When you build a website, it's vital to make sure you use good SEO practices. But unless you know what good SEO is, you will be missing out on huge number of visitors! Here are some beginner's tips for search engine optimisation.

Make sure your pages include vital SEO concepts. These include providing good content that is relevant to your desired search keyword, without resorting to methods such as keyword stuffing. Basically, if people would find your site to be highly useful for your desired keyword phrase, you're probably doing a decent job at on-page SEO already. Almost every piece of on-page SEO advice you will find is about making your site easy to navigate (such as through site maps and breadcrumb navigation) or including good content.

Make sure your website URL is search-engine friendly. If possible, your domain name should include your desired search keyword. Pages within your site should have file names that reference the content of your page. For example, if your site sells dog food, your domain might be bestdogfood.com. A page within your site about the benefits of organic dog food could then be bestdogfood.com/organicfood_benefits.html. These URLs receive a higher rank by search engine algorithms and also benefit human users.

Make a social media presence for your site. This will have the direct effect of driving people from the social media site directly to your webpage. It will also increase the number of backlinks to your site. Every time you post something from your social media account and include a link to your site, the number of relevant links to your site increases. The more good links you have, the higher the search engines will rank your site. Social media is a great, inexpensive way to build these links.

Use article marketing to build your search engine rankings. Article marketing means writing articles on topics that are relevant to your web site, and then posting them on other websites. Include a link to your site and an author bio with each article. Everyone wins with article marketing, because the site that uses your article gets a piece of new content, and you get a link back to your site that is surrounded by quality, highly-relevant content.

Consider hiring an SEO consultant. If you are new to online business, you may miss out on valuable opportunities. An SEO service can help boost the rankings of your site by capitalising on things you might miss, especially as a beginner. However, do remember that no one really knows what the search engine algorithms are doing, and so no SEO firm can guarantee a higher ranking. Also, research the reputation of any SEO firm before you hire them, and know what "black hat SEO methods" are. If your consultant recommends anything that could be considered "black hat", you need a new consultant.

SEO doesn't have to be confusing or complicated. Even as a beginner, you can successfully optimise your site and start seeing more traffic soon. Use the tips in this article as a springboard for your new online business success!