You are probably already used to reading blogs since they are popular and widespread on the internet. Blogs on virtually any topic can be found online--from technical information about computer programming to daily posts from the war front in Baghdad. Some search engines (like Clusty for example) even offer search services that specialize in blog content.

One thing the many diverse blogs on the web have in common is that they can all benefit from the fundamentals of search engine optimization (SEO). Good SEO practices will help the valuable content in these blogs achieve the high search engine rankings they deserve. Each blog manager should strive to educate those that are authorized to publish on the blog about SEO practices.

Here is a list of techniques that should be considered when publishing blog content:

• Keywords
  Identify a central keyword of phrase that captures the essence of the article. Use the keyword or phrase several times throughout the text. Try to place the keyword or phrase in the following areas of the document:
  
  
  
  • Title tag
    
  • Heading tag
    
  • Meta Keyword tag
    
  • Meta Description tag
    
  • Link text
    
  • Link URL
    
  • ALT tags for images
    
  
  It's important to make sure that your blog articles contain enough content. Search engines favor pages that have at least 300 words in the body (but this number can vary from engine to engine). WebPosition's Page Critic feature is an excellent tool designed to help ensure your keywords are present in the relevant page areas and that your content length is sufficient.

• Linking Structure
  Create good internal linking structure for the blog. For most web sites, a site map makes it easy for search engine spiders to index their content (read this article for more information about site maps). However, since site maps do not apply to blogs very well, a good approach it to use a template that contains links to all of your major category pages on the home page and if possible every page of the blog.

• Good Web Site Design
  Make sure the blog template and all published articles have well formatted HTML code. Search engines can have trouble indexing your web pages if there are errors in the HTML code. It's not always obvious if your code has errors because web browsers often display the page normally even when errors are present. A good way to check your code is to use an HTML validator like this one provided by W3C. Read this article for more information about the importance of HTML validation.

• Stick to the Blog Theme
  When publishing articles in the blog, it's important to keep the topics within the general theme of the blog as a whole. Search engines will give better rankings to sites that present information relevant to a specific central theme.

• Do not Violate Search Engines' Terms of Service
  You should avoid any practice that violates a search engine's terms of service such as duplicate content, hidden text, or redirected pages. Read this article for an overview of practices you should avoid.

• Work on Link Popularity
  Search engines measure the number of other web sites in their database that link to a particular site. The absolute number of links to your site is not as important as the quality of those links. Try to cultivate link enchange relationships with popular and authoritative sites in your topic area. For more information about Link Popularity, read this article.
  

Conclusion
Like any web page, a blog article will be evaluated by search engines to determine that page's ranking for keyword searches. To achieve good rankings, it's important to put good SEO techniques into practice when publishing articles on your blog. With a little effort, web sites can take advantage of the excellent information in their blogs to help boost the ranking of their web site as a whole.

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