Most websites are not built with search engines in mind. Preparing your website prior to submitting to search engines or directories, is vital. By having a solid foundation you will save a lot of time and aggravation. Planning a web promotion strategy is as important as planning your overall business strategy. You don't know have to know everything to get started, but please get the basics down, such as researching the right key terms and optimizing your page content.

Are you wondering where or how to start optimizing your website to get more visitors or even how to get it ready for the search engines before submitting? The foundation to proper SEO or search engine optimization is first developing the most relevant keywords. One way to do this is by using the keyword tools at Google or Overture. Another way is to check what your competition is doing. After that is done, build relevant Meta tags for each page in the web site. Scan through each page and make sure you are using those same keywords throughout each page of the website, where they would apply, by relevency.

Next, build a site map giving the visitors direction to each important area within the site. Then a solid reciprocal link campaign should be put in place with the idea that it’s going to be an ongoing process (as in the rest of the search engine optimization process). It’s more realistic thinking to get links crossing in both directions (reciprocal), if you’re working within a traditional linking campaign. Most people you contact will want a link coming back. The purpose is to have good resources to link both ways, from your web site to relevant non-competitor websites and those websites linking back. I need to warn you here, getting companies to link back is very time consuming and some will never contact you back. Another way to get the right links from other websites is getting listed in industry directories, this can be free to very expensive.

A couple of additional methods is by writing and submitting press leases and expert articles. These are great because they both have relative content and can be placed on your website, providing good additional content. When submitted to a directory they link back giving you a solid link structure which helps ranking. And by adding them to your website you add value to your website, giving your readers something new to consider and it keeps your website fresh. Keeping it fresh is a very important component in the ranking process.

And last but not least, you'll need to have a good method to track your results, including search engine ranking, visitor traffic and other metrics, such as what key terms are driving the most business and which ones are not.