Here are some notes I made when I worked for a company that did very well in SEO. This was a few years ago now, so this might be horribly out of date now.
Hygiene factors
- Never expose an error page to Google.
- Never expose an empty page.
- Make sure all content is visible on first page load (e.g. not behind pop ups).
- Show the same content to Google as to users.
- Make sure all relevant content is in the HTML (not loaded dynamically).
- Make sure page load times are good.
Keywords
- Research keywords you need to match.
- Build database of search terms you wish to match, grow and improve this database over time.
- Carefully curate pages, their URLs and metatags to match these keywords.
- Use this database to choose which pages to expose to Google and make sure that all links and pages have the correct follow/nofollow attribute.
- Steadily grow the content you expose to Google over time, keeping the quantity and quality of content on pages exposed to Google high.
Site structure and internal links
- Organise your site in a shallow tree structure. Top level pages should have many links to lower level pages.
- All levels of the tree should have keyword rich content which is useful to users.
- Not every level of the tree needs to be visible in the Google search results, it is mostly to make things easy for the crawler.
External links
- Use PR and social media to generate good backlinks for your site.
- Use social media like reddit, pinterest and others as well as facebook and twitter.
- Do not generate fake backlinks, if Google thinks you are doing this they will give you a severe penalty.
Submit your sitemap
- Submit your sitemap in Google webmaster tools and make sure it is kept up to date at least weekly.
Bounce rate
- Carefully monitor your bounce rate and time on site for users coming from Google as these are key factors in Google rankings.
Click through rate
- Use descriptive and relevant titles and metatags to improve the click through rate from the Google search results to your site.
- PR, social media, advertising and other channels can improve brand awareness that in turn improves click through rate.
- Regularly check a selection of searches that you rank on to assess the quality of your Google search listings.
Hygiene factors
- Never expose an error page to Google. - Never expose an empty page. - Make sure all content is visible on first page load (e.g. not behind pop ups). - Show the same content to Google as to users. - Make sure all relevant content is in the HTML (not loaded dynamically). - Make sure page load times are good.
Keywords
- Research keywords you need to match. - Build database of search terms you wish to match, grow and improve this database over time. - Carefully curate pages, their URLs and metatags to match these keywords. - Use this database to choose which pages to expose to Google and make sure that all links and pages have the correct follow/nofollow attribute. - Steadily grow the content you expose to Google over time, keeping the quantity and quality of content on pages exposed to Google high.
Site structure and internal links
- Organise your site in a shallow tree structure. Top level pages should have many links to lower level pages. - All levels of the tree should have keyword rich content which is useful to users. - Not every level of the tree needs to be visible in the Google search results, it is mostly to make things easy for the crawler.
External links
- Use PR and social media to generate good backlinks for your site. - Use social media like reddit, pinterest and others as well as facebook and twitter. - Do not generate fake backlinks, if Google thinks you are doing this they will give you a severe penalty.
Submit your sitemap
- Submit your sitemap in Google webmaster tools and make sure it is kept up to date at least weekly.
Bounce rate
- Carefully monitor your bounce rate and time on site for users coming from Google as these are key factors in Google rankings.
Click through rate
- Use descriptive and relevant titles and metatags to improve the click through rate from the Google search results to your site. - PR, social media, advertising and other channels can improve brand awareness that in turn improves click through rate. - Regularly check a selection of searches that you rank on to assess the quality of your Google search listings.