SEO Reality - Search Engine Optimization

Most people think that SEO means making your website #1 in google. That is not the point of SEO at all, in fact the likelihood of your site being #1 in google for the words you choose is very slim. Realisticly you want your pages found and to do that they must be search engine friendly.

The term Search Engine Optimization does not mean make me # 1 in google, yahoo and Bing. It means make my website visible to google, yahoo and bing.

At pageBuzz.com we make every effort to automatically make your pages search engine friendly. We automatically add titles and plain html formatting which is the base standard for crawlers. All links are crawler friendly and all pages are accessible so nothing gets left out of the search indexes. We do not limit crawl rates, so even big websites can be fully updated at regular intervals. We do not charge extra for bandwidth as the crawlers read pages over and over again each day. We truly are about the the most search engine friendly website host online.

But that is not what people expect. They expect to be #1 for their market. They expect to be #1 and get loads of search engine traffic instantly upon opening their website.

REALITY CHECK! It just is not going to happen.

We lose many prospective hosting customers when we tell them it wont happen and they usually run off to a website host that lies to them and promises them the #1 page of google.

Search Engine Facts

• No website host can promise any type of search engine placement. The search engines are independent companies and they have their own rules and those rules change daily. If you built a website today and it was #1 by next week it would be someplace else. That is just how they function to keep the index clear of spammers and seo experts. They want quality content and not sites that trick themselves into being listed.

• It is very hard to get listed, but very easy to get delisted. Once a site is delisted, it is over. Nobody can find it, you will bet zero search engine traffic and eventually dry up and die. You can easily get delisted by trying to boost your search engine ranking using common spammer techniques such as misleading meta tags, repeating keywords over and over in pages, linking to known spam sites (also know as link farms).

• The search engines don't care about your website. You are one in over a trillion pages online and losing your page or not listing your page is just not going to change the face of the Internet. So you have to play by their rules and follow their standards or you will not be listed.

• Search engines are independent companies that owe you nothing! They can choose to list your website or not. It is up to them where they put you and if they list you at all. Deal with it!

• Your website will be competing with hundreds of millions of other websites for the same traffic. There are millions of pages for every user online. So getting traffic is not an easy task.

• Not every user online is looking for your website. There are many search terms that are only search for a few times a week. Yes, that is correct. So even if you are #1 for your market it does not mean that anyone is actually searching for it.

Sometimes people need a dose of reality. Search engines are not a tool that will make you a millionaire over night. They can sustain traffic and help people get to your website. They are an important part of the Internet. Without search engines the Internet would not be what it is today, so we thank them for that. But they are not your key to success.

What to do to get web traffic

When the professional talk about SEO it is more about page formatting, link and page accessibility and content. Using the correct page formatting is critical to SEO.

When we talk about page formatting we are referring to plain html and text in the pages. If you use javascript to deliver content it will not be read by the crawlers. if you use flash it is not read by the crawlers.

Having a flash website is like having an invisible store. Nobody can find it, it can't be listed at least for the flash content. So webmasters will typically add plain text to the page that the search engines can read and help with SEO. The same is true for javascript, having noscript tags that the crawlers can read will insure that the pages do get listed.

These are the true tools of SEO. The down and dirty reality of what the search engines can or cannot read. Tweaking crawl rates so the servers do not crash but still allowing ample access to th pages. Insuring that pages are linked and can be crawled and if not then creating a sitemap to insure page crawling.

None of this will get you to #1 in google, bing or yahoo, but it will help get you listed and if your content is relevent, you will be listed #1. A well built website will get search traffic, there is no question. Having a well optimized site is crucial to running a website.

Stop looking for the easy route to #1, it is not there. But that does not mean SEO is not important.

You can certainly build a website that is not search engine friendly and not get any search engine traffic or be delisted. But it is unlikely as long as you have some text on your pages. Follow the search engines guidelines, don't participate in any seo scams and you should have a well optimized website.