This will show you how well your website is optimized for search engines.

Search engine optimization (SEO) is a very complex topic that involves many different factors. Since the majority of website access on the Internet is initially via a search engine such as Google, Bing or Yahoo, the optimization of websites in order to be found as quickly and easily as possible in search engines is becoming an increasingly high priority. The position in which a page appears in a search engine depends on many different factors. The fact is that the click rate on the first entry after entering the desired search terms on Google is statistically over 70%. There are many highly frequented websites that get their visitors mainly from search engines such as Google. However, before optimizing a website, the status quo must first be determined to what extent the site is already suitable for good positions in search engines. This article describes how you can do this yourself.

Researching keywords - play "dumb".

Before any analysis, it is important to find out which search terms your website should be found for in a search engine. It is not important to name particularly sonorous technical terms (hardly anyone searches for "indicative degeneration of the establishment according to the principle of successive approximation"), but rather to put yourself in the position of the target group when researching suitable keywords. It is often helpful to assign relatives or employees the task of compiling a list of suitable keywords. You should keep a close eye on the most frequently mentioned keywords after the evaluation and note them down in descending order of priority.

Quick check: Content on your website

In this article, I will initially only discuss the information that is relevant for search engines. In addition, there are other important topics such as legal certainty in order to make the website or online store largely warning-proof - however, these topics would go beyond the scope of this article, so I would rather address other important topics in a later article.

When they visit your website, they should first get a positive visual impression of the site. Obtaining the opinions of third parties also helps here. Now we come to some details. A very important note at this point: Bsearch engine optimization is not just about your homepage, but about all (!) pages. Google indexes each page individually, so the following tips apply to ALL pages of your website.

Onsite optimization

• Title tag - Technical term for the title of your website. The title is the text that is displayed at the top of the title bar of your browser window. The keywords you have written down should appear here as often and as far forward as possible. Do not write more than approx. 70-100 characters in the title. The basic rule is: as few words as possible, but as comprehensible as possible. When writing the text, remember that the page will be read by people and should only be (largely) optimized for search engines. If possible, put the name of your website at the back and the search terms that you think will be most successful at the front.
• Image descriptions - There is a so-called "alt tag" for images that allows an alternative text for images. You can read this text in modern internet browsers when you move the mouse over an image element. If no text appears when the mouse is moved over the image, no alt tag has been set - a pity, because you should use this with a description of the image using important keywords. The advantage of this information for the search engine is that it can index the content of the image in words.
• Link title - A title can be assigned to each link on your website - an important opportunity to include search-relevant keywords. The link title provides the search engine with a better topic-relevant assignment of the link. You can see the link title by moving the mouse over the link. If a text appears in a (usually yellow) text field with your important search terms, everything is OK. If this is not the case, you should make improvements at this point.
• First words on your website - Pay attention to which words are mentioned first on your website. Again, your favorite keywords should be at the top of your page if possible.
• Footer of your website - the footer of your website should once again display the most important links (e.g. imprint, contact etc.) and also contain the most important of your search terms.

The above examples naturally apply not only to the homepage of your website, but also to all subpages. Every single (sub)page of your website is recorded by a search engine and sorted according to relevance. Always remember to use as few words as possible in order to achieve maximum impact. Imagine a search engine giving your site a total score divided by the number of words on the site. Thus, the fewer words on your website, the more weight is given to each word. At the same time, the page must above all be easy to read for the user. So create good content that is easy to understand and written in good German and make sure that your most important keywords are at the beginning of the page content if possible.

Other - The domain age can certainly play a role in the listing of a website, but cannot be influenced. Wikipedia and DMOZ are more of a "nice-to-have" because not every site is included in these portals.

Further SEO measures for your website

This article only deals with a small part of search engine optimization, which should also enable beginners to carry out an initial analysis of their website. However, a complete optimization includes many other factors - both with regard to your website itself (onsite optimization) and external factors (offsite optimization). I will be happy to discuss other search engine optimization topics in subsequent articles. I hope you enjoyed our "first foray" into search engine optimization and would be delighted if you stay tuned to my articles.