Search engine optimization or SEO is the strategy, technique and tactics used to improve the visibility of a website in a search engine. Internet users generally do not click on search results pages. Most users visit only those websites that are visible on the first page of search results. Therefore, the goal of SEO is to make a website appear in the top ten results of a search engine and, more specifically, in the top three. By doing so, this will drive more traffic to the website. The higher a website ranks in search results, the higher the chances of a user visiting it.
A good SEO strategy consists of carefully selected keywords that stand out to search engine algorithms through two methods: off-page SEO and on-page SEO. Off page deals with promotion methods. Optimize your web pages by getting back links. These backlinks connect your site to other relevant websites using different promotional methods such as blog comments, social bookmarking, and press releases. On Page refers to traditional website elements such as content, images, and web pages and layout.
Another aspect of SEO that you may have heard of is ‘White Hat’ and ‘Black’. Although both types of SEO have their own characteristics, most companies with stable and long-term goals prefer to go for White Hat. In a nutshell, White Hat uses methods to improve a website’s visibility that don’t run against one search engine’s guidelines while the other does. It works on the weakness of the search engine mechanism and follows techniques that are considered to be contrary to its guidelines. White Hat provides consistent, stable, long-term results, while the opposite offers unpredictable, rapid, short-term growth.
Many companies these days work in the gray area, aptly named Gray Hat SEO. This method is recognizable by the low price and the use of questionable methods to deliver quick results instead of legitimate and lengthy optimization campaigns. In other words, Gray Hat SEO follows the techniques that don’t cross the border into the black region, but are still outside of what would be called White Hat Search Engine Optimization.
There are people who promise fast and quick results using their SEO methods, but it is worth noting that there is no short cut to SEO. If it is done legally, it will not give sudden results. That is not the nature of the beast. It takes some time because there are hundreds of thousands of websites to manage. However, the range obtained according to the guidelines offers long-term stability and better visibility.
You want your site to be seen for years to come, don’t you?
