Understanding SEO Campaign Strategies pg 1 of 4 Revision C-08/02

Understanding SEO
Campaign Strategies
Introduction
Many companies are engaged in Search Engine Optimization (SEO). Although their performance claims are nearly all the same,
the strategies each use may be significantly different and produce varied results. Understanding these different strategies is
fundamental to choosing your SEO Company.
An SEO campaign may be broken down into 6 basic functions.
1 & 2 Strategic Analysis Analysis of optimal theme-words & link structure of competing sites
3 Link Optimization Add relevant external inbound links and outbound links to and from
other websites
4 Page Optimization Optimization using theme-words for high ranking
5 Results reporting Report on the ranking results and campaign status
6 Analyze & Revise Analyze results and revise tactics to maintain or improve positioning.
With a little understanding of the different strategic approaches and a few specific questions, you can
gather the information you need to make an informed choice. Consider these questions to evaluate your SEOs strategies.
What kind of SITE ANALYSIS is conducted?
Site analysis is the cornerstone of all SEO campaigns. This analysis is necessary to determine:
Theme-words The site theme as represented by specific and focused theme-words, and phrases that users are likely
to type into a search engine to find websites that match your products and services.
Links The number of relevant inbound and outbound links to attain in order to compete with top ranked
websites already positioned for a target theme.
Choosing the wrong theme-words can be devastating to an SEO campaign. In the most extreme cases, the wrong theme-
words will produce good ranking but very poor traffic or the wrong kind of traffic. The choice of theme-words also relates to the
competitive environment for that space. The more competitive, the stronger the page and link campaign must be to achieve
top ranking.
Example: analysis indicated a minor change in site theme-word from "stopping foreclosure" to "stop foreclosure"
increased the hits of highly qualified viewers from 387 to 4,128 per month.
Relevant inbound links complement and significantly strengthen a websites theme. By analyzing the link structure of top
ranked competitors, the number of relevant inbound links to include in an SEO campaign can be defined.
What kind of inbound LINK OPTIMIZATION will you use?
Free, web-rings or
non-relevant links
This strategy consists of obtaining links from other websites that may have little or no common theme to your
site.
Advantage Disadvantage Commentary
Low effort and easy to
attain.
Websites with non-relevant inbound links produce
little or no ranking improvement. Furthermore, they
do not build long-term traffic because visitors using
these links are likely to have little or no interest in
your subject matter.
The strategy used to be very popular and produced
good results, but current search engines can test for
relevance. There is new evidence from the search
engines that suggest these links are harmful to a sites
ranking and some may result in site banning.
Relevant links
This strategy consists of obtaining relevant links from other websites that have a similar or common theme to
your site.
Advantage Disadvantage Commentary
The newer search engines
consider relevant links one
of the most important off-
page factors in judging a
sites ranking.
Obtaining relevant links that are consistent in
theme to your site but not directly competitive
requires significant effort and expertise.
In addition to influencing search engine ranking, it has
strong long-term benefits. As the number of inbound
relevant links increase, search engines consider the
website more of an authority for its specific theme and
assign higher ranking. Building a strong relevant link
structure can in of itself produce a significant number of
site visitors who are interested in your products.

