Extreme Web Designers

Finding a new website on the internet might be difficult for people. You have to place it right up there, right? The answer is no..!! You need links or you should inform the top search engines that your website is online. Screaming in the jungle will not help you, but certain tools can do wonders. A XML sitemap is one great seo tool.

How do you get a sitemap? Its Simple. You can either code it yourself (protocol here), or use a XML Sitemap generator. There are tons of free generators and tons of software out there to buy. I personally use xml-sitemaps.com for my projects. I have them crawl my sites, save the document made, and then edit it using a text editor.

What is the benefit? Well, it gives a concise look at your website. It’s how you inform the search engine spiders what you consider important. Is your privacy policy that important? Probably not as much as your main product page.

Now you’ve made one, what to do now?

1. Put it in your main directory. Ex. http://www.mysite.com/sitemap.xml
2. Edit your Robots.txt to include it for all engines. Add a line in there like the one below
   Sitemap: http://www.example.com/sitemap.xml
3. Tell the engines about it directly.
   1.    Learn more about Webmaster Central Here.
   2.    Yahoo SiteExplorer
   3.    MSN/Live

Probably the single best resource to learn about sitemaps is Sitemaps.org. Their FAQs and Sitemap Protocol say just about everything you might need.

If you want professionals to get sitemaps configured and do some search engine optimization for your website conctact us at +94115050939 (Sri Lanka)

Web design and SEO has to work together and be compatible together or else they are mutually exclusive. The best known incompatibility to us is the extensive use of Flash programming to design websites. Website owners unknowingly hire designers who are not concerned or not aware of the ultimate objective of a commercial website…which is to make profit for the website owner. Therefore the best looking website will not have any success in online business if the website is unreadable by search engines; this will render the website and makes the business invincible to online visitors who search through search engines. The basic idea is that Flash content cannot be read by major search engines. So if your entire website is made with flash and the descriptive text, navigational links, headers and footers are developed with Flash, Google will never understand it and read it.

To be Search Engine friendly means that everything should be discoverable by search engines on your website. So in essence your SEO actually starts with the web design. This is one of the major mistakes most of the businesses make. They usually first seek a designer who may not be good in SEO knowledge and a much less expert. SEO friendly web Designs are essential which makes the foundation for a long term competitiveness of the website.

Having explained all of this we now know that interactive websites gets better results because of the visual stimulation of video, onsite tours, etc. so how can you make this work? Knowing that most of the search engines likes text and it is essential to be found the answer is to do both in a very precise balanced approach so that search engine spiders can be provided with what they are looking for while providing human beings the correct elements and content to get a positive response or conclusion.

First the fundamentals of Search engine optimization must be adhered to:

1. Search-Engine Friendly Pages – HTML; no Full Flash.
2. Unique Page Titles for every page – must be targeted on the most important keywords (requires keyword research).
3. Unique Meta Descriptions
4. Installation of Search Engine Friendly CMS (Content Management System) to form the basis for consistently adding and indexing new content.  We like WordPress and Joomla depending on the needs of the website.  Sometimes we use a combination within one domain to take advantage of unique advantages each has.
5. E-Commerce – critical selection of SEO Friendly E-Commerce software; this means SEO-friendly shopping cart structure that includes database functionality for unique product names, unique descriptions; all of which easily read by the search engines by conforming to search engine guidelines.  We have great success with OsCommerce and Virtue mart and  have used it to “save” certain E-Commerce websites from themselves due to obviously SEO unfriendly E-Commerce software.
6. Blog – Content Management System Selection for easy indexation by the search engines; any such system must be text-readable, include ample room for Titles, Descriptions, Tags, Social Media compatibility, RSS functionality, commenting-friendly.
7. Dynamic Site Map – automatically submits new site-map to Google every time new content is added to the site.

You should be aware that there is much more to SEO. These elements alone will not take you to the first page. However making your foundation strong keeps you in the game and makes you competitive towards success.

With solid SEO fundamentals in place, you now need to pay attention to web page interaction through optimal user interactivity.  After all, getting great ranks isn’t enough … you need visitors to convert.  There are countless methods and tools available to increase and optimize user engagement, interaction, and entertainment and ultimately reach both a logical and emotional conclusion towards taking the act of conversion.

