The competition to get onto the most popular search engines, like Google, is making the process of obtaining a good ranking for a Web site extremely complex and time-consuming. As it is highly specialised, there are only a few companies that are able to assist, and therefore it becomes a costly exercise.
Specialist Web hosting company Waterfront Web has a business model that involves buying bandwidth in bulk. According to director Phil Southwell: "The more we buy, the better the rate we obtain from UUNet - it is therefore both in our interests and those of our clients, to increase relevant traffic to their web sites.
"Quite obviously, if our clients are doing brisk business on their Web sites, their companies thrive and they remain loyal. Therefore in order to make owning a busy site as attractive as possible, we structure our billing charges so that the busier sites pay a decreasing bandwidth rate as their traffic increases.
"We also offer full statistics and analyse visitor browsing and purchasing patterns which allow us to give rapid feedback on the effectiveness of our submissions and marketing campaigns.
"In order to achieve increased relevant traffic to client sites, we have formed New Media Consultants, part of the Ivory Tower Group."
New Media`s role is to research browsing profiles and trends, quantify the popular keywords within a Web site`s target audience, ensure pages are optimised to use these keywords, and ensure the Web sites are search engine friendly.
Finally, when the site is ready and responsive enough to prevent time out by the search robots, the site is submitted to the major search engines.
Southwell warns: "Beware of companies that claim to submit your site to thousands of search engines - 90% of your traffic will come from the top three search engines, the rest will just generate huge amounts of spam.
"Three criteria are essential for good search engine positioning - optimised and relevant key phrases, a content-rich site, and strong linking to other well-ranked sites. These criteria are managed independently of the Web site, using the Content Manager and Site Manager software developed for Waterfront Web by Ivory Tower Internet Solutions."
The modules store keywords and meta-tag records, which can be inserted into pages, and the page performance analysed. These records can be optimised further through a browser by someone independent of the Web developer. This role can be fulfilled by anyone in the client`s organisation who has the appropriate skills, or it can be undertaken by New Media Consultants.
To achieve good listings for multiple key phrases, keywords have to be supported by content. Content management software allows page content to be changed via a browser, so that it can be re-optimised regularly in order to maintain or improve search engine ranking. Using the technique of URL replacement built into part of the Content Management software, dynamic pages - in other words pages generated from a database that are not normally indexed - will now be detected by search engine robots.
"Link exchange programs have proven effectiveness," says Southwell. "We subscribe to best of breed industry programs and provide our own to encourage other Web masters to link to our clients` sites.
"As an example, we have just developed and optimised six satellite sites selling pharmaceuticals internationally that have achieved page one ranking for their most trafficked keywords, through a combination of paid advertising, submission of multiple sites and continuous monitoring.
"Waterfront Web is a professional hosting company for clients who are serious about their Web campaigns. We host nationally and internationally, and provide all the ancillary services to make a site visible and earn its keep!"
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