At the moment Google is top dog for free traffic online, but being seen by people through Google search listings is not easy. there are literally thousands of websites all competing for any given search term at any given time, so how do you jump the que and push in front of the pack?

There are plenty of tips and techniques to be found out there on SEO, but do they all work? Yes, but some will have you tweaking your webpages time and time again just to get the 'settings just right'. This will only waste your time, yes they work, but the degree of difference to the search engines is tiny.

# The most important ingredient #

Content. Yes content. Content rules. Real, new, good, well written content. Do you see a pattern here, yes, your right, content rules, and the newer, fresher, well targeted content the better. It doesn't matter how well you configure, market, link to and SEO your website, good content will always win.

Why you ask? Lets say you achieve a top listing in Google for a specific search term, you will then recieve traffic, people looking for good content. When they find your site lacking in the content they are searching for (remember, this is why Google placed you at the top) they will simply press the 'back' button and go to the next site in the list. Google will then notice that they have not spent any, or little time on your site and you will be demoted or even sandboxed. You see, any search engine (SE) needs to place at the top of their list the very best info site for that specific search term, after all, traffic is their life blood, and people will go elsewhere if they do not deliver.

So always remember, content is king, specific, on topic content, and it always will be king.

# S E O #

What is SEO? Search engine optimization. The art of page tweaking. As I stated previously, seo does work to a certain degree. The principle behind seo is to find out which websites are ranking at the top for specific search terms, then look at their source html coding and find out what they are doing and copy it. This is not deemed a copyright infringement because they are not actually copying specific content, just immitating the use and position and frequency of the search terms that they are ranked at the top for.

# Directories #

There are major and minor directories, ones that you have to pay for and some that are free, but all are important for your website to be found by the se's. Dmoz is the top directory, and as such is difficult to get listed in, and it takes a while. Zeal is another top level directory, and your site will have to look totally non commercial for them to list it for free. There are plenty more directories out there, do a search for them and try as many as possible, as each one is an inpointing link, and some are used for search engine listings.

# linking #

Both inbound and outbound links are very important to any website, infact they are the life blood. SE's rank websites by the amount of links in and out, and the quality of the links. You can determine the quality of any site through the se's by downloading their toolbar, especially the Google and Alexa toolbars. They both have a ranking displayed on the toolbar.

Inbound links are the most important, because they tell the se's if quality sites think your site is worth linking to. Getting sites to link to you can be achieved in many ways. By Email - if you find an ontopic site (your human traffic have come to see specific info on a specific subject, keep your links as close to that subject as possible) and it is ranking well enough for you (don't set your level too high, remember, you need to start somewhere), then send them an email requesting a link. A faster way of achieving this is linking exchanges (not as good as one way links), they allow you to contact all the sites they have listed and allow those sites to contact you. This can be painful due to the amount of emails you will recieve and webpage altering you will have to do, but it is worth it in the end, I can testify to this as it has worked for me and is still working. The best way of achieving inbound links is to write, be it articles like this or ebooks or an ezine, whatever you can think of. Articles are a good source for inbound links, and the better the information the better the chance of webmasters placing the article on their site. You just place a link or two, to your website and you will have an inpointing link from wherever your article ends up.

Out bound links are not as important, but you will be given points (or however you want to phrase it) for good quality and on topic links to resources that will enhance your visitors online experience.

So there you have it, if you constantly place good content on your site and continue to find good quality inpointing and outpointing links, you will start to see the search engines notice you.

Webmaster of Creating Online Income
I have been in the online marketing business for some time now and have seen plenty of webmasters try to place links from any and every website that they can link to and get a reciprocal link from, this strategy just ends up hurting them. Always keep your linking to websites that share the same topic as your site.

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