Some of the SEO friendly tools that can be integrated into producing websites are:

1. Video Introduction – to grab and hold attention in those first few critical seconds.
2. Sliders – Moving slides of images and / or text that quickly deliver the value proposition to the visitor.
3. Engaging questionnaires or polls
4. Featured Articles and Press Releases
5. Animations
6. Special Offers
7. Knowledge base
8. Newsletter Sign-up

Marrying interactive web design with SEO is ultimately essential towards both driving traffic and driving conversions.  You can’t do one without the other and expect to be successful.

Looking for better conversions?  Better Traffic?  Contact us and let’s talk about it.  It’s a free initial consultation.

Google has explained a big change about how they manage search results by including synonyms in keywords which might be used in search keywords. How will this affect your website position in Google search results??

Why is it important that Google can deal with synonyms?
Google targets to show the finest results for your search. To achieve this it’s very important that Google’s algorithms can understand the search keywords which you may use in the search query. One important factor of recognizing the words is to understand synonyms.

These are words which can have the same meaning, Example: “home” and “house”. People who are searching for “home improvement” might also be interested in websites which contains the keyword “house improvement”
But the issue is that some words can have many meanings. For example, “case” could mean “box” , “container” or it can mean “instance” , “occurrence” or example.

Google’s measurements show that synonyms affect 70 percent of user searches across the more than 100 languages Google supports.

What has changed?

According to the posting in Google’s official blog, Google has improved the way that they detect synonyms. For example, the algorithm can now find 20 possible meanings of the search term “GM”. GM can mean General Motors, George Mason in [gm university], gamemaster in [gm screen star wars], Gangadhar Meher in [gm college], general manager in [nba gm] and even gunners mate in [navy gm], etc.

Google also made a change to how the synonyms are displayed. The searched words and the synonyms are now displayed in bold in the search results. Web pages that contain only synonyms of the searched word can also be displayed in the search results.

Do you have to change your web pages?
If you have optimized your website as explained by our search engine optimization consultants and as explained then you don’t have to change anything. Here’s a reminder:

1. Think out of the box.
Don’t just use the technical terms that you use in your company. Think about the words that other people would use to describe your product. For example, don’t just use “rhinoplasty” but also “nose job” and “nose surgery”.
Our search engine consultants will help you to find the best keywords for your website.

2. Optimize different pages of your website for different keywords.
The more pages you optimize, the better. It is much better if one web page is highly relevant to one keyphrase than somewhat relevant to many keyphrases.

Don’t stuff a single page with keywords. The keywords should fit naturally in your web page content. Our consultants will help to find out where on your web pages you should use your keywords.

Different people use different words to find the same things. Use different ways to talk about your website topic and optimize as many pages as possible of your website.

Over the next couple of days we will be discussing about the different ways of finding the latest trends and search engine keywords in order to let you focus more on your site’s content, advertising, and affiliate links; hence improve your site’s conversion.

There are various resources and tools to help you find what people are currently searching, buying, and doing. You can use these methods for not only improving your site so that it comes up better in searches if you optimize your website for targeted keywords, but you can also use it to come up with the most searched for topics, thus increasing the potential traffic to your website.

Using Google Trends

With Google Trends, you can find the latest searches for each day. For each search term you enter, Google Trends will analyze a portion of Google web searches for that particular term you entered, relative to the total number of searches performed on Google over a period of time. It then shows you a graph with the results (known as the Search-Volume graph).

Continue reading “The Best Keyword Tools | Keyword Research and Trends” »

If you want to get your website indexed properly by search engines such as Google, Yahoo and Bing you need to create a XML sitemap and submit it for indexing. A sitemap is a file which is on your web server that will allow the search engine crawlers to find all the files you have.

Basically there are two different types of sitemaps. a HTML page or a XML file. Generally the HTML sitemap is a single web page which allows visitors to see all the available pages on a website and usually it links to all those pages. The XML sitemap is used by search engine crawlers to find out how many pages are available and which have been updated recently. A XML sitemap is not meant for normal website visitors and it does not look pretty.

XML-Sitemaps is a free sitemap generator. Here you can index all your web pages and create a XML sitemap file which you can upload to your web server root directory. There is nothing to install. All you need to do is, use the XML-Sitemaps website and it will do all the hard work for you automatically. Read more about How to Create a XML Sitemaps

Continuing where we left off in our previous blog post, let’s take a look now at the next few Blog tips that will Help You Succeed in 2010:

14. Remember to add an author section to your blog posts – No one would want to read an article posted by a face-less author, or one which does not have a name either.

15. Forget about the stats and numbers – Instead of spending valuable time checking the stats of traffic to your blog, focus that time on something more productive, like writing new blog posts instead.

