Search Engine Optimization All-in-One For Dummies, 3rd Edition

Search Engine Optimization All-in-One For Dummies, 3rd Edition

by Bruce Clay
Released September 2015
Publisher(s): For Dummies
ISBN: 9781118921753

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Book description

The most comprehensive coverage of search engine optimization

In Search Engine Optimization All-in-One For Dummies, 3rd Edition, Bruce Clay—whose search engine consultancy predates Google—shares everything you need to know about SEO. In minibooks that cover the entire topic, you'll discover how search engines work, how to apply effective keyword strategies, ways to use SEO to position yourself competitively, the latest on international SEO practices, and more.

If SEO makes your head spin, this no-nonsense guide makes it easier. You'll get the lowdown on how to use search engine optimization to improve the quality and volume of traffic on your website via search engine results. Cutting through technical jargon, it gets you up to speed quickly on how to use SEO to get your website in the top of the rankings, target different kinds of searches, and win more industry-specific vertical search engine results!

  • Includes new and updated material, featuring the latest on Bing!, Google instant search, image search, and much more
  • Covers SEO and optimizing servers for SEO
  • Provides important information on SEO web design
  • Shows you how to use SEO to stay "above the fold"

If you're a website owner, developer, marketer, or SEO consultant, Search Engine Optimization All-in-One For Dummies, Third Edition is the only resource you need to beat the competition.

