What is SEO?

Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) refers to a variety of techniques applied to a website in order for it to appeal more to search engines and result in higher rankings in search results.

SEO is divided into to main areas; On Page Optimisation and Off Page Optimisation. On Page Optimisation refers to refining and improving the content of the website by increasing usability and relative information. Off Page Optimisation refers to a comprehensive link building strategy, development of social media resources, search engine and directory submissions, blogs and forums.

Ethical SEO Techniques

Ethical Search Engine Optimisation is an SEO campaign which works with search engine protocols rather than trying to deceive or manipulate them. Unethical SEO practices are commonly know as "Black Hat SEO Techniques". These methods are devised to deliberately fool the search engines into ranking a website or page well regardless of whether it offers anything valuable to the searcher or not. Such techniques as keyword / meta tag stuffing can incur heavy penalties from certain search engines and could even result in bans.

At Asterix Solutions we only use ethical SEO techniques, because not only does it work with search engines to produce a better web searching experience for all, it means that users get the most valuable and relevant results for their searches.

On-Page Optimisation Techniques

To ensure an extensive on-page optimisation process we analyse every element of your website that could potentially result in a negative search engine listing.

Critical Issues

• Check for and fix broken links - All 404 errors will be removed or redirected.
• Identify and remove/nofollow external links.
• Create XML and HTML sitemaps to improve site crawling and also usability.
• Check for and fix all W3c validation errors to ensure that your website is W3c compliant.
• Check for web hosting location.
• Submission of your website to the top 20 search engines.
• Check for web hosting location.

Website Improvements

• Adjust meta tags (title, keywords, descriptions) to focus on the target industry.
• Add user friendly optimised content.
• Adjust/create SEO friendly headings. (h1, h2, h3 etc).
• Optimise image alt tags.
• Optimise internal linking on site keywords.
• Check for/remove duplicated content.
• All work completed on test url for sign off or in report format.

Off-Page Optimisation Techniques

An important area of SEO is improving a websites natural linking profile in order to build the domain authority of a site. Domain authority is determined by the number of backlinks a site has from other relevant sites that provide information about a particular subject. The more relevant backlinks a site has generally sees them rank higher for particular terms so the goal here is to build on the number of relevant links by the following linking methods:

• Article submissions
• Directory submissions
• Social media submissions
• Themed PageRanked links
• Blog comments
• Press Release Submissions

At the start of all search engine optimisation projects we would review a client's full linking profile to establish the shortfalls in comparison to the client's competitors who are on page one for the main target keywords. Depending on the clients current linking profile we would then set out an off page monthly workflow plan in order to increase the client's backlinks.

Each project is reviewed on an individual basis to determine the best methods to apply to each project so that, from an off page perspective, all steps are taken to increase a website's linking profile. After the first few months of the off page strategy has been implemented each project is then reviewed to determine the effects of the work done so far and to re-assess the client's linking profile in comparison to their competitors to ensure the right amount of off page work is being done in order to compete with the competitors on page one.