“I keep hearing the initials SEO..what is that?”

What is “search engine optimization” (SEO) and why should I care?

Update March 27, 2007 by Valerie Anderson

If you have zero desire to attract customers via the search engines, then you don’t need to care about how the various search engines operate. However, even if you are a local pizza place hoping to capture a few new customers, ensuring your web site is read properly by the search engines is an essential fundamental of web design.

The algorithms for each search engine are different and each have their own set of rules and guidelines, however the basics still remain the same. Attaching an XML or ROR sitemap to your site makes it easier for the spiders to crawl your. Although there is debate that the use of meta-tags is on the way out, they still serve a purpose if they are not abused. Alternative text assists with the word count game involved with page rankings. Internal search engines such as the one we use on our site relies on the art of search engine optimization techniques.

The bottom line is that if a search engine spider cannot explore your web site, you will never gain the benefits involved with the Internet community relying upon search engines to find the information they are looking for.