40. Best Practices Explanations Are the keywords that you are targeting not only relevant but also popular with searchers? Do your page titles lead with your targeted keywords? Is your body copy of sufficient length and keyword-rich? Does the anchor text pointing to various pages within your site include good keywords? Do you employ text links from your home page to your most important secondary pages? Does your Web site have an XML Sitemap, as well as an HTML site map with text links? Are the URLs of your dynamic (database-driven) pages short, simple and static-looking?
41. Best Practices Does your site have an optimized internal linking structure? Do your pages have keyword-rich meta descriptions with a compelling call to action? Does your site have a custom error page that returns the correct “status code”? Do your filenames and directory names include targeted keywords? Are you actively building links to your site?
43. Worst Practices Does your primary navigation require Flash, Java or Javascript to function? Is your web site done entirely in Flash or overly graphical with very little textural content? Is your home page a “splash page” or otherwise content-less? Do the URLs of your pages include “cgi-bin” or numerous ampersands? Do the URLs of your pages include session IDs or user IDs? Do you unnecessarily spread your site across multiple domains? Are your title tags the same on all pages?
44. Worst Practices Do you have pop-ups on your site? Do you use “click here” or any other superfluous copy for your hyperlink text? Do you have superfluous text like “Welcome to” at the beginning of your title tags? Do you have any hidden or small text meant only for the search engines? Do you engage in “keyword stuffing”? Do you repeatedly submit your site to the search engines? Do you incorporate your competitors’ brand names in your meta tags? Do you have duplicate pages with minimal or no changes? Are you submitting to (“Free For All”) link pages and farms?
45. SEO Key Factors www.seomoz.org/article/search-ranking-factors
46. Top 5 Ranking Factors Keyword Focused Anchor Text from External Links 73% very high importance External Link Popularity (quantity/quality of links) 71% very high importance Diversity of Link Sources (links from many unique root domains) 67% very high importance Keyword Use Anywhere in the Title Tag 66% very high importance Trustworthiness of the Domain Based on Link Distance from Trusted Domains 66% very high importance
47. Next 5 Important Factors Keyword Use in Internal Link Anchor Text on the Page 47% moderate importance Keyword Use in External Link Anchor Text on the Page 46% moderate importance Keyword Use as the First Word(s) in the H1 Tag 45% moderate importance Keyword Use in the First 50-100 Words on the Page 45% moderate importance Keyword Use in the Subdomain Name 42% low importance Keyword Use in the Page Name URL 38% low importance
49. On Page Considerations Keyword Use Anywhere in the Title Tag 66% very high importance Keyword Use as the First Word(s) of the Title Tag 63% high importance Keyword Use in the Root Domain Name (e.g. keyword.com) 60% high importance Keyword Use Anywhere in the H1 Headline Tag 49% moderate importance Keyword Use in Internal Link Anchor Text on the Page 47% moderate importance Keyword Use in External Link Anchor Text on the Page 46% moderate importance Keyword Use as the First Word(s) in the H1 Tag 45% moderate importance Keyword Use in the First 50-100 Words in HTML on the Page 45% moderate importance
50. On Page Considerations Keyword Use in the Subdomain Name (e.g. keyword.seomoz.org) 42% low importance Keyword Use in the Page Name URL (e.g. seomoz.org/folder/keyword.html) 38% low importance Keyword Use in the Page Folder URL (e.g. seomoz.org/keyword/page.html) 37% low importance Keyword Use in other Headline Tags (<h2> – <h6>) 35% low importance Keyword Use in Image Alt Text 33% minimal importance
51. On Page Considerations Keyword Use / Number of Repetitions in the HTML Text on the Page 33% minimal importance Keyword Use in Image Names Included on the Page (e.g. keyword.jpg) 33% minimal importance Keyword Use in <b> or <strong> Tags 26% minimal importance Keyword Density Formula (# of Keyword Uses ÷ Total # of Terms on the Page) 25% minimal importance
53. On Page: Non-Keyword Existence of Substantive, Unique Content on the Page 65% very high importance Recency (freshness) of Page Creation 50% moderate importance Use of Links on the Page that Point to Other URLs on this Domain 41% low importance Historical Content Changes (how often the page content has been updated) 39% low importance Use of External-Pointing Links on the Page 37% low importance
54. On Page: Non-Keyword Query Parameters in the URL vs. Static URL Format 33% minimal importance Ratio of Code to Text in HTML 25% minimal importance Existence of a Meta Description Tag 22% very minimal importance HTML Validation to W3C Standards 16% very minimal importance Use of Flash Elements (or other plug-in content) 13% very minimal importance Use of Advertising on the Page 11% very minimal importance
56. Links Keyword-Focused Anchor Text from External Links 73% very high importance External Link Popularity (quantity/quality of external links) 71% very high importance Diversity of Link Sources (links from many unique root domains) 67% very high importance Page-Specific TrustRank (whether the individual page has earned links from trusted sources) 65% very high importance Iterative Algorithm-Based, Global Link Popularity (PageRank) 63% high importance
57. Links Topic-Specificity/Focus of External Link Sources (whether external links to this page come from topically relevant pages/sites) 58% high importance Keyword-Focused Anchor Text from Internal Links 55% high importance
59. Site Wide: Non-Link Site Architecture of the Domain (whether intelligent, useful hierarchies are employed) 52% moderate importance Use of External Links to Reputable, Trustworthy Sites/Pages 37% low importance Length of Domain Registration 37% low importance Domain Registration History (how long it’s been registered to the same party, number of times renewed) Server/Hosting Uptime 32% minimal importance
60. Site Wide: Non-Link Length of Domain Registration 37% low importance Domain Registration History (how long it’s been registered to the same party, number of times renewed, etc.) 36% low importance Server/Hosting Uptime 32% minimal importance Hosting Information (what other domains are hosted on the server/c-block of IP addresses) 31% minimal importance
62. Social Media Related Delicious Data About the Domain or Page 21% very minimal importance StumbleUpon Data About the Domain or Page 19% very minimal importance Twitter Data About the Domain or Page 17% very minimal importance LinkedIn Data About the Domain or Page 15% very minimal importance Facebook Data About the Domain or Page 12% very minimal importance MySpace Data About the Domain or Page 11% very minimal importance