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Why Do The Search Engines Change Their Minds?

One of the common questions that come up time after time on forums is , "why do the search engines keep changing their minds about what they want". The search engines really don't chop and change what they want, really they don't. They all want one thing, to deliver the most relevant pages to searchers. it isn't rocket science (despite what some of the telephone sake oil salespeople SEO's tell you). SEO is simple, here are off my cuff the simple basics of seo.

1) Make sure your site can be spidered.
If not then all else is wasted, this is a basic that believe it or not many overlook.

2) Make sure the spiders can spider it quickly and understand the importance of every page in your site.
Set up a nice clean navigation and folder structure with the site broken dow into little pockets of focused pages. Put in place a sitemap, with links to the pages, and a brief text of what to expect at that page.

3) Carry out keyword research and do not cut corners.
Keyword research is the bedrock of any marketing, be it PPC or organic SEO, get it right and it is a joy, get it wrong you pay the price miles down the line when you have to come all the way back and start again.

4) Create the structure above, and create informative clear crisp focused pages.
A page should focus on a subject and the subject should be clearly identifiable. Make the subject the page title and your away.

5) Create clear page titles
How on earth do you expect a search algo to know what your pages are about if they are not clearly marked? Leep in mind that the page title serves two masters, the search engine, and more importantly the searcher. A clear focused page title will encourage clicks to your page.

6) Create clear quality on topic content.
Search engines need content to work out what your site is all about, without it they have to guess. Quality content matched to quality backlinks into your site will help you rank well, and will please your visitors.

7) Focus your pages!
The search engine algorithms need to be able to work out what each page is about on the web. Covering three or four topics on the same page will only serve to confuse the issue. Focused tight content and outbound on topic links will help both visitors and search engines.

8) Be proud of your site.
Let people know it exists, submit to directories, contact other sites that are likely to be able to share client types, and swap links.

9) Link out
So much is made of incoming links, but I am a firm believer that you can assist the search algorithms greatly by linking out to good authoritive pages from within your site. This is how it was in the beginning with academics citing each others work, and this still works today.

10) Use the right anchor text
Anchor text was again how we did it in the early days, but people kind of lost track of that. Now again they realise the importance of anchor text. Use descriptive anchor text when possible, and this includes internal links within your own site.

Well that is that take a look and tell me what is new there? The answer is nothing really. So SEO doesn't change, the search engines don't keep changing their minds about what they want. The problem is that too many people create sites that algo chase one factor or another of the algorithm, and when the weight is altered for this factor, they have to move onto another to shore it up. Create a good well balanced site with all the elements covered, and it will stand the test of time.