Search engine optimization

From Computer Science Wiki
Web Science[1]

Search engine optimization (SEO) is the process of affecting the online visibility of a website or a web page in a web search engine's unpaid results—often referred to as "natural", "organic", or "earned" results. In general, the earlier (or higher ranked on the search results page), and more frequently a website appears in the search results list, the more visitors it will receive from the search engine's users; these visitors can then be converted into customers.[2]

White hats and black hats[edit]

In general terms:

  • when you see white hat you should think "ethical, legal, in line with terms of service"
  • when you see black hat you should think "unethical, illegal, not in line with terms of service".
  • when you see grey hat you should think "skirting along the boundary of white hat and black hat".


Black-hat-white-hat.jpg

White hat search engine optimization[edit]

According to Google, these specific strategies are a good place to start SEO:[3]

  • Create unique, accurate page titles
  • Make use of the "description" meta tag
  • Improve the structure of your URLs
  • Make your site easier to navigate
  • Offer quality content and services
  • Write better anchor text
  • Optimize your use of images
  • Use heading tags appropriately
  • Make effective use of robots.txt
  • Be aware of rel="nofollow" for links
  • Notify Google of mobile sites
  • Guide mobile users accurately
  • Promote your website in the right way

Black hat search engine optimization[edit]

According to webopedia[4],

In search engine optimization (SEO) terminology, black hat SEO refers to the use of aggressive SEO strategies, techniques and tactics that focus only on search engines and not a human audience, and usually does not obey search engines guidelines.

Some examples of black hat SEO techniques include keyword stuffing, invisible text, doorway pages, adding unrelated keywords to the page content or page swapping (changing the webpage entirely after it has been ranked by search engines).

Black Hat SEO Usage Black hat SEO is more frequently used by those who are looking for a quick financial return on their Web site, rather than a long-term investment on their Web site. Black hat SEO can possibly result in your Web site being banned from a search engine, however since the focus is usually on quick high return business models, most experts who use Black Hat SEO tactics consider being banned from search engines a somewhat irrelevant risk.

Standards[edit]

These standards are used from the IB Computer Science Subject Guide[5]

  • Discuss the use of white hat and black hat search engine optimization.
  • Suggest how web developers can create pages that appear more prominently in search engine results.

See Also[edit]

This is the guide from google discussing SEO

References[edit]