SEO stands for Search Engine Optimization and is defined as “The process of finding out the best keywords for a web site and by the use of optimizing the web site along with other off-page work making that website attain a higher position in the search engine result pages (SERPs) for those selected words. It is considered to be a single branch of online marketing. In general terms, you can say that it means to make a website more visible and make it look important in the eyes of search engines. Being unfamiliar with SEO procedures and not utilizing them can make a huge difference in terms of visitors to your website.

There is no simple solution to attaining high search engine rankings. Search engine optimization is intricate work and requires a strong knowledge of how the Internet functions and how search engines operate. There are a million "Tools" on the market these days, some good, some bad. Each search tool has its own unique characteristics and automated services. Some "tools" may be helpful in certain areas, but in and of themselves, there is no "Tool" that can do SEO for you. Dismiss such claims as merely attempts to lure you to empty your wallet. Also, many"Tools" become useless, outdated or conflicting with a future Google algorithm update.

Search Engine rankings fluctuate frequently, however, if your site is properly maintained by search engine specialists month to month then it is likely that the movement will be confined to within the top 10 positions.

Virtually all website designers haven’t learned the importance of search engine friendly design. In almost every caseI’ve ever encountered, the site designer is a highly skilled and creative artistic person whose job is to put your ideas on the web. More often than not, the designers have not received any training in search engine optimization and don’t think about it while pursuing a cool looking design. It’s just not their job, which is to visually impress you and your potential customers. Traditionally, it initially impresses YOU, but the potential customers just never are impressed because they never come there. See my “Six Stages of a Website”.Search engines are also constantly changing their ranking criteria. They do this to prevent gross manipulation of their search tools. Often, website designers are not fully up to date with changes at search engines. Web Site Design is a full time profession, and Search Engine Optimization is a full time profession. I have done both in my lifetime, and I would never attempt to do both at the same time. I would never be able to be an effective Search Engine Optimizer if I went back to designing web sites. But if I ever DID design a new website, it would be incredibly Search Engine friendly, having been in the business of SEO these last 24 years.

1) The actual "Market Focus" of the site

2.) The amount of traffic Market Focus Terms will generate.

3.) The difficulty of attaining a top ranking.

3.) The profitability of that keyword.

Page cloaking is still a BIG one, which basically consists of using server-side scripts to determine whether the visitor is a search engine or a human and serving up different pages depending. The script would serve up a keyword-rich, totally souped-up page to search robots while giving humans an entirely different page.

Link farms are considered black hat. Link farms are basically sites that consist of masses of links, for the purpose of getting rankings in search engines and turning a profit (often from affiliate program advertisements on the website).

Duplicate content can keep a page from getting indexed, and some people have even reported trouble with entire websites being duplicated by unethical webmasters, causing problems with their rankings.

Spamming keywords, in meta tags, title tags, or in your page’s content is a black hat SEO trick that used to work well back in years past. It’s long since been basically exterminated as a useful trick by most legitimate SEO firms but is still employed by overseas entities who are not in it for the long run.

Even if your site does not employ these tactics, simply by linking to “bad neighborhoods“, or sites that have been banned from search engines for using the above tricks, is definitely unhealthy for your own site's rankings.

Entire Books have been written on this subject, so any short answer is really a disservice, however, here are the essential features that will make a SecondEffort successful:

1). Good content, and lots of it updated regularly over a period of months/years

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2) On-page optimization (static URLs, proper title and meta tags, use of H1, H2 tags, etc).

3). Off-page optimization (link popularity, building up inbound links).

4). Community building tools, aka Social Marketing (forums, article comments, whatever applies).

5). Viral marketing (release something people want for free with some tag to your site on it).

6). Promotion and Advertising (promote your site wherever you go, & however you can).

7). Use email as the valuable tool that it is.

You CAN do the work yourself. But if your personal time is worth money to you, you'll soon discover this avenue is not usually prudent. However, if that's the avenue you select, you will need to continuously update your knowledge of how the various search engines work and any changes made in the way they rank sites. Take your time and take one step at a time. But a word of caution. Be aware that if you make a mistake in optimization and submission, or utilize a faulty tactic, it can take months to find the mistake and fix it, reindex the site and obtain the search engine ranking you desire. SEO is hardly a fast-moving, racetrack atmosphere. It requires patience doing it, and patiently waiting to see the results.

I would suggest you visit the "Wayback Machine" at www.archive.org. From there you can type in the website address of the company you are considering (.e. www,secondeffort.com if you were to be checking on me!). You can then check how long the company has been around, and what it has been doing over the years. Those of us who have been doing this for years are proud of our track record. When you contact them, ask them "how many" keywords they intend to rank you for. If the number is 3, or 4, or 5, beware. A good SEO company will rank you for dozens of keywords over the life of the company-client relationship. Also, beware of those companies with a "Contract" that has no clear avenue of termination.

Remember, it’s not how good you are, it’s how long you are good. The Wayback Machine shows that the vast majority of the “SEO Experts” weren’t even around a couple of years ago!

And of course, check references. Do not be someone else’s learning curve. And make sure you have accountability access to the person who will be doing the work. Large SEO companies have Salesmen, Account Managers, Project Managers, SEO Content Writers, Design Analysts, Link Analysts, subcontractors, and others who might be involved in your account. In my humble opinion, this “Team Approach” to SEO causes leakage, finger-pointing, and a non-accountable attitude to the simple & single goal of sending visitors to your site through Search Engine Optimization.