by Peter Kent
Search Engine
Optimization
FOR
DUMmIES
‰
2
ND EDITION
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Search Engine
Optimization
FOR
DUMmIES
‰
2
ND EDITION
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by Peter Kent
Search Engine
Optimization
FOR
DUMmIES
‰
2
ND EDITION
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Search Engine Optimization For Dummies
®

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Library of Congress Control Number: 2006921155
ISBN-13: 978-0-471-97998-2
ISBN-10: 0-471-97998-8
Manufactured in the United States of America
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About the Author
Peter Kent is the author of numerous other books about the Internet, includ-
ing Pay Per Click Search Engine Marketing For Dummies, the best-selling
Complete Idiot’s Guide to the Internet, and the most widely reviewed and
praised title in computer-book history, Poor Richard’s Web Site: Geek Free,
Commonsense Advice on Building a Low-Cost Web Site. His work has been
praised by USA Today, BYTE, CNN.com, Windows Magazine, Philadelphia
Inquirer, and many others.
Peter has been online since 1984, doing business in cyberspace since 1991,

We’re proud of this book; please send us your comments through our online registration form
located at
www.dummies.com/register/.
Some of the people who helped bring this book to market include the following:
Acquisitions, Editorial, and
Media Development
Project Editor: Tonya Maddox Cupp
Previous Edition: Paul Levesque
Acquisitions Editor: Tiffany Franklin
Technical Editor: Tyler Knott Gregson
Editorial Manager: Jodi Jensen
Media Development Specialists: Angela Denny,
Kate Jenkins, Steven Kudirka,
Kit Malone, Travis Silvers
Media Development Coordinator:
Laura Atkinson
Media Project Supervisor: Laura Moss
Media Development Manager:
Laura VanWinkle
Media Development Associate Producer:
Richard Graves
Editorial Assistant: Amanda Foxworth
Cartoons: Rich Tennant
(
www.the5thwave.com)
Composition
Project Coordinator: Erin Smith
Layout and Graphics: Andrea Dahl,
Stephanie D. Jumper, Barbara Moore
Proofreaders: Jessica Kramer,

Chapter 10: Finding Traffic via Geo-Targeting 185
Chapter 11: Getting Your Pages into the Search Engines 195
Chapter 12: Submitting to the Directories 211
Chapter 13: Buried Treasure — More Great Places to Submit Your Site 221
Part IV: After You’ve Submitted Your Site 235
Chapter 14: Using Link Popularity to Boost Your Position 237
Chapter 15: Finding Sites to Link to Yours 257
Chapter 16: Using Shopping Directories and Retailers 291
Chapter 17: Paying Per Click 315
Part V: The Part of Tens 331
Chapter 18: Ten-Plus Ways to Stay Updated 333
Chapter 19: Ten Myths and Mistakes 339
Chapter 20: Ten-Plus Useful Tools 345
Appendix: Staying out of Copyright Jail 357
Index 361
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Table of Contents
Introduction 1
About This Book 1
Foolish Assumptions 2
How This Book Is Organized 3
Part I: Search Engine Basics 3
Part II: Building Search-Engine-Friendly Sites 3
Part III: Adding Your Site to the Indexes and Directories 4
Part IV: After You’ve Submitted Your Site 4
Part V: The Part of Tens 4
Appendix 4
Icons Used in This Book 5
Part I: Search Engine Basics 7

Looking at the TITLE tags 34
Examining the DESCRIPTION tag 35
Giving search engines something to read 37
Getting Your Site Indexed 39
Chapter 3: Planning Your Search-Engine Strategy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .41
Don’t Trust Your Web Designer 41
Understanding the Limitations 42
Eyeing the Competition 43
Going Beyond Getting to #1 46
Highly targeted keyword phrases 47
Understanding the search tail 47
Controlling Search-Engine Variables 49
Keywords 50
Content 50
Page optimization 51
Submissions 51
Links 51
Time and the Google sandbox 52
Determining Your Plan of Attack 53
Chapter 4: Making Your Site Useful and Visible . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .55
Revealing the Secret but Essential Rule of Web Success 56
The evolving, incorrect “secret” 57
Uncovering the real secret 57
Showing a bias for content 58
Making Your Site Work Well 59
Limiting multimedia 59
Using text, not graphics 60
Avoiding the urge to be too clever 60
Don’t be cute 61
Avoiding frames 62

Preparing Your Site 91
Finding a hosting company 92
Picking a domain name 92
Seeing Through a Search Engine’s Eyes 94
Understanding Keyword Concepts 96
Picking one or two phrases per page 97
Checking prominence 97
Watching density 98
Placing keywords throughout your site 99
Creating Your Web Pages 99
Naming files 99
Creating directory structure 100
Viewing TITLE tags 100
Using the DESCRIPTION meta tag 102
Tapping into the KEYWORDS meta tag 103
Using other meta tags 104
Including image ALT text 105
Flush the Flash animation 106
Avoiding embedded text in images 107
Adding body text 108
Creating headers: CSS versus <H> tags 109
Formatting text 111
Creating links 111
Using other company and product names 112
Creating navigation structures that search engines can read 114
Blocking searchbots 114
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Table of Contents
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Chapter 7: Avoiding Things That Search Engines Hate . . . . . . . . . . .117

