Most of us with Websites to optimize only have limited time and/or resources to do so. Working full-time at our day job, it’s usually not a good idea to install SEO software on the work computer for lunchtime SEO. That leaves our optimization time to whatever we can squeeze in after a full day of work and hopefully some quality time at home.

I’ve been there - believe me. The other problem was trying to afford an SEO consultant. The really good ones were way too expensive so I bought lots of books. Some were really bad (but I didn’t know enough to realize it at the time).

I finally made it as an SEO professional and Web designer, but it took a lot of research and a good plan. I’d like to share that information with you now. Just take the ideas that work for you and leave the rest.

Information:

Whoever said, “Knowledge is power” must have been psychic and thinking about search engine optimization. When it comes to SEO you really need the latest and greatest information. That said; there are books that I wholeheartedly recommend for real “SEO on the Go”. The first is a good mass-market publication - ‘Search Engine Optimization for Dummies’ at $24.99 soft cover or $16.99 digital (Amazon.com link is way to long to include). The second is a lesser-known gem - ‘SEO Answer Book’ available at Amazon.com or through http://www.SEOAnswerBook.com. Written specifically for Website owners, Webmasters and up and coming SEO Professionals – each with their own special section, you’re getting 160 pages of consulting advice from $300 per hour SEO professionals ($19.99 soft cover or $12.25 digital).

Tools:

If you are trying to optimize your site, don’t spend a ton of money on expensive tools unless you really need to. So many are free these days and some can even be used online, which is where we’ll concentrate.

First let’s focus on keywords. Hands down, Overture’s keyword suggestion tool is the best I’ve ever used online. It’s located at http://inventory.overture.com/d/searchinventory/suggestion/ and has been around a long time. But even if you’ve used it, here’s something you might not know… Take the number of searches reported times five and that’s about how many searches were conducted on Google (it used to be 8X before Yahoo! dropped Google for search results).

For all other SEO tools, try http://www.seopartner.com/ (tool links on right). They have over a dozen great SEO tools already and add at least one new one each week based on visitor suggestions. You’ll find standard tools like a nice rank checker but you’ll also find real SEO specialist stuff like an IP address checker to tell if your site is static or dynamic, a nice keyword density analyzer, broken links checker, META tag generator, deep link analyzer – even a spider simulator and more. It’s definitely worth a visit.

Now that you’ve got the portable knowledge resources and the great online tools get out there and optimize!

Michael Small is a founding partner of Virginia Design Group, Inc. An SEO professional with seven years experience, Mike manages the optimization division of Virginia Design Group and is available at http://www.VirginiaDesignGroup.com for questions or comments.

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