Online
Tutorial
Step 6 - The checklist
Herewith then a couple of things that you might
want to check, just before you launch your new
site. Some of these items may seem trivial, but
I think this should be a basic check list for
all new sites.
All of the items below are very important in
creating a site that is Search Engine friendly
and will hopefully get you good placement!
We have gone through all of this already, but
there is an old adage in the IT Industry that
says: 'Test and test and then test again!"
If any of the items below don't seem to be 100%,
don't fret. You can always come back and change
them again at a later stage.
1. Define the purpose of your web site. It
could be something as simple as "I want
to sell my 5 products through my web site" or "I
want to create a site where my organization members
can get a schedule of events and view our employee
handbook through a password protected area."
You
can and will most likely refine your definition
as you go but make sure you have some clear
direction.
2. Define your keywords. This is probably
the most important aspect of starting any site
and you should really spent some time on this.
3. The new sites' URL . You have to ask
yourself the following questions:
- Does it contain your Keywords?
- Is the URL to long?
4. Check the page title . Does the page
title contain your keywords? This is very important
for good Search engine placement. Also make sure
that it is not to long.
5. Check the Description tag . Does this
contain your keywords and is it too long? As
you may notice there is a bit of a trend here.
6. Check the Keywords Tag . Once again,
does it contain all your keywords and in order
of importance and relevance? Always try to place
the most relevant keywords first and never, ever
place any irrelevant keywords. This does actually
negatively affect your rankings!
7. Make use of ALT Text .
Always try to make use of your keywords in the
ALT text of images on your site. Not only does
it help people that can't display pictures, but
it also increases the occurrence of your keywords
on the site and we all know what that means!
8. Check your body text . You guessed
it! Does it contain enough instances of your
keywords? You should also consider the following:
- Does your body text contain enough content?
- Is your body text human-readable?
- Does the page have excess HTML markup which
could be removed?
9. Linking pages. Do all pages in your
site link to each other? It has been said that
you should be able to access every single page
within the site with no more than two clicks.
I don't know if this is strictly correct, but
the principle is definitely sound!
10. Promoting your site.
This we will discuss in much more in the next
step ( Step 7 )
The old adage "We have built it, so they will
come" does not hold true in this scenario. We
really have to promote our site and make sure
that we will get the visitors. Here are a couple
of things that you should ask yourself:
- Does the site have a site map?
- Is it possible to issue a press release about
this new web site?
- Can you submit this new site to web directories?
- Could you mention your new site on relevant
web forums?
- Could you trade reciprocal links with similar
web pages?
Now it is time to get the visitors in!
How will we do this? Well, let's get on to the
next step.
Click
here to continue.
