Good search engine optimization (SEO) in Walnut Creek is not always as simple as one might think. You may be surprised at how hard it can be. Here are some things to remember when you are optimizing your site for search engines.

You will want to select a name for your company or organization that is unique. Check search engines for the names you are considering before you make your final decision. Using the name of your city as a major part of your business name may sound like a great idea, until you look it up online. It may be that most of the businesses in the area did the same thing. When you have chosen the perfect company name, purchase a domain name using the company name, if at all possible.

Once you have your domain name purchased, create a website that explains your company and its products and services thoroughly. Include your chosen search terms in your content. Be sure to define the page in the description meta tag, and use alt text in your image tags – using search terms there, also. You do not want to stuff keywords, and the meta tag for keywords is often ignored by search engines, so it will not hurt to use 6-8 in it. Unfortunately, it may not actually help, either. Use your chosen keywords in the content on the page 3-4 times, including once near the beginning of the page and once near the end.  Make sure the content is quality information people will want to read, for best results.

Add a blog. A blog is an excellent way to keep your website fresh and add quality content regularly. Be sure the blog is part of your website, and not hosted on the blog software’s site, as the latter will not help your SEO efforts. Plan to add at least one new post a week. If you have time to write a lot of posts now, but probably will not later, then you can write them and set them to post automatically at set intervals. Use your keywords in the titles of the posts, and make sure they directly relate to your company, its products, or its services.

Inspire traffic. The more people that visit – and share links to – your site, the better your SEO ranking is likely to be. Tweets that encourage visitors to read content on your site are a good tool for this purpose. People click through to read the information you advertise, and they will often continue to look at other areas of the site. Other social media platforms may have similar results.

Use a sitemap to make all pages accessible, both to search engines and to visitors. If a page is hard to find, it will necessarily have less traffic. Google and most other search engines recognize Sitemap Protocol 0.9 which was introduced by SiteMaps.org, in case you are curious or want to learn more.

These tips are sure to be helpful to your SEO efforts. It is equally important to remember, however, that SEO in Walnut Creek is not a one-time prospect, but an ongoing task.