In order to be successful on the web, you have to have a clear understanding of search engine optimization, or SEO. Many people have heard of SEO, but very few completely understand it.

Search engine optimization is actually rather simple, and it is one way to generate traffic to your site for free. This method does take some time, but if you put good work into it, you will be seeing results within a few weeks.

The first concept that you must understand is how search engines rank pages. Pages are ranked according to their relevancy in relation to specific keywords that people use when looking for information. The more inbound links that a site has from similar sites with high quality information, the better the site will rank. The more relevant and useful the information is on the site, the higher it will rank for a specific keyword. This does not necessarily mean that it will rank high for related keywords or key phrases, however.

When people search the Internet, they are not usually interested in those pages who are

number 200 in rankings. They are more interested in the first 10 or 20 because they do not want to spend the time looking and sifting through hundreds of pages. The idea is that through search engine optimization, you can move your site up the ranks with fresh, keyword content that will attract the search engines and traffic. In turn, the more traffic you generate, the higher you will be ranked in the listings. Think about your own searching habits when you are looking at optimizing your website. If you are planning a vacation to Las Vegas, are you really going to look on page 40 for a hotel or casino? Most likely you’re not.

Secondly, keywords that are used frequently are going to have a lot of competition. So, you already know that there are about 4 million websites on the Internet. Now, let’s assume that you have a website about wine. Obviously, you are going to think of “wine” as being your main keyword. Now, if you search wine in a search engine, how many pages are there for you to sift through? Most likely you will find hundreds of thousands and all of these sites are your competition. When you are targeting your site for a keyword, you need to choose a path of least resistance. The key is determining which keywords are popular, but not highly competitive.

Thirdly, you will want to begin by choosing keywords that are easy for you to compete for. You will then want to build pages that are based around those keywords that receive traffic, but have no competition. As you do this, you will want to begin building up pages that reach the higher and more competitive keywords. Essentially, you will be building a ladder that allows you to exchange links with relevant sites and you then use their keywords as an anchor in your sites. In order to gain exposure you have to be indexed. You can guarantee yourself to be placed in their “sandbox” by simply submitting your sites. However, you may still have to wait several weeks or months before they finally make their way around to your site. The key to getting noticed quickly is to get your website’s link on a highly ranked page. This is because highly ranked pages get spidered more quickly than those websites who are waiting. If you are linked into one of these higher ranked sites, then the search engine’s spider will move into your site as well through the link. To get linked into one of these highly ranked sites, you can simply purchase advertising space.

You can spend $10 to $25 and get placed on their site, which will then get your site indexed. After your time period for your link is over, you are not obligated to repurchase, but you will enjoy being indexed very quickly.

The next way to get noticed is to join a highly ranked forum. Leave useful posts that include a signature with your website address in it. You can also leave comments on popular blogs. Be sure that they do not use “no follow” tags, otherwise you are just leaving a comment that will go unnoticed by the search engines. Always make sure that your signature links back to your website.

This is just a couple of ways to get a link on a highly ranked page. There are several other methods that you may use as well.

This is crucial when building a website. Not only will it save you a lot of money in advertising, but it will always work for you. Organic hits are the best and if you can receive all organic hits, then your site is going to be very valuable. This is especially true if you were to consider selling your website somewhere down the road.

The best way to start receiving free traffic is to do link exchanges. You will want to find other websites that are in your niche, and then you request that they place your link on their page and then you will do the same for them. You will also want to setup links with sites that are ranked highly and are related to your area. You should also keyword optimize your anchor text for your link so that you have keyword optimization working for you as well. This is what the search engines will look at when they are determining what your site is all about. While you are writing your anchor text, it is also important to have a few different variations. Use different keywords so that you will receive traffic from a variety of different keywords. This also helps to prevent duplicate content.

At the same time, you will want to keep your website’s content fresh. You should set-up a content creation program that you will use to add new keyword optimized pages to your website so that your site is new and ever changing. The more often you change your site, the more often the search engine spiders will have make their way back to you to check you out. In return, you will begin moving up in the ranks.

There is more coming on traffic generating techniques, stay tuned!

Thankyou

Jeff Risley

Founder of http://www.beachboppin.com