I’ve become obsessed by SEO.  No, it’s not anything to do with Milan, Italy, Italians or food.  Its to do with web stuff and stands for Search Engine Optimisation (or Optimization by people who are American or people who don’t realise that the correct spelling in English is with an “s” and not a “z” – you see, having been an English teacher for over a year has, somewhat, coloured my ideas about the English language and spelling, etc.)

Anyway, back to SEO.  Now, considering I’m now a Project Manager for an Italian company, why on earth would I still be interested in Web stuff?  Well, I just can’t escape it and I have some customers who are even more interested in it than I, so it’s become a bit of a passion.

Those of you not in the computer business probably never think about why, when you type something into Google you get a list that changes most times you enter the same words.  Or why one page appears above another.  And how many pages of the search results do you look at?

Apparently, most of us look only at the first page, some at the first few pages, but that’s about it.  If we can’t find what we’re looking for pretty soon, we tend to try a different search.

So, if your website doesn’t appear on the first, let’s say, 3 pages, you will never be found by general browsers.

Even worse, if you’ve had to pay a few grand to get your site up and running and it doesn’t appear on page 1, you could get a bit cheesed off, to say the least.

So, my author friend N, whose website I wrote (with the help of my friends from Pigreca), has his site which initially (after being there for several weeks) disappeared from Google (even when you type in the full web address in the search box), gets a little worried that his new, all-singing, dancing, flash site appears to not exist in Google (rightly so, IMHO).

I, of course, understanding very little at that stage, am very worried.  I send messages to Google, search their sites for help, even contact the people I use to host the site, just in case its a problem with them.  Google, of course never reply!  My hosting company suggest that it’s because I haven’t got any links TO the site (i.e. no websites are saying go to N’s homepage from HERE) and there are a plethora of companies offering SEO for a fee (which, of course, I can’t possibly afford).

So, after a few weeks of trying to do things – adding meta tags on the pages (which most people say are a waste of time ‘cos Google doesn’t count them), trying to get N’s mates to add links from their sites (which Google can’t seem to see anyway after 6 months!), adding a sitemap through Google (which may or may not be something worth doing – the jury’s out on that one) and various other things, Goggle, after a few weeks, suddenly re-find the site, and everyone is happy (or in my case, breathes a sigh of relief).

And then, from time to time, N has the question – why am I suddenly on page 5 when the last time I looked I was on page 1.  Again, no straightforward answer because Google does it’s own thing and keeps the actual method secret (although it does give you tips).

I do wonder how these SEO pay-for people do it.  There are some things that I do now, which do seem to help.

1. I add the site to ‘my sites’ in my Google area.
2. I add a sitemap, which tells Google when and what to look for (although they obviously ignore it on the most part).
3. I make sure that I put the ‘keywords’ into a meta tag (because it does seem to help).
4. I try and change the site often (Google seems to like this).
5. Get your site linked from other sites.

And, finally, something I learnt the other day, which does really seem to work, although it is time consuming is to

6. Search Google for the terms that you think most people will look for and then go through the search pages until you find the site you want to ‘promote’.  Make sure you enter it (and maybe go to some of the other pages on the site).

It’s a strange thing.  When N said, the other day, that his site was page 5 or whatever, I searched through and, sure enough, it was on page 5.  However, after searching again it was number 2 in the list?  Coincidence, I thought.  So I asked V to search for it and, again, it was number 2.  So, I thought, ah, Google recognises where the query came from and automatically places the results in the same order.  So I tried it from work and, lo and behold, it was the second website in the list again.

So now, I go in most days and search and enter the site to keep it in that position (if that’s the reason).  I tried it on V’s sites and the Vanda site moved from page seven to page four after 2 days!  So I think it does have an effect.

So now I’m thinking about setting up a company where you do SEO and have an army of numbnuts searching Google all day for the sites that you want to promote!  You give them the terms and they spend all day searching and clicking on the sites.  Interesting idea, but I’m only joking really (or maybe not!)