SEO Explained in a Layman's term
SEO is an acronym for Search Engine Optimization,In its simplest terms, it is anything done to enhance the visibility of a website on any search engine eg Google, Yahoo, Bing, etc. It is all about getting your website to the top results of search engines to attract attention to your site and of course, make more money. The target of most business owners is to gain the top position in Search Result Pages (SERPs) of any search engines .
Despite the Acronym, SEO is as much about people as it is about the search engines themselves. People go to search engines asking questions and also seeking answers so SEO is all about understanding what people are searching for online, the keyword they are familiar with and often use, and also satisfying content to what they seek. Having in mind that a change in keywords can alter the results shown in SERPs.
Thereby knowing the mind of your audience is one side of the SEO's coin, delivering it in a way search engine crawlers can find and understand is another.
How does SEO work?
I'd use Google to explain this.
Google search engines are also referred to as Answer Machines. They provide answers to any kind of questions their users seek, when the search button is clicked on the search engines go in and out of billions of sites, contents, PDFs, images, and videos evaluating them to know the one that is most likely to answer the user's query. This process is known as crawling and indexing while arranging them in SERPs to suit the user's query is known as ranking.
Google's program for selecting and ranking the websites that appear in its Search Results Pages is commonly referred to as Google's ranking algorithm and it has openly stated that it uses more than 200 signals and puts in place different factors to determine whether or not to show a webpage in its SERPs. These factors are divided into two main categories:
- On-site Optimization.
- Off-site Optimization.
On-site Optimization
This is concerned with what your website is made up of eg the words on its pages, the background HTML code, thee server your site is hosted on, ensuring that your site can be found by a search engine and making sure it is included in the Search Engines Index list for easy accessibility.
When a new website is created, the website files are hosted on a server that alerts google of the existence of the website, and in turn, Googlebot accesses and reads the files and content for inclusion in its index. This is known as SPIDERING and if the website isn't found worthy it is excluded, this can be as a result of the Googlebot's inability to read the website code. Making sure your site is well structured and coded in a way that search engine bots can read is important.
Off-site Optimization
This is largely concerned about backlinks placed as hyperlinks to your website which when clicked on by the user lead to your website. If another website links to your website, Google also interprets this as a "vote" to your website meaning that the more backlinks to your website, the more chance your website stands of appearing in the first or top page rank in SERPs. This is because backlinks are proof that your site is good and highly recommended to the user.
However, not all backlinks are equal. How?
Backlinks work more like a reference. If you are applying for a job in a construction company and you're able to supply a reference from a former employer in a construction company that's a good reference. But if you're able to supply a reference from a former employer and also from the Federal Minister of Works- that's an Excellent reference that is both relevant and of high authority and it increases your chances of being employed for the post.
This also applies with backlinks and the possibility of being selected by a google bot so if my sites sell Jersey and sports kits, I'd rather have NFL.com or NBA.com added to my site instead of KaySportsMania.com. Social sites are a perfect place to post content as followers can share your content and also if respected influencers share your content, it creates more visibility and also benefits your site optimization.
In Conclusion, Top positions in SERPs are highly contested and also yield financial gains for businesses owning websites, SEO plays a huge role in the game. Hereby when creating a website, do well to involve an SEO specialist cause the important part of the job is Identifying those keywords and turning the understanding of Search engines also to the advantage of the users.
Finally, keep an eye out for my next article, diving into more interesting topics.
And if you wish to share your views on this topic and also ask questions, I'll be looking forward to reading them all. Thanks for reading.