You First Need an Effective Web Site If You Want to Have a Site With Good SEO

If you want to effectively search engine optimize your Web site, the Web site itself must first be effective.

Here are important considerations:

- A domain name that effectively supports your business or project.

You want to have a domain name that is easy to remember and spell and that connects with your business or project. For example, you wouldn't want the domain name www.makemoney.com in order to attract attention if this has nothing to do with your knitting instruction site.

- Do you want to capture the email addresses of people who come to your Web site and are interested in what you have to sell?

You want to be able to stay at the front of people's minds. One way to do this is by sending periodic emails with information and special offers.

- Is the home page's most important "real estate" used for your site's most important information?

Do not waste your visitor's time with a flash intro that prevents a visitor from immediately getting to the heart of the site or with announcing in large letters "Welcome to my company site." Also don't feature a photo of a sunset or similar photo that has nothing to do with your site.

The most important home page real estate should immediately answer the question of what you are offering in information or products that makes sticking around on your Web site worthwhile. And, of course, this content should include the keywords that you will want to use for SEO.

- Does your Web site create a personal relationship with potential customers?

Nowadays people want to know who is behind the site. Use photos of yourself and your staff rather than a photo of the outside of your office building. - Is the call-to-action of your site clear?

Web site visitors are not mind readers. If you want them to do something, you need to tell them what to do.

If you are a book author, do you have a BUY THIS BOOK button prominently on every page? If you want someone to sign up for a free teleseminar, is that sign-up prominently displayed? If you want people to click through to a blog post, do you ask them to read your post now and include a hot link to the post?

All of the above considerations might seem minor to you. But these strategies added together can be very important for an effective Web site.

With an effective Web site built on SEO principles to attract your target markets, you should be good to go.