SEO: So Easy A Caveman Can Do It.

SEO: So Easy, A Caveman Can Do It.

Well, I’m no “SEO” genius but I have been doing some reading and research via Google (imagine that) and I have come up with a few helpful tips to increase your search engine rankings.

First, I must post a disclaimer. Try these tips at your own risk. I do not guarantee that they will work. I have tried them myself, and my company’s website found its way to the front page of Google within a week. Do not strangle me if you do not see your site on the front page of Google, but please cut me a check for $100 if it works. I’m kidding….no I’m not. Ok, yes I am.

A little background:
Search Engines send out little programs called spiders. A spider crawls the back-end of your website. The back-end is the actual code (HTML) of the website. You see the pretty graphics and text, but a search engine spider only cares about the HTML.

What exactly does a spider do? A spider sorts through the HTML looking for the title, description, keywords, and relevant content. After crawling a website the spider reports back to a database that will then enter the information into the search engine. So, if a Google spider crawls your website it will report back to the Google database to be posted on Google.com if the right keywords are searched. Makes sense, right?

If a search engine spider is crawling your site looking for the site title, description, keywords, and relevant content, wouldn’t you want to make sure all of those items are in place? I know I would.

The Tips:

For this example we will use a fictional company, Will’s Christmas Lights located in
Fishers, Indiana.


1. First off we will need to title the website. Example: Will’s Christmas Lights: Fishers, Indiana wholesale, retail, and Christmas light repair headquarters.

2. Second, we will want to add a few RELEVANT meta keywords. Less is more. Separate each keyword with a comma. Let’s add: Fishers, IN, Christmas light wholesale, Christmas Light retail, Christmas light repair.

3. Now we need to add a description of the website. Again, make sure the description is relevant and that it utilizes the same words used in the title and keywords of the site. For my example I will use “A Christmas Light wholesaler, retailer, and repair services in Fishers, Indiana”

4. Lets take a look at what we have done so far. We’ve titled, inserted keywords, and described our company while staying consistent with our phrases and making sure all of our content is relevant to our business. Notice we did not clutter our keywords with “Santa, Rudolph, Snow, Gingerbread, Trees, Nutcracker, Stockings, Snowmen, Frosty, Candy Canes, presents, gifts, December 25, sugar cookies” and anything else Christmas related that we could possibly think of. This is actually a BAD idea to add 1,000 keywords. It is the classic example of being an inch deep and a mile wide. If we did this we would be spreading ourselves too thin. I know what you are thinking, why can’t we trick Google? Why can’t I add 1,000 keywords so that when someone searches “Rudolph wants to eat a Gingerbread Cookie” my Christmas Light company comes up? My easy answer is: Why would you want that? Is that even close to being relevant to your company and products? Do you sell any Rudolphs, cookies, or gingerbread? So who cares if your site pops up as a result to that search? Chances are they aren’t looking for Christmas Lights, which is what YOU sell. Spiders actually take one more step to make sure you are who you say you are which is explained in tip 5, so keep reading.

5. After the spider crawls the title, description, and keywords it then moves on to the website’s content. This is where the spider checks that your site’s content actually matches the keywords, title, and description. With that said, we will want to put a small blurb about our company on the main page that relates to the title, description, and keywords. For our example we will put: Welcome to Will’s Christmas Lights! We are conveniently located in Fishers Indiana. We wholesale, retail, and repair Christmas lights.

Pretty straight forward huh? See, it wasn’t as bad as you thought it would be and it actually makes logical sense. So, lets pretend this was a real company. You live in Fishers Indiana, you need Christmas lights this season but you don’t know where to get the best deals. What do you do? You most likely go to Google and type in “Fishers Indiana Christmas Light retailer” Now who do you think Google is going to pull up as being the retailer of Christmas lights in Fishers Indiana? I rest my case.

I must also tell you that this is barely scraping the surface of SEO, but it’s a good surface to scrape. Do not expect to see immediate results. Search Engines do not hit your website every day with spiders. It took Google a week or so to crawl my website with my new SEO in place. I used to be MIA when you type in Fishers Web Design on Google…go try it and see where I come up.

Good Way:
Title: Will’s Christmas Lights: Fishers, Indiana wholesale, retail, and Christmas light repair headquarters.
Keywords: Fishers, IN, Christmas light wholesale, Christmas Light retail, Christmas light repair
Description: A Christmas Light wholesaler, retailer, and repair services in Fishers, Indiana
Content: Welcome to Will’s Christmas Lights! We are conveniently located in Fishers Indiana. We wholesale, retail, and repair Christmas lights.

No So Good Way:
Title: Untitled (which is the default title if left untitled)
Keywords: snow, Christmas, lights, Christmas cookies, Rudolph, santa, clause, santa clause, trees, Christmas trees, candy canes, gummy bears, presents, gifts, stars, frosty, snowman, reindeer, Mrs. Clause, old saint nick, December 25, etc. etc. etc.
Description: A website that sells Christmas lights. Created with AOL Page Maker on March 23, 2006. We have a great selection! Come see us!
Content: Welcome to our website. We love when you purchase our products!

SEO EXPERTS: FEEL FREE TO ADD, CORRECT, OR EXPLAIN ANYTHING. I AM NO EXPERT.

Please visit willhardison.com to see the HTML examples of the title, keyword, and description codes.