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

Chapter 4

Getting Your Site to Appear in the Right Results

In This Chapter

• Seeking traffic as your real goal
• Avoiding spam
• Understanding how behavioral searching impacts your ranking
• Introducing intent-driven search
• Using vertical search engines to your advantage
• Getting into local search results
• Signing up for paid ads in the various search engines

If the Internet were a mall, Google would be the biggest department store and Yahoo and Bing would be the smaller ones in between. But a mall is more than just its department stores: You can also shop in dozens of specialty stores, food venues, merchant carts, and so on. In this chapter, you meet the specialty stores of searching, the vertical engines, and find out how to make sure your product (your site) displays on those stores’ shelves.

In this chapter, you discover how to put your products in front of customers by changing your focus to traffic, not ranking; discover how to avoid spam tactics that could hurt your site; and gain an understanding how personalized searches change what your audience sees on the search results page. You also find out about how to get into the local search results and how to get started with a pay per click campaign in the main engines.

Seeking Traffic, Not Ranking

First, a couple of reminders are in order. Your search engine optimization efforts, if done well, can earn your site a higher ranking in search results pages. However, do not confuse the means with the end. Keep in mind your real goal ...