Does anyone have any tips for SEO optimization? I am just beginning to understand this, and any & all help is GREATLY appreciated!
You may have already seen this, but Wikipedia has a very good, detailed explanation of SEO: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Search_engine_optimization One thing to avoid is the barrage of SPAM mailings you may be getting from SEO Optimizing companies who promise ridiculous results for a fee. Tweaking a site for SEO is an ongoing process, as the way search engines do rankings change over time (as mentioned in the Wiki article). It's very much a "chicken before the egg" scenario. You want your site highly ranked (and showing at the top of searches) so you get more traffic.....but being ranked highly depends partly on already having the traffic. Remember....CONTENT RULES! Searches are for information, not pretty graphics. As an example, check out the Drudge Report. http://www.drudgereport.com/ All emphasis on content and none on how it looks - and they are one of the most highly visited sites on the web. Showing up in the searches that will benefit you has a lot to do with really knowing your site and your visitors. If you aren't looking at web traffic statistics at least once a week for your site, then you really have no idea how it is performing, who is visiting, where they are coming from and why, and what they are viewing on your site.
If you don't have any way of checking the # of visits, visitors, how long they were there.....there is a free program from from statcounter.com It's easy to configure and pretty useful.