Concrete Shoes, Cyanide, TNT — An Arsenal for Dirty Deeds 150
Keyword stacking and stuffing 151
Hiding (and shrinking) keywords 152
Using <NOSCRIPT> tags 153
Hiding links 153
Using unrelated keywords 154
Duplicating pages and sites 154
Page swapping and page jacking 154
Doorway and Information Pages 155
Using Redirects and Cloaking 156
Understanding redirects 157
Examining cloaking 158
Paying the Ultimate Penalty 159
Search Engine Optimization For Dummies, 2nd Edition
xiv
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Chapter 9: Bulking Up Your Site — Competing with Content . . . . . .161
Creating Content Three Ways 162
Writing Your Own Stuff 163
Summarizing online articles 163
Reviewing Web sites 164
Reviewing products 164
Convincing Someone Else to Write It 164
Using OPC — Other People’s Content 165
Understanding Copyright — It’s Not Yours! 166
Hunting for Other People’s Content 168
Remembering the keywords 168
Product information 169
Web sites and e-mail newsletters 169
Government sources 171

Using Google sitemap 199
Using Yahoo! sitemap 202
Finding third-party sitemap creators 202
Using Paid Inclusion 204
Excluding inclusion 205
Using trusted feeds 206
Submitting to the Secondary Systems 207
Using Registration Services and Software Programs 208
Chapter 12: Submitting to the Directories . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .211
Pitting Search Directories against Search Engines 211
Why Are Directories So Significant? 213
Submitting to the Search Directories 214
Submitting to Yahoo! Directory 214
Submitting to the Open Directory Project 218
Understanding different link types 219
Submitting to Second-Tier Directories 219
Finding second-tier directories 220
Avoiding payment — most of the time 220
Chapter 13: Buried Treasure — More Great Places to Submit
Your Site . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .221
Keeping a Landscape Log 221
Finding the Specialized Directories 222
Finding directories other ways 225
Local directories 226
Bothering with directories 227
Getting the link 227
Working with the Yellow Pages 229
Getting into the Yellow Pages 231
Part IV: After You’ve SubmittedYour Site 235
Chapter 14: Using Link Popularity to Boost Your Position . . . . . . . . .237

Find sites linking to your competition 265
Ask other sites for links 268
Make reciprocal link requests 268
Respond to reciprocal link requests 273
Search for keyword add url 273
Use link-building software and services 275
Contact e-mail newsletters 276
Mention your site in discussion groups 277
Respond to blogs 277
Pursue offline PR 278
Give away content 278
Apply for online awards 278
Advertise 278
Use a service or buy links 279
Just wait 281
Fuggetaboutit 281
Got Content? Syndicate It! 282
Four ways to syndicate 283
Getting the most out of syndication 284
Getting the word out 285
Syndicating utilities 287
Using RSS 287
Who’s Going to Do All This Work?! 288
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Table of Contents
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Chapter 16: Using Shopping Directories and Retailers . . . . . . . . . . .291
Finding the Shopping Directories 291
Google Catalogs 293
Froogle 295

Part V: The Part of Tens 331
Chapter 18: Ten-Plus Ways to Stay Updated . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .333
Let Me Help Some More 333
The Search Engines Themselves 334
Google’s Webmaster Pages 334
Yahoo!’s Search Help 335
MSN’s SEO Tips 335
Ask.com FAQ 335
Search Engine Optimization For Dummies, 2nd Edition
xviii
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Search Engine Watch 335
Google’s Newsgroups 336
WebMaster World 337
Pandia 337
IHelpYouServices.com 337
HighRankings.com 337
Yahoo!’s Search Engine Optimization Resources Category 337
The Open Directory Project Search Categories 338
Chapter 19: Ten Myths and Mistakes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .339
Myth: It’s All about Meta Tags and Submissions 339
Myth: Web Designers and Developers Understand Search Engines 340
Myth: Multiple Submissions Improve Your Search Position 340
Mistake: You Don’t Know Your Keywords 340
Mistake: Too Many Pages with Database Parameters and
Session IDs 341
Mistake: Building the Site and Then Bringing in the SEO Expert 341
Myth: $25 Can Get Your Site a #1 Position 342
Myth: Google Partners Get You #1 Positions 342
Myth: Bad Links to Your Site Will Hurt Its Position 343

on earth would you want this book for? After all, can’t you just build
a Web site, and then pay someone $25 to register the site with thousands of
search engines? I’m sure you’ve seen the advertising: “We guarantee top-ten
placement in a gazillion search engines!” “We’ll register you in 5,000 search
engines today!”
Well, unfortunately, it’s not that simple. (Okay, fortunately for me, because
if it were simple, Wiley wouldn’t pay me to write this book.) The fact is that
search engine optimization is a little complicated. Not brain surgery compli-
cated, but not as easy as “Give us 50 bucks and we’ll handle it for you.”
The vast majority of Web sites don’t have a chance in the search engines.
Why? Because of simple mistakes. Because the people creating the sites don’t
have a clue what they should do to make the site easy for search engines to
work with. Because they don’t understand the role of links pointing to their
site, and because they’ve never thought about keywords. Because, because,
because. This book helps you deal with those becauses and gets you not just
one step, but dozens of steps, ahead of the average Web-site Joe.
About This Book
This book demystifies the world of search engines. You find out what you
need to do to give your site the best possible chance to rank well in the
search engines.
In this book, I show you how to
ߜ Make sure that you’re using the right keywords in your Web pages.
ߜ Create pages that search engines can read and will index in the way you
want them to.
ߜ Avoid techniques that search engines hate — things that can get your
Web site penalized (knocked down low in search engine rankings).
ߜ Build pages that give your site greater visibility in search engines.
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ߜ Get search engines and directories to include your site in their indexes
and lists.

2
Search Engine Optimization For Dummies, 2nd Edition
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