You have a terrific looking website with great content, so now it's sitting out there on the web just waiting for people to find it. Here are ten top tips for getting the traffic to flow.

#1 It's all about the keyword phrases

Many people get stuck on trying to fill their sites with keywords in order to attract search engines. This might work to a point, but individual keywords can become too competitive to attract much attention. Instead of individual words, come up with keyword phrases for your site. Keep them to about two or three words in length, and be sure they explain your business perfectly.

#2 Put your keyword phrases in the right places

You get the most benefit from your keyword phrases when you put them in the right places. It's critical to place them in your page title, toward the top of your page content, and in the meta description. Other great places to put them include link addresses, alt tags, headers, and meta keywords.

#3 Double check your page title tags

If your page title tags are incorrect, your site will show up as "unknown" or "untitled" in search engines. Double check that your page title tags are complete, accurate, and input correctly.

#4 Content is king

You've heard it before, and we're going to say it again. Content is king when it comes to generating web site traffic, so make sure yours is focused and rich with your keyword phrases.

#5 Beware of image maps and frames

A number of search engines do not work when your website has image maps and/or frames. If you must use image maps and frames, be aware that these sites will not be able to crawl very deeply into your site.

#6 Text links are the best option

Search engines are much more likely to find text links in your website than other kinds of fancy menus. To make your text links even more noticeable, create a site map and include a link to the site map on every page of the website.

#7 Exchange links with other websites

Many search engines, especially Google, pay a lot of attention to the number of sites with links to your site. Make the most of this by actively soliciting and offering to exchange links with other sites with content or information that's related to your site. Also, be sure your site has an easily accessible link resources page so that others can quickly and easily set up their links with you.

#8 Keep your content updated and fresh

Websites with regularly updated content that's fresh and interesting not only attract the attention of web surfers, but they also attract the attention of many search engines. Some set up their crawlers so that the more often a page is changed, the more often it gets crawled and ranked higher up.

#9 Target the most important search engines

You could go crazy trying to optimize your website for the hundreds of search engines out there, so it pays to target the ones that are most important. This of course includes the big hitters like Google and the like, but it also might include some of the smaller search engines as well. For instance, if your website caters to a particular niche audience and that niche audience typically uses a particular search engine, it makes sense to do whatever you can to achieve higher rankings with that preferred search engine.

#10 Fork over the cash

Yes, it's true; the best way to get higher rankings with an increasing number of search engines is to pay for placement. You'll never come out ahead competing directly with the heavy hitters who have tons of money to spend, but if you're in a niche or specialized market with fewer competitors, it might be worthwhile to invest some money in search engine ranking.

Learn more about this author, Miles Galliford.
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