). In addition, Onpage SEO includes the creation and optimization of relevant content, as well as the technical SEO (technical condition of the page such as redirects, page speed, etc.).

The term offpage optimization , on the other hand, refers to all methods that the operators of a website cannot directly determine. As part of the optimization process, they are intended to improve the ranking in search engine results.

It is important for website owners to connect and interact with other site owners when it comes to offpage optimization. With the aim of placing links on other websites that direct users to your own website. In addition to the number of external links, the quality of the links plays an important role .

Links to your own web pages should be positioned on pages with similar content, because search engines take this into account, especially when ranking.
One measure is link building, which is intended to increase the number of backlinks. A site with many backlinks is often rated with better authority by search engines. Reciprocal links, i.e. the reciprocal linking of two web pages, have no influence on the ranking.

You should always make sure that i.B.a. the links in your own link profile are in a “good neighbourhood”(Bad Neighbourhood is the opposite) – this means that the links leading to your own page meet the following criteria:
– Topic relevance (to the industry, niche)
– Quality of the page (from which the link comes)
– Do not receive a penalty from Google
– No websites overfilled with advertisements (most of which also do not comply with Google’s Webmaster Guidelines )

Why is search engine optimization important?

Because nowadays search engines are the pivotal point for the procurement of information worldwide, search engine marketing and especially SEO still play an important role. Especially when researching certain topics – whether health, product tests and reviews, or science and sports – search engines like Google are among the essential places to go.

Here are four important reasons for SEO:

• For many companies, search engines (especially Google) are the most relevant channels for attracting users to their website. You can verify this with your own web analytics data.
• Users who come through search engines are usually motivated to go to your site to accomplish the desired goal. Because ideally they were searching for a term that brought them to your site.
• For many companies search engines are the most important source to lead users to their own website with generic search terms. Thus, SEO is often the most important channel for acquiring new customers.
• Sustainable search engine optimization often results in sustainable sessions. Once a search term has taken a position, it is usually extremely stable – if you have built up the search engine optimization sustainably and orientate yourself to the needs of the users.

The dark side of SEO

Search engine optimization also has negative sides or you can use it for“Negative SEO“. Because SEO also distinguishes between “good” (white hats) and “bad”(black hats). With Negative SEO, you can, for example, cause damage to other websites by setting a lot of low-quality backlinks. They then fall back in the rankings of the search engines. However, this is not as easy as it was a few years ago. Google takes certain links (with high spam score) partly completely out of the evaluation of the link profile.

Conclusion