Understanding SEO Campaign Strategies
Understanding SEO Campaign Strategies pg 2 of 4 Revision C-08/02
What kind of PAGE OPTIMIZATION will you use?
Doorway pages
This strategy is considered an older method of manipulating search engines. It includes the creation of pages
that are optimized and submitted to the search engines to serve as a doorway into the website. Although
the definitions of doorway pages vary, traditionally, they share a common construction strategy: outbound
links point to real site pages; very few (if any) inbound links.
Advantage Disadvantage Commentary
The single advantage is
that this strategy does not
require adjustment to
visible content on the site.
Doorway pages suffer from several disadvantages:
1. The look and feel of these pages may not look
like they belong to the site.
2. Typical doorway pages only have outbound links
to real site content - few (if any) inbound links to
doorway pages mean lower value.
3. Special attention must be given to assure that the
theme of the main site is consistent with a theme
created by doorway pages.
4. Doorway pages are not spidered on a routine
basis if they lack inbound links, therefore,
constant submissions may be required.
5. Doorway pages do not add value to visitors.
Popular search engines place a higher emphasis on
pages that have several inbound and outbound links.
Since doorway pages have no or few inbound links,
they receive lower ranking.
Altavista publicly states that doorway pages are
considered SPAM, and if detected, will drop the site
from its index.
Doorway pages are often filled with many keywords
and do not offer value to the visitor. Therefore visitors
are less likely to visit the main pages of the site which
can decrease site popularity and lower rankings in
directories such as Yahoo and AOL that measure
popularity.
Site pages
Optimization of site pages requires modification of visible and invisible text.
Advantage Disadvantage Commentary
This strategy produces
optimized pages for a
focused and consistent
theme through the site. If
additional content is
needed to support theme
strength, there will be more
content for visitors to view.
Producing optimized pages on a website does
require adjustment to visible content of the site
proper. This usually requires a higher level of effort
to maintain good readability while maintaining
strong optimization. Some search engines can not
effectively spider frame-based or dynamic sites.
Optimization of the site content is considered the best
way to optimize for focused and consistent themes.
Unlike doorway pages, the strategy does not
compromise site theme integrity, but requires content
adjustment. Theft of optimized site content is reduced
significantly because the content is visible.
Visitors that stay longer also influence rankings in
Yahoo and AOL.
Trusted Feed (XML)
Offers a method of indexing website pages that are dynamically produced for websites with over 500 pages.
Advantage Disadvantage Commentary
This strategy is available
for Inktomi, FAST, Teoma,
and AltaVista and offers a
way to index large sites
with non-search engine
friendly pages.
Trusted feed programs are pay-per-click models.
Depending on the search engine and category,
clicks range from $0.25 to $0.60. These programs
appear to be much more expensive than traditional
Search Engine Optimization strategies. The most
popular search engines do not support this strategy.
These programs involve placing meta-information into a
search engine database and thereby eliminating the
need for spidering. This meta information is used in the
search engines ranking algorithms. Meta information
need not represent the true page content; therefore,
some may consider it closely related to cloaking.
Cloaked pages
This strategy employees special software that can detect the difference between a visitor and a search engine
spider. The visitor sees the normal site or public pages but the search engine is given special or private
pages that have been optimized.
Advantage Disadvantage Commentary
Cloaked websites do not
require adjustment to
visible content but still
achieve good rankings.
Higher ranking can be
achieved by creating
unique page-sets for better
optimization for each
search engines
algorithms.
Since cloaking can be effectively used to disguise
the true intent of a website, some search engines
publicly denounce its use (eg. Google). Although
proper uses of cloaking are considered acceptable,
there is a remote risk of being banned by a search
engine. Lastly, good cloaking software is costly
(~$1,000).
Since search engine spiders cannot easily read the
content of pages that are frame-based, dynamically
produced from a database (eg. CGI pages), or pages
with intense graphics, cloaking offers the only practical
approach.
Theft of optimized cloaked pages is very difficult
because these pages are not visible to normal website
browsers.
What RESULTS will you measure during the campaign?
There are many types of reports, but for the most part these reports can be segmented into 5 basic groups.
Ranking Reports
List all theme-words by search engines, and their respective ranking. The better reports include ranking
for root and branch pages.
Original Ranking
Reports current ranking compared to ranking prior to the SEO campaign for each theme-word.
Submission Reports
Lists the last time submissions were made to each of the search engines. The better reports included
specific submission information to the directories.
Link Report
Lists all new external inbound links from other websites and external outbound links to other websites.
Maintenance Report
Journals all activities associated with an SEO campaign.
Understanding SEO Campaign Strategies
Understanding SEO Campaign Strategies pg 3 of 4 Revision C-08/02
More relevant inbound
links strengthens
a sites theme
No. of relevant links
T
h
e
m
e

