Search Engine Optimisation - Getting to the top in Google

April 2009

This bulletin provides an introduction to 'Search Engine Optimisation', an online marketing activity that aims to get your website nearer to the top of the results pages on search engines such as Google.

The author Ned Wells, has ten years experience running web-based business projects for blue-chip and SME companies. Online marketing is one of Ned's responsibilities at First Line and he has also recently helped a number of our clients make better use of the internet to achieve their business objectives.

So, how do you get to the top of the pile in Google's search results?

The first thing to say is that since around 70% of all search traffic goes via Google, everybody in the world wants to know the answer to that. It's the '64 million dollar question' of the online world and Google keeps the exact answer to it a closely guarded secret.

Partly because of this secrecy, different people will give you different answers and the reality is, there is no single thing that you can do. Google and the other search engines move quickly to remove sites from their listings that employ anything they regard as 'sharp practices'. Tricks they've clamped down on include writing keywords in the same colour as the background and mass repetition of keywords, called 'keyword stuffing'.

It would seem that Google uses a complex and continually evolving algorithm to work out its results but don't worry… all is not lost. Amongst this complexity, we do know that Google rewards web pages that are:

• highly relevant to a target set of keywords
• regularly updated
• easy to navigate
• trusted by other websites

Where should I start?

The starting point of any exercise aimed at getting nearer to the top of the search engine ranking, and thereby driving more and better traffic to your website, is to develop a list of ‘keywords' relevant to your business. Keywords are the phrases that people type into a search engine when they are looking for something.

People new to keyword research often start by thinking "what keywords do I want to be No 1 on Google for?" But a more pertinent question might be "what phrases would people type into Google when they are searching for the goods or services we provide?"

There are some good tools available to help you define a list of keywords, such as Google's free keyword tool.

Having identified your list of keywords, making your website more relevant to them is achieved through actions both within your own website, called ‘on-site optimisation' and on other websites that link into yours, called ‘off-site optimisation'.

Next steps

For some people, that will be quite enought detail. If you believe that improving your google rankings could be of benefit to your business and you'd like some support or guidance, please just get in touch with First Line.

If you'd like a bit more detail on this subject, you can read more about Search Engine Optimisation here.