Very much a rookie to all off this.

I'm well versed but I need some help from pros

[slappytheking]

I'm helping a friend who has a site that does nothing. It was made with frontpage (and no I'm not using Frontpage for the facelift) and the list of NO-NO's go on and on and on....most of all, on the SEO side of things...

I've read about inbound links, anchor text, relevance, bots & spiders (all of his pages are cached in Google) and now I'm at the point of deployment. I've done my DD on #*$!, I've kept with good keyword phrases outside of the box, navigation is good and clean, no frames, no flash....etc...

But I know there are many things out there that I could do to give the site the best possible chance of ranking well with Google, MSN...etc...

I just need help from experts....I want to help him...

Any kind words or "did you think about...." would be great....

Slappy

[annej]

Have you seen Brett's classic at
[searchengineworld.com...]

[tedster]

I think about deploying new pages as the beginning of a process -- not an end point. Watching the server logs is extremely helpful for finding those long-tail phrases that you didn't plan for, but just might make great pages on their own.

Remember that sites don't rank, but pages do.

[caveman]

> Remember that sites don't rank, but pages do

Hehe. OK tedster...perhaps it's time to have a new discussion on THAT point!? ;-)

[tedster]

When I say "sites don't rank but pages do" I'm really addressing a mindset. Searches return a set of links to PAGES, and visitor's first entry to your site can be on any page at all. This is an advantage to any site that has a good navigation in place, but a disadvantage to an overly controlled website that requires a visitor to start on the Home Page for a "proper" experience.

It's too easy to think of a site in a linear fashion, like a house where everyone comes in through the front door, and close friends might use the back door once in a while. A website is more like a house where visitors can also arrive through the windows, down through the skylights, and up through the drain in the basement floor.

It's easy to resist this fact of web life, but you can plan for it and make it work for you. In the case of using server logs, suppose you find 3 visitors on an unplanned-for search phrase that is relevant -- and by visiting the search engine you see that your accidental page comes in at #9. If you create a new page that is DEDICATED to that phrase, and maybe link it from the page that is already ranking, there's a good chance you'll get a #1 or #2 and see a significant multiplication of that traffic.

You also may see search traffic to a page that does not solidly address the topic that was searched on. And so most of that traffic is what we can call a "one hit wonder" -- they back button out quickly. If you can tweeze out what information these people really want, then giving them that content on a different page may bring you greater value from what seemed to be worthless traffic.

Another way to say it: a site with just a small number of "entry pages" may not be taking full advantage of the medium.