There is nothing that does not have a Dummies guide to it and so you will find a large number of search engine optimization for dummies websites promising to make life easy for you. While they all have something to offer and the material offered by Google is the most valuable (after all, it is used by more people than any other search engine), everyone has different ideas about how dummies should go about optimizing their websites and the newbie needs to use his brains to figure out what advice he should and should not follow. Luckily there are some basic points on which there seems to be general agreement and these are what are given here, the beginning point of search engine optimization for dummies. Here are two very basic rules which, if followed, will get dummies started off on the right foot and from which they can go on to more advance search engine optimization.

Newbies often get carried away with the idea of using keywords, a tactic that can backfire on them because search engines are very sophisticated and will skip any sites that they feel are artificially stuffed with keywords to boost their ranking in the search results. Before worrying about keywords, make sure that the content of your website is clear, concise and relevant because the final aim is not just to get people to your site but to get them to buy what you are selling and garbled content is not the way to do that. After getting your material together use a program like Google’s AdWords to help you find the right keywords for your site and then make sure that you use these keywords in such a way that they fit naturally into the text and do not appear to be forced into place. A good thumb rule to keep in mind is to make sure your keywords are as short and simple as possible.

When adding keywords to your content be careful about stuffing, the forced use of keywords just to attract search engine attention because engines can now spot this and then the websites are blocked out of the search results so limit your keyword density to around 3%. In case the keywords are such that they are common phrases or words that fit into the text as part of normal usage, you can think of a higher density, but be careful of stuffing. Ensure that the keywords are in your webpage title and are also present in any headers and sub headers that you use because most search engines give more weight to keywords used in this way. Use keywords as links to other pages on your website as these too are given more importance by many advanced search engines.

Okay, you now know the first steps of search engine optimization for dummies but you need to keep on learning, things move fast in the cyber world and keeping abreast of the new developments in how search engines work will enable you to keep your site high in the search results.

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