Search Engine Optimization involves the search engines, your website and the end users so before understanding what Search Engine Optimization is, lets first understand what Search engines are, how the users use a search engine to find their information and what you need to do to derive the best results for your business from the search engines almost for Free.
Search Engines are software on the Internet that automatically and continuously (24/7/365) collect information about the various websites lying across the world wide web and then saving them onto their own servers. The collected data is then re-arranged in a specific order and provided to the end users through the search engine user interface usually referred as the SERP (Search Engine Results Page). In order to provide the users with exact or very closely matching website pages, the search engines apply 200+ rules while arranging the website information on the SERPs, these rules are generally called as search engine algorithms. Some of the popular search engines are Google, Yahoo and Bing.
It is estimated that more than 80% of all global Internet users prefer to use a search engine for their personal and business requirements. The Internet users search for information about various things like products, services, places, etc. using search engines. While searching they enter the name of the products, services or places as a phrase or a sentence in the search box and click on the search button, the search engine then responds back by picking up those set of records that closely match the users search phrase and diplay them on the search engine results page, about 10 results per page. All this happens in a couple of seconds. The user then checks on the listings and if something suits his needs then he may click on the link and visit the website. In case he does not find the information that he is looking for then he may check on the next page but its very rare instead he will once again type another search phrase or sentence and click on the search button to view the new results. So as you can see its very important to understand that your website should appear within the first 10 results for the search phrase (keywords) that match your products and services, otherwise it would be just a waste of time and resource.
What do you need to do so that your website appears within the first 10 positions of the SERPs for the keywords or keyphrase that match your business products or services?
First you will have to understand how the search engine works, what algorithms does it apply while listing the websites etc. Next you start implementing these set of rules onto your own website. Gradually over a period of time (about 3-6 months) you will see your website appearing within the first 10 positions of the SERPs for your business related keywords or key phrase.
Search Engine Optimization is a process of understanding how a search engine works and then fine tuning your own website as per the requirements of the search engine, resulting in improving the website ranking in the SERPs and thereby attracting more prospective visitors to our website