Effective SEO is not about tricking the search engines to achieve short-term high rankings; it is about  crafting keyword-rich and relevant site content, as well as other long-term site optimization methods designed to make it more user- and search-engine friendly.  Keywords research and management, appropriate tagging, strong internal links, text link navigation menus, linkbaiting and website blogs are all part of the honest and hard work which goes into good SEO practices.

Search Engine Optimization (SEO) refers to those tactics employed to make a website and its pages more user-friendly, to increase site traffic and to as such organically achieve higher search engine rankings. Search Engine Marketing (SEM) encompasses a wider scope of activities, and features SEO as well as other tactics to realize higher engine rankings for a site. Such measures invariably involve the purchase of paid search engine ads and PPC (pay per click advertising).

Newcomers to SEO often hear about the “science” of optimization, and sometimes feel overwhelmed by terms such as relevant keywords research, algorithms, cost per click and web analytics. The SEO industry itself is relatively new, not really a decade old, so it is constantly changing and even SEO “veterans” are still on an information learning curve.

Algorithms and analytics aside, there is really no bag of magic tricks for practicing effective SEO. Strong, long-term SEO services are not about “tricking” the search engines to rank a site highly; they are about making sure that the site has original, relevant content and is a valuable source of information for its industry community. Strong SEO is about making sure that the site is also fine-tuned in other ways, so that it is more user-friendly and attracts more visitors. Making your site more “findable” for the specific keywords and phrases which will drive customers to your site is essential to this process. Strong SEO also involves ensuring that there are strong internal link structures and that quality, respected external website pages are linking to your site.

Good SEO really begins with extensive and intelligent keywords research, organization and selection. Always remember what the search engines really do – they organize all search results based on the words or phrases people actually type into the engine. Choosing the relevant keywords for your site is the ultimate goal here, and you can complement your research into the best keywords with audience surveys, keywords software and helpful websites (WordTracker.com, Yahoo Search Marketing).

Once chosen, managing those keywords is also important. Always examine data and statistics on the type and scope of traffic your site is receiving from specific keywords, and then identify the most valuable words as well as those bringing little or no traffic. You can complement your keywords management research with SEO software tool kits (i.e. Trellian) as well as surveys and helpful sites.

Strong website content, writing and design are also very important to good SEO, and improve your site’s ability to get engine-noticed. To help your site get better indexed, you should do the following: limit the size of each web page; avoid broken links; use correct HTML; make sure the server is always up; avoid duplication pages on your site; and employ user-friendly, text link navigation menus.

Ensuring that each website page has an appropriate title tag is also important; these tags are one-sentence descriptions coded into the HTML and displayed at the top of the browser of each page.

Organizing your site in URLs (Universal Resource Locators) is another factor facilitating easier engine-indexing; these locators refer to the address system employed by the Internet to locate sites and other resources.

A strong internal linking mechanism helps to bring in those incoming links from other sources and to “bleed” the Google PageRank (“link juice”, if you will) to the other pages within the site. Thus you can better realize high search engine rankings not only for your index or home page, but also for the pages of secondary importance containing valuable information. Good internal links are also user-friendly, allowing for easier site navigation.

Employing descriptive internal links and strong text link navigation will enhance your site’s internal linking mechanisms. Adding an informative sitelink map to your text link menu, limiting incoming and outgoing links to site-relevant ones and having your pages indexed in Google and Yahoo will make your internal links even more potent!

Ensuring that there are quality external websites linking to your own is also very user- and engine-friendly. Both free and paid external links pointing to your site will help to attract viewers and engines, allow for easier site indexing (particularly if the link text actually contains one of your keywords) and leads to higher engine rankings.

Another viable SEO practice is linkbaiting, generally defined as the creation of great, original and relevant website content to essentially attract or “bait” links for search engine rankings.

Regular postings on your company website blog can also positively impact on your SEO campaign in several different ways:

* Creating original, relevant and keyword-rich content, thereby increasing the breadth and depth of your site information base
* Attracting search engine spiders to your site, thereby increasing your page rank standings
* Attracting users to your site, particularly those associated with your industry, thereby increasing site traffic
* Driving your company to better find its market niche in your industry

Regardless of whether you define SEO as an art or a science or both, it is important to remember that there is no quick fix, no simple solution. SEO requires lots of hard, honest work to ensure that your website is attracting both visitors and search engine spiders not only in the short-term, but also over the long haul. Those who practice short-sighted SEO, designed to trick the search engines and achieve higher rankings in the short-term, may be able to pull a rabbit out of the hat once in awhile. Long-term SEO strategies will pay dividends over time, however, whereas eventually short-term SEO providers will come up empty when they reach into their bag of tricks.