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Plug Your Book!
179
Search engine optimization
The beauty of publishing a blog is that it naturally optimizes your
content for indexing by search engines. A blog makes you highly visible,
without your having to think too much about technique. Even so, it helps
to know some basics of search engine optimization (SEO) to enhance
your site’s ability to draw new visitors.
The leading search engines are Google, Yahoo, and MSN.com. If
your site doesn’t already appear in search results, request that your site
be added. To request indexing by the search engines, go to:
Google:
MSN:
Yahoo:
Another way to get your site included in the search engines is to
have at least one incoming link from another site that’s already been
indexed by search engines. The next time Google and other search
engines crawl the other site, they’ll follow the link to yours.
The essential ingredients for a high-ranking site change periodically.
Many bloggers and Webmasters waste time and money chasing the
“perfect” formula for getting to the top of search results, and then must
start over when Google changes the way it evaluates Web pages. Rather
than spending lots of time trying to game the system, you can better
spend your time adding valuable content to your site.
Keyword density
One effective way to make your content more visible with search
engines is keyword density. Let’s imagine you’re writing a blog post
about how to wax a car in 30 minutes. You might write the title: “Waxing
your car in less than 30 minutes: Here’s how.” This way, the most
important words, waxing and car, appear at the beginning of the title.
Your first sentence might be, “Waxing your car can be a time-consuming
chore, but here’s how to get it done fast.” This reinforces your keywords.
Repeating them again will enhance your keyword density and ensure
your post ranks high in searches for those keywords.
Be consistent with word choices to maintain keyword density. Let’s
imagine you have a page on your site devoted to antique Ford
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