Basic guide for self serve Organic Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

This guide is created for (future) web owners, designers or webmasters who are starting or planning to create their own website for personal or business use and want to know about the basics and fundamentals of developing a search engine and user friendly website.

The reason I called this a 'basic' guide, is because of the fact that more and more people want to have their own website, but not always know how to do this. Small business companies, self employed people, mom and dad e-shops are rising every day. Especially for this group I created this basic guide to web success. You don't need a large budget to setup a web service, online shop, or information site. And it is not too difficult to earn money with a successful site. But you must know the fundamentals and you must do the right things in the right order and at the right places.

In this guide you will learn:

(follow the chapter order of the navigation on the left)

• The basic rules of designing a website

• To choose the 'type' of website 'you' want

• The major facts about Search Engine Optimization

• How to choose a domain name

• How to write (optimized) content

• How to choose a web host

• How make your site visible in search engines and web directories

We offer you:

• Free tools for different analyses and (keyword) research

• Information, advice and useful resources that will help you build and promote your web site

Why this basic SEO guide?

Most large commercial companies have a website. Their (IT) organization has or hires employees like, a web developer (back end), web designer (front end), graphic designer (look & feel), Webmaster, site manager, content managers, text-editors, marketing managers and site promoters, or they hire professional web design- and SEO companies. In any way, such companies have better (financial) opportunities to create and promote a website then most individuals or small business companies have. In your case you probably have to to do this all alone, using your single PC, HTML-editor and a graphic software like Photoshop. This means that you need to have a lot of different skills to reach the ultimate goal; 'get a prominent position/ranking in the major Search Engines (SE's)'.

Sounds hopeless? No, it isn't, because if I can do it, you can do it too. I also started once with a personal website and got interested in organic SEO. So I started reading, subscribed to some good SEO newsletters, visit specific SEO forums and read some books about SEO, design, marketing and writing and one of the most important things, I visit and analyze the websites of my competitors. The only problem is (for me it is a challenge) that the development in the 'SEO-world' never stops, you have to keep yourself up with the developments of the major search engines and directories and stay up-to-date by reading prominent articles and regular visit SEO forums. I do that by subscribing to some interesting RSS feeds which I read with my (free) Google RSS reader.

Just remember that all information you need to learn about SEO is free on the web. You only need to know where to find it. And you need some talent to distinguish all these information form what is true and what is not (or what is something in between).

For this reason I have published for you this Basic SEO Guide. With this guide you start what you want: your own website. And in such way, that it can be found in the search engines too.