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The problem with many of the sites is that they're not constructed in a search engine-friendly manner. For example, one site has the most important keyphrase in an image on the page. I really want to have it in an <h1> tag, but that would look ridiculous.
I've changed titles on the pages, but some of these sites are up against stiff competition.
It's tempting to tell the owners of the company to completely re-do their sites, but I know that's not an option.
Does anyone else have this problem?
Also, if the site -- as currently structured -- has little chance to compete longer term, they should know that now. What they do with the information is up to them.
My 2 cents.
SEO goes beyond the H1 tag and there are many other things you could advise them to do, things such as optimising metatags, externally referencing javascripts and proper internal linking, to name but a few...
If you're thinking about meta keywords, meta tags will not help you rank. Well written meta descriptions will help you get more click-throughs if your page does rank, but they're not going to be of much ranking help either.
External javascripts will help your site load faster and maybe get more pages spidered if you have an extremely large site, but that also won't change your rankings.
Good titles are important. H1s do help if they're followed by text the relates to them. The appearance of H1s can be legitimately controlled by CSS, and they don't have to look ridiculous. Internal nav can be very helpful as well.
But, in addition to the above, you need good content and good inbound links to rank for anything competitive, and that will require work and time. You also need to target wisely, to find attainable phrases that actually are searched and will bring in traffic.
You're in an awkward political situation, since your employer the hosting company did a bad job. In my opinion, you do need to work out a politically acceptable way of doing what caveman suggests... of proposing short term real world and long term ideal world approaches.
If you're thinking about meta keywords, meta tags will not help you rank. Well written meta descriptions will help you get more click-throughs if your page does rank, but they're not going to be of much ranking help either.
I was thinking Meta Title and Meta description and they do both help you rank, especially if they're optimised for your targeted keywords and compliment the IB and internal link strategy you adopt.
Externally referencing JS allows you to bring the content closer to the top of the page and also allows the SEs to better spidere your site.
I am Manish Parkar new member of this forum. I would like to suggest you for already designed website :
1) Try to increase internal linking from the pages of
the website
2) Keep hyperlink to your important keywords.
3) Try to add title text to the hyperlink
May be you come across these activities but try to increase your keyword density by using this types of small small techniqes.
I assume that the site is selling something. If you do get the site to rank well in the SERP's, it is not essential (at first) for the site to be "good". Searchers who really do intend to buy only need the basic facts. If the site offers a phone number or the like, then sales will go up. After all people don't require a "good read", or a pretty website, they only need the specific facts they are searching for.
Yes, there is so much more you could do for the site, but getting it visible to the SE's, regardless of its condition - will benefit the client and establish the value of your advice.
I've already been optimizing sites for some time, which is why the owner of the hosting company asked me to help out.
For my own site, as well as others I've worked on previously, I've managed to get first-page results for nearly every term I want. But, with these sites, I also had input into how they were constructed.
It may be that I'll only be able to make a few suggestions to the site owners, and see where it goes from there.
I was thinking Meta Title...
The title element is not technically a "meta tag." It is very important in page optimization, particularly when, as you say, it's used in conjunction with page content and inbound links.
Building the Perfect Page - Part I - The Basics
Developing the perfect balance between user and bot.
[webmasterworld.com...]
But, when a site is poorly constructed, even the title tag isn't going to help. Particularly when competition for the keywords is stiff.
One of the most problematic sites I've been handed is constructed using tables. That's not unusual, but there's hundreds and hundreds of lines of code. There's also 54 internal links on each page. Scroll down through the source code, and you get dozens of lines of rollover links, then a little piece of meat (content). Scroll down another 50 or so lines, and there's another piece of meat. Repeat ten or so times.
The navigation structure is a mess, since you have to go through several steps before you reach the "Acme Widget" page that the site owner wants things optimized for.