16. Don’t think about making money – This can lead to you losing sight of the most important goal every new blog must reach first, which is quality content. Instead of posting hundreds of affiliate links and self-promotional articles, focus more on the content of your articles. Money can be a driving force but don’t let it ruin your blog.

17. Write eye-catching headlines – You can effectively complete over half the percentage of your blog’s advertising with just one single attractive headline. An important point to take note here is to avoid the most commonly used and generic blog titles and always attempt to come up with titles that are unique and thought-provoking.

18. Guest post – Go ahead, don’t feel intimidated to submit your articles to other reputable blogs.

Blogging can be a hobby or a business and we at Extreme Web Design understands that many new bloggers cannot afford an expensive blog design company to create a new blog site for them.

We provide the ideal solution for such bloggers and create custom Wordpress theme designs . We know how Wordpress functions & we know how to make it look great for your requirements.

Continuing where we left off in our previous blog post, let’s take a look now at the next few Blog tips that will Help You Succeed in 2010:

7. If you are new to Blogging, you might want to start with a WordPress.com blog after which you can switch over to a self-hosted WordPress blog. The following are three reasons for you to use WordPress:

• It is used by a large number of people.
• Recognition and reputation.
• Strong support.

8. Avoid or try to minimize grammar mistakes by proofreading – Poor grammar can lead to a frustrated user. For example, a user would visit your website looking for value but unfortunately the content is all mixed up with misplaced “has” and “their” and other terrible spellings. Would that user want to keep reading? Probably not.

9. Add rich media content to your blog – For example, make use of the power of Youtube and other available media sources. Utilize and match them accordingly into your blog content.

10. Understand your role and stick to it – Ensure that you have a clear definition and understanding of what your blog is about. The second important thing is always keep your blog posts related to your topic.

Continue reading “18 Blog Tips to Help You Succeed in 2010 – Part II” »

1. Judge a blog by its cover – If it doesn’t look pretty, people have a hard time focusing on what you have to say. Take a look at the home page of your blog, focusing on the uppermost region (without scrolling down). Would you want to take a look around after arriving on the home page as a new visitor?

2. Comment smartly and consistently – Bloggers are tired of seeing the overused “Nice post!” or “This is really interesting!” Stand out by trying to put some thought into your comments and, most importantly, make it sound like you actually read the article.

3. Get a Gravatar- Before you start commenting on blogs, it’s a good idea to register your own gravatar. If you follow step 2, readers and blog owners will become familiar with you for better or for worse.

4. Show your personality in your writing – Establishing a voice in your writing is a crucial element is producing content that people will want to keep coming back over and over again for more. Don’t be that Average Joe in a sea of Average Joes.

Continue reading “18 Blog Tips to Help You Succeed in 2010 – Part I” »

Google continues to smile on iPhone and Android users. On Thursday, the search giant rolled out some localization improvements for U.S. searchers.

Type a query into Google.com from either an Android device or the iPhone and Google will now spit out results based on your current or previously logged location. Search “muse” as Google did in its side-by-side screenshots above and you’ll see the most-often-sought terms in your area.

Hence, it isn’t exactly that Google has made its search suggestions any better at anticipating your intended query. More accurately, Google is relying on the hive mind to contextualize location-based searches.

Based on Google’s test, localized search suggestions will work best for businesses. To make sure you get the full impact, go into the Google.com home page settings from your mobile browser and turn on “save recent locations” and “allow use of device location.”

In our third segment on Hiring the Right SEO for your website article, we will continue our discussion on the guidelines which we left off from yesterday.

•  Choose wisely

While you consider whether to go with an SEO, you may want to do some research on the industry. You might also seek out a few of the cautionary tales that have appeared in the press, including this article on one particularly aggressive SEO. While Google doesn’t comment on specific companies, they’ve encountered firms calling themselves SEOs who follow practices that are clearly beyond the pale of accepted business behavior. So be careful.

• Be sure to understand where the money goes

While Google never sells better ranking in their search results, several other search engines combine pay-per-click or pay-for-inclusion results with their regular web search results. Some SEOs will promise to rank you highly in search engines, but place you in the advertising section rather than in the search results. A few SEO’s will even change their bid prices in real time to create the illusion that they “control” other search engines and can place themselves in the slot of their choice. This scam doesn’t work with Google because their advertising is clearly labeled and separated from their search results, but be sure to ask any SEO you’re considering which fees go toward permanent inclusion and which apply toward temporary advertising.

Continue reading “Hiring The Right SEO – Part III” »