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This is a guest post from Joel Carl. If you’re interested in writing an article for this blog, feel free to use the contact form. You will be linked to appropriately.

The Fundamentals of Blog SEO

Blogs are the beez-neez as far as the major search engines are concerned. Google, yahoo and MSN especially love blogs because they constantly provide fresh content and blogs have built in software that pings the search engines each time a new post or page is published.

In a way, blogs are SEO friendly right out the box. This is true, they are SEO friendly, but they still require some fundamental plugins and adjustments to make them 100% SEO optimized. This is where you are going to get ahead of your rivals and into google’s favor!

We will discuss the plugins and adjustments very soon, but firstly we need to understand the fundamentals of blog SEO.

SEO Fundamentals

• Consistent regular content: Blogs which are consistently updates with fresh content are recognised by the search engines and crawled more regularly. Obviously fresh content is also adding value for your readers. Search Engines LOVE fresh content.

• XML sitemaps: An XML sitemap is a small file on your website which provides a list of URLs which notifies search engines when fresh content is posted. Each time fresh content is added, the sitemap is updated. Search engines love sitemaps because they only need to spider this small file to discover the new content. Major blogging platforms have plugins available which easily setup and rebuild your xml sitemap.

• Duplicate content: Blogs can face problems with duplicate content, meaning that the same content is on several pages on your blog. This happens because you have category, archive and tag pages. Search engines may penalise blogs for this. With smart SEO, we can noindex these pages and allow the search engines to simply index the main page or post. The mighty wordpress platform has a plugin called “All in One SEO” which allows you to simply check a box and noindex these pages.

• Links: Internal and external linking are important for SEO purposes. Firstly, with linking you can direct your readers to the more important pages on your website. The search engines also follow these links around your websites which helps them find out exactly which pages are most important on your site. External linking to other websites is also looked on favorably by the search engines. Search engines can penalise you for having no outbound links as they like to see “natural” looking websites. It is tough to do though, because you are directing your visitors away from your blog. For SEO purposes, sure google likes to see it, but there are many reasons not to. Its a compromise really. Here is what I do – whenever I have an outgoing link, I will make sure that the link opens in a new window – this way the visitor will still have access to your website on an open browser.

• Anchor text: Super important!! Rather than using anchor text such as “CLICK HERE”, you should be using keywords in the anchor text. We will be covering this topic in greater detail in upcoming tutorials.

• RSS feeds: Each blog contains an RSS feed – this is a huge advantage over a static website. It gives you another chance to retain visitors who subscribe to your feed.

Tomorrow, we will cover 15 wordpress plugins to SEO boost your site and drive organic traffic.

This is a guest post from Joel Carl. If you’re interested in writing an article for this blog, feel free to use the contact form. You will be linked to appropriately.

Search Engine Optimization(SEO) is just as crucial for blogs as it is for standard websites. We all love getting free traffic from the search engines, but most of us simply don’t get enough because our SEO is just not cutting it. SEO is more than a skill, it is an art and a wholistic understanding of how the major search engines view and rank sites.

• Firstly you need to put yourself in google’s shoes. If you were a part of the google team – what would be your number 1 priority?

“Provide relevant and useful information for google users”

So you need to do that! If you can consistently provide quality content, google will reward you. There are some crucial tips you need to follow in order to be found – we will cover that soon.

• Second thing you need to know : Google is smarter than you and always will be! If you think you can beat the google system, you are wrong!

• Third thing you need to know : Google loves to reward the good guys. If you are providing useful and relevant information, google wants to reward you with free traffic!

I’m sure you have heard of all the black-hat techniques that webmasters use to beat the google system, sure these things can work sometimes and for a limited time, but if you are trying to create a long-term stream of google traffic, you need to be providing quality and consistent information for your visitors.

Now it is just a matter of helping google “find you”.

Tomorrow’s Blog Post will cover how you can SEO optimize your blog to maximize search engine traffic.

Optimal URL structures are important for two reasons:

1. Better search engine rankings: Although not as important as other factors (such as title tags, and keyword density), URL structures are still relevant in SEO.

2. People are more likely to click on your link: Short URLs get clicked on twice as often as long URLs according to an eyetracking study.

How to optimize URL structure:

• Include Keywords: 5 keywords is usually what you’re aiming for. Any more than that, and the value of each word is diluted.
• Use Hyphens As Word Separators: Underscores are gaining acceptance, but hyphens are still considered optimal.
• Use Static URLs: No ampersands, equals signs, or question marks.
• Keep It Simple: Less is more. Try to stick with one or two parameters.

Results:

Poor URL Structure: http://www.bizboink.com/2009/04/24/seo/optimalurlstructureformaximumseobenefit

Optimal URL Structure: http://www.bizboink.com/optimal-url-structures

Optimizing URLs with Wordpress:

If you’re using Wordpress, you can set up an optimal URL structure in under a minute. Go into your control panel, and click on “Permalinks” under “Settings.” Click on “Custom Structure” and then copy and paste /%postname% into the box. Congratulations, you’re all set!