Table of contents

    1. Cover
    2. Introduction
      1. About This Book
      2. Foolish Assumptions
      3. Icons Used in This Book
      4. Beyond the Book
      5. Where to Go from Here
    3. Book I: How Search Engines Work
      1. Chapter 1: Putting Search Engines in Context
        1. Identifying Search Engine Users
        2. Figuring Out Why People Use Search Engines
        3. Discovering the Necessary Elements for Getting High Keyword Rankings
        4. Understanding the Search Engines: They're a Community
      2. Chapter 2: Meeting the Search Engines
        1. Finding the Common Threads among the Engines
        2. Getting to Know the Major Engines
        3. Checking Out the Rest of the Field:AOL and Ask.com
        4. Finding Your Niche: Vertical Engines
        5. Discovering Internal Site Search
        6. Understanding Metasearch Engines
      3. Chapter 3: Recognizing and Reading Search Results
        1. Reading the Search Engine Results Page
        2. Understanding How People Look at Search Results
        3. Identifying Mobile Users’ Search Patterns
        4. Discovering the Features of a Search Results Page
      4. Chapter 4: Getting Your Site to Appear in the Right Results
        1. Seeking Traffic, Not Ranking
        2. Avoiding Spam
        3. Understanding Personalized Search’s Impact on Ranking
        4. Using News, Images, Books, and Other Search Verticals to Rank
        5. Showing Up in Local Search Results
        6. Making the Most of Paid Search Results
      5. Chapter 5: Knowing What Drives Search Results
        1. Using Advanced Search Operators
        2. Understanding Long-Tail Queries
        3. Using Predictive Search as a Research Assistant
      6. Chapter 6: Spam Issues: When Search Engines Get Fooled
        1. Understanding What Spam Is
        2. Discovering the Types of Spam
        3. Reporting Spam
        4. Avoiding Being Evil: Ethical Search Marketing
        5. Realizing That There Are No Promises or Guarantees
        6. Following the SEO Code of Ethics
    4. Book II: Keyword Strategy
      1. Chapter 1: Employing Keyword Research Techniques and Tools
        1. Discovering Your Site Theme
        2. Doing Your Industry and Competitor Research
        3. Researching Client Niche Keywords
        4. Checking Out Seasonal Keyword Trends
        5. Evaluating Keyword Research
      2. Chapter 2: Selecting Keywords
        1. Selecting the Proper Keyword Phrases
        2. Reinforcing versus Diluting Your Theme
        3. Picking Keywords Based on Subject Categories
        4. Understanding Keyword-Based Search versus Semantic Search
      3. Chapter 3: Exploiting Pay Per Click Lessons Learned
        1. Analyzing Your Pay Per Click Campaigns for Clues about Your Site
        2. Reducing Costs by Overlapping Pay Per Click with Natural Keyword Rankings
      4. Chapter 4: Assigning Keywords to Pages
        1. Understanding What a Search Engine Sees as Keywords
        2. Planning Subject Theme Categories
        3. Choosing Landing Pages for Subject Categories
        4. Organizing Your Primary and Secondary Subjects
        5. Understanding Siloing “Under the Hood”
        6. Consolidating Themes to Help Search Engines See Your Relevance
      5. Chapter 5: Adding and Maintaining Keywords
        1. Understanding Keyword Frequency and Distribution
        2. Adjusting Keywords
        3. Updating Keywords
        4. Using Tools to Aid Keyword Placement
    5. Book III: Competitive Positioning
      1. Chapter 1: Identifying Your Competitors
        1. Getting to Know the Competition
        2. Figuring Out the Real Competition
        3. Knowing Thyself: Recognizing Your Business Advantages
        4. Looking at Conversion as a Competitive Measure
        5. Recognizing the Difference between Traffic and Conversion
        6. Determining True Competitors by Their Measures
        7. Sweating the Small Stuff
      2. Chapter 2: Competitive Research Techniques and Tools
        1. Realizing That High Rankings Are Achievable
        2. Getting All the Facts on Your Competitors
        3. Calculating the Requirements for Rankings
        4. Penetrating the Veil of Search Engine Secrecy
        5. Diving into SERP Research
      3. Chapter 3: Applying Collected Data
        1. Sizing Up Your Page Construction
        2. Learning from Your Competitors’ Links
        3. Taking Cues from Your Competitors’ Content Structure
    6. Book IV: SEO Web Design
      1. Chapter 1: The Basics of SEO Web Design
        1. Deciding on the Type of Content for Your Site
        2. Making a User-Focused Website
        3. Choosing Keywords
        4. Using Keywords in the Heading Tags
        5. Keeping the Code Clean
        6. Organizing Your Assets
        7. Naming Your Files
        8. Keeping Design Simple
        9. Making a Site Dynamic
        10. Making Your Site Mobile Friendly
        11. Developing a Design Procedure
      2. Chapter 2: Building an SEO-Friendly Site
        1. Preplanning and Organizing Your Site
        2. Designing Spider-Friendly Code
        3. Creating a Theme and Style
        4. Writing Rich Text Content
        5. Planning Your Navigation Elements
        6. Implementing a Site Search
        7. Incorporating Engagement Objects into Your Site
        8. Allowing for Expansion
        9. Developing an Update Procedure
        10. Balancing Usability and Conversion
      3. Chapter 3: Building a Mobile-Friendly Site
        1. Choosing the Right Mobile Approach
        2. Designing for a Mobile User
        3. Making Mobile a Part of Your SEO Strategy
        4. Testing Mobile Friendliness
      4. Chapter 4: Making Your Page Search Engine Compatible
        1. Optimizing HTML Constructs for Search Engines
        2. Enriching Your Site with Rich Snippets
        3. Using Clean Code
        4. Making Your Site W3C-Compliant
        5. Externalizing the Code
        6. Choosing the Right Navigation
      5. Chapter 5: Perfecting Navigation and Linking Techniques
        1. Formulating a Category Structure
        2. Selecting Landing Pages
        3. Absolute versus Relative Linking
        4. Dealing with Less-than-Ideal Types of Navigation
        5. Naming Links
    7. Book V: Creating Content
      1. Chapter 1: Selecting a Stylefor Your Audience
        1. Knowing Your Demographic
        2. Creating a Dynamic Tone
        3. Choosing a Content Style
        4. Developing a Blog
        5. Using Personas to Define Your Audience