S
t
r
e
n
g
t
h

Relationship between number of
relevant inbound links and theme
strength
One focused theme
More themes reduce
theme strength
and website focus
Themes
R
a
n
i
k
n
g

Relationship between number of
Website themes and site ranking
More keywords reduce
theme strength and
website focus
Number of keywords
T
h
e
m
e

S
t
r
e
n
g
t
h

Relationship between number of
keywords and theme strength
How will you REPORT these results?
The industry makes SEO campaign REPORTS available in 3 methods.
Web access (real time)
This method allows for 24/7 access from any Internet browser. The best reporting systems allow you to
check ranking by historical date for trend analysis.
Web access (monthly)
This method allows for 24/7 access from any Internet browser but only includes ranking for one day
during a monthly period.
Email reports (monthly)
An email is sent which includes a static report for one day during a monthly period.
What kind of work is done during the MAINTENANCE period?
Optimization work continues long after the optimized site is launched. The continued areas of effort fall into 4 basic categories.
Analysis and revision of
page optimization
The competitive environment is a moving target. To maintain top ranking, SEO Analysts must evaluate
the RESULTS and make tactical modifications based on performance observations.
Adaptation to search
engine algorithm
changes
Search engines are constantly modifying their ranking algorithms. It is not unusual to see several
changes each year for each search engine. These changes must be identified and analyzed for
continued top ranking.
External link structure
maintenance
Over time, websites change their design. These changes can affect or otherwise break inbound or
outbound external links which can adversely affect website ranking.
Continued submissions
to search engines
Over time, search engines clean house. Those without any links from other websites are commonly
dropped. Sometimes pages are dropped inadvertently. Whether purposely or not, search engines must
be monitored continually to be sure website pages are properly indexed or resubmit pages that have
been dropped.

Common Principles of Search Engine Optimization
1. Directories and Search Engines are different. Directories use humans to initially
judge the acceptability of a website who then produce their search results in a list with
the more popular sites first. Search Engines use computerized algorithms to
determine a websites theme and strength for ranking.
2. 3-6 theme-word phrases are considered typical when trying to maintain a strong
focused theme.
3. There is an indirect relationship between keyword popularity and competition.
Usually, the more popular a keyword, the more competitive the space is for
websites.
4. The more competitive a keyword space, the stronger a site theme must be, and the
more important relevant inbound links will be to compete with established websites.
5. Relevant inbound links from other websites with a common theme produce short term
ranking improvements and long-term traffic benefits.
6. Website theme strength comes from a combination of:
o page optimization (more optimized pages increases theme strength)
o relevant inbound link optimization
7. Websites with:
o Intensive graphics
o Frame-based designs (Google can read some pages)
o Dynamic page (database driven) (Google and Intomi can read some pages)
are not search engine friendly and may require a cloaking strategy.
Understanding SEO Campaign Strategies
Understanding SEO Campaign Strategies pg 4 of 4 Revision C-08/02
Check List
Use this section to compare Position Research SEO campaign strategies against others.
SEO Campaign Element
Position
Research
Other 1 Other 2
Strategic Analysis
o Optimal theme-word
o Optimal link structure (inbound and outbound)
Link Optimization
o Free or non-relevant links
o Relevant links
o How many inbound links will you obtain links links links
Page Optimization
o Doorway pages Optional
o Site pages Standard
o Trusted Feed (XML) as required
o Cloaked pages as required
o How many pages will you optimize pgs. pgs. pgs.
Results reporting (kind)
o Ranking reports
o Original ranking
o Submission reports
o Link report
o Maintenance report
Results reporting (accessibility)
o Web access (real time)
o Web access (monthly)
o Email reports (monthly)
Analyze & Revise
o Analysis and revision of page optimization
o Adaptation to search engine algorithm
changes

o External link structure maintenance
o Continued submissions to search engines
Ancillary Services
o Domain registration
o Corporate hosting plan
o Web based e-mail plan
o Corporate traffic reporting
o Website maintenance plan
o Website design services
o Search Engine Optimization consultation
services

o Programming services
Java script (client & server side)
PHP, PERL, web enabled Db (SQL)