By Monique Martin
As a small business, you can’t afford to miss any opportunity to increase the visibility of your Web site. While there’s some debate over what level of importance Google PageRank has in search result placement, it’s still a factor in their mysterious algorithm. That means that it’s something you simply can’t ignore. Here are 10 tips for improving your Google PageRank.
1. Submit your site to Web directories. Submitting your Web site to legitimate Web directories like Yahoo!, LookSmart and DMOZ gives you quality backlinks.
2. Use your expertise. Join forums and become an editor for Wikipedia. Contribute to these sites without overtly selling yourself or your business. Put a link to your Web site in your profile and signature.
3. Include the URL to your Web site in all of your communications. Make sure your Web site is included in all of your emails, newsletters and even your snail mail marketing.
4. Have quality content. Well-written, topical content gives people a reason to come back to your site. Keep it updated regularly. Google spiders hate stagnant sites.
5. Provide an RSS feed. This makes it easier for other sites to pick up your content blurbs and distribute them.
6. Create a sitemap. Sitemaps help Google spiders find all the pages of your Web site. Make sure you have a link to your sitemap on every page.
7. Send out a press releases and follow-up. This takes some patience and perseverance, but when you have a newsworthy event, let the press know.
8. Get high quality Web sites to link to your site. Do not submit to link farms or “trade links” with random sites; this hurts your PageRank. If you can get a link from a University or government agency, they’re golden.
9. Make sure your code is error free. Bad code will keep the Google spiders away.
10. Keywords. Make sure your content has good keyword density, but don’t stuff. About 3-4% is ideal.
About the Author
Monique Martin served as Chief Operating Officer for a successful online insurance marketing firm for five years.