      2. Chapter 2: Establishing Content Depth and Page Length
        1. Building Enough Content to Rank Well
        2. Developing Ideas for Content
        3. Using Various Types of Content
        4. Optimizing Images
        5. Mixing in Video
        6. Making the Text Readable
        7. Allowing User Input
        8. Creating User Engagement
        9. Writing a Call to Action
      3. Chapter 3: Adding Keyword-Specific Content
        1. Creating Your Keyword List
        2. Developing Content Using Your Keywords
        3. Optimizing the Content
        4. Finding Tools for Keyword Integration
        5. Competitive Analysis Tools
      4. Chapter 4: Adapting Your Content for Local Search
        1. Taking Advantage of Local Search
        2. Optimizing Content for Local Searches
      5. Chapter 5: Dealing with Duplicate Content
        1. Sources of Duplicate Content and How to Resolve Them
        2. Duplication by Outsiders
      6. Chapter 6: Crediting Your Content
        1. Factoring in Intellectual Property Considerations
      7. Chapter 7: Using SEO to Build Your Brand
        1. Selecting Keywords for Branding Purposes
        2. How to Build Your Brand through Search
        3. Using Engagement Objects to Promote Your Brand
        4. Building a Community
    8. Book VI: Linking
      1. Chapter 1: Employing Linking Strategies
        1. Theming Your Site by Subject
        2. Implementing Clear Subject Themes
        3. Siloing
        4. Making the Most of Outbound Links
        5. Obtaining Inbound Links
      2. Chapter 2: Structuring Internal Links
        1. Subject Theming Structure
        2. Optimizing Link Equity
        3. Creating and Maintaining Silos
        4. Building a Silo: An Illustrated Guide
        5. Maintaining Your Silos
        6. Including Traditional Sitemaps
        7. Using an XML Sitemap
      3. Chapter 3: Obtaining Links
        1. Understanding the Benefits and Risks of Link Building
        2. Identifying Quality Links
        3. Attracting Links
        4. How Not to Obtain Links
      4. Chapter 4: Vetting Inbound Links
        1. Identifying Inbound Links
        2. Avoiding Poor-Quality Links
        3. Dealing with Search Engine Spam
      5. Chapter 5: Connecting with Social Networks
        1. Making Use of Blogs
        2. Discovering Social News Sites
        3. Promoting Media on Social Networking Sites
        4. Optimizing Social Media
        5. Social Signals as Search-Ranking Factors
        6. Building Community
        7. Incorporating Interactivity
    9. Book VII: Optimizing the Foundations
      1. Chapter 1: Server Issues: Why Your Server Matters
        1. Meeting the Servers
        2. Making Sure That Your Server Is Healthy, Happy, and Fast
        3. Excluding Pages and Sites from the Search Engines
        4. Creating Custom 404 Error Pages
        5. Fixing Dirty IPs and Other “Bad Neighborhood” Issues
        6. Serving Your Site to Different Devices
      2. Chapter 2: Domain Names: What Your URL Says about You
        1. Selecting Your Domain Name
        2. Registering Your Domain Name
        3. Covering All Your Bases
        4. Pointing Multiple Domains to a Single Site Correctly
        5. Choosing the Right Hosting Provider
        6. Understanding Subdomains
      3. Chapter 3: Using Redirects for SEO
        1. Discovering the Types of Redirects
        2. Reconciling Your www and Non-www URLs
      4. Chapter 4: Implementing 301 Redirects
        1. Getting the Details on How 301 Redirects Work
        2. Implementing a 301 Redirect in Apache .htaccess Files
        3. Implementing a 301 Redirect on an NGINX Server
        4. Implementing a 301 Redirect on a Microsoft IIS Server
        5. Using Alternate Ways to Redirect a Page
      5. Chapter 5: Watching Your Backend: Content Management System Troubles
        1. Avoiding SEO Problems Caused by Content Management Systems
        2. Choosing the Right Content Management System
        3. Customizing Your CMS for SEO
        4. Optimizing Your Hosted E-Commerce Site
        5. Avoiding Problems with JavaScript Frameworks
      6. Chapter 6: Solving SEO Roadblocks
        1. Inviting Spiders to Your Site
        2. Avoiding 302 Hijacks
        3. Handling Secure Server Problems
    10. Book VIII: Analyzing Results
      1. Chapter 1: Employing Site Analytics
        1. Discovering Web Analytics Basics
        2. Measuring Your Success
        3. Examining Analytics Packages
        4. Log Files Analysis
      2. Chapter 2: Tracking Behavior with Web Analytics
        1. Measuring Website Usability
        2. Tracking Conversions
        3. Tracking the Success of Your SEO Project
        4. Analyzing Rankings
      3. Chapter 3: Mastering SEO Tools and Reports
        1. Getting Started with Conversion Testing
        2. Discovering Page and Site Analysis Tools
        3. Seeing Visitor Paths through the Site
        4. Understanding Abandonment Rates
    11. Book IX: International SEO
      1. Chapter 1: Discovering International Search Engines
        1. Targeting International Users
        2. Identifying Opportunities for Your International Site
        3. Realizing How People Search
      2. Chapter 2: Tailoring Your Marketing Message for Asia
        1. Succeeding in Asia
        2. Discovering Japan
        3. Succeeding in China
        4. Finding Out about South Korea
        5. Operating in Russia
      3. Chapter 3: Staking a Claim in Europe
        1. Succeeding in the European Union
        2. Knowing the Legal Issues in the EU
        3. Working within the United Kingdom
        4. Discovering France
        5. Operating in Germany
        6. Understanding the Netherlands
      4. Chapter 4: Getting Started in Latin America
        1. Succeeding in Latin America
        2. Geotargeting with Google Search Console
        3. Working in Mexico
        4. Operating in Brazil
        5. Discovering Argentina
    12. Appendix: The Value of Training
      1. Making the Most of Industry Conferences
      2. Picking the Right Training Courses
      3. Training for Professionals
      4. Getting Things Done for Do-It-Yourselfers
    13. About the Author
    14. Cheat Sheet
    15. Advertisement Page
    16. Connect with Dummies
    17. End User License Agreement

Product information

  • Title: Search Engine Optimization All-in-One For Dummies, 3rd Edition
  • Author(s): Bruce Clay
  • Release date: September 2015
  • Publisher(s): For Dummies
  • ISBN: 9781118921753