Search Engine Optimization (SEO)  SEO is not a substitute for hard work...  Understanding your customers, developing high-quality content that users find compelling, and designing high-quality, error-free web sites are the building blocks a successful SEO strategy is built upon. Do you have these building blocks in place? Do you have: A stable high-quality technical website development infrastructure?  A SEO friendly content management / deployment platform (content management systems)? A content creation strategy that adds new content to your website on a scheduled basis?  High-quality coding standards - did you validate the source code before you deployed your website? A navigational architecture that allows a consumer to navigate to high-quality content in two clicks? An information architecture that governs content creation, navigation and page-markup elements? Content-poor websites rarely do well when it comes to search relevancy... If you have less than critical mass in several of these areas - solve these problems before you hire a SEO expert. The quality of your code, how fast your homepage loads and website architecture matter, and these are variables used to calculate relevancy by search engines. Here is a discussion about how easy it is to fail at SEO. Preparing content (your website) so that it can be found by customers requires an awareness of how your Search Engine Optimization (SEO) plan is impacted by Consumer Search Behavior, by Product Development choices, by Content Creation strategy and Search Engine behavior.   SEO is not a stand-alone discipline...   This graphic illustrates how many moving parts there are in a high-quality website.

Taking Control of Your SEO Strategy  What Kind of SEO do You Need? Strategies for Website SEO range from simple to complex. If your customers all live within 25 miles of your business your SEO focus is very different from a firm that sells products to a global audience. There are many elements that can go into a SEO plan. Here are a number of good resources to help you plan: Mobile Website SEO SEO for Local Businesses Linking SEO Strategies Multilingual SEO Develop a Strategic SEO Road-Map SEO and Compound Words XML and HTML Sitemap SEO Preparing for a SEO Audit SEO Ranking Dynamics Unimportant Words Impact Search Relevancy Image SEO SEO foor Copy Writers Optimizing Landing Pages and PPC Ads Important Search Variables in Local Search SEO for Files Unimportant Words Effect SEO SEO and Compound Words Understanding How SEO Works To take control of your SEO strategy you must factor in your SEO requirements into the Search-Content-Behavior-Product Development eco-system. This is a two-part process.  You need to: Define the SEO elements that are important to you. Consumer Search Behavior (advanced keyword research) should be analyzed to determine how this behavior will impact content development and page markup. Acquire a basic understanding of the technology in play, and how it impacts your website: How Search Engine relevancy algorithms work. Why your content can appear on page 1 vs. page 200. How crawlers work, and why you have to pay attention to them. How coding choices and practices impact search engine results. Good SEO practices vs. bad SEO practices. SEO Analysis    With this knowledge you are better positioned to understand the second part that can include: A comprehensive SEO analysis of your website. A SEO analysis of your competition's website(s). Fully articulated strategic SEO plan for each of the SEO sub-disciplines you need. Development of a content strategy based on consumer search behavior. Completed advanced keyword research (search behavior models) for the top keyword phrases that are important to you. This process will provide you with a strategic road-map for taking complete control of your SEO strategy.

Next Step With a single one-time consulting engagement, you can take tactical control of your SEO strategy. If you would like a cost-effective review of your website I can conduct an analysis of your top four pages, and develop a search behavior model that provides insight into how consumers are searching for your products and services. Call if you would like to talk about my approach to SEO, or fill out the form below and tell me a little about what you're looking for. Mark Sprague . 781-862-3126 P 339-223-0500 C . Mark@MSprague.com   SEO for Boston, MA  Send Me Information Send me an email at: Mark@MSprague.com and I'll send you a free ten page report that deals with Mobile SEO and Mobile Development issues.