Page 176 - Social Media Marketing

Creating and Maintaining Your Own Web Site 161

attract attention and drive traffic to your site. Following are some
techniques that can help:

• Make your site attractive to search engines. Search engine
optimization (SEa) is a term used to describe various techniques
for improving the ranking of Web pages in search results. One
way to make your Web pages more visible to search engines is
to pack your Web pages with key words and phrases that peo-
ple commonly search for on the Internet when they're looking
for content that your web site offers. Using HTML tags, such as
<em> for emphasis, to call attention to key words and phrases
also helps. For additional tips and strategies for giving your
Web pages and blogs a higher profile, check out Search Engine
Optimization For Dummies by Peter Kent (John Wiley & Sons,

2008).

• Exchange links. Generally, the more highly ranked sites you
have linked to your site, the higher will be your ranking with
search engines. One way to encourage the creators of other
web sites to link to your site is to link your web site to theirs.
However, some SEa experts claim that shared links do little or
nothing to improve your ranking. It's better to have a site link
to yours without a link from your site to the other site.

• Contribute content to other sites. People in your industry who
have their own web sites and blogs are probably in a constant
search for original content. Offer to write an article for them
on a topic area of your expertise in exchange for them adding
a link back to your web site. They can put the link in the credit
they give you for writing the article.

• Buy pay-per-click ads. Google, Yahoo!, MSN, and other search
engines generate revenue by selling pay-per-click advertising.
Whenever someone searches for words or phrases related to
the content on your web site, your ad appears as part of the
search results. You pay only if somebody clicks your ad. The
cost per click varies depending on how high you want your ad
to appear in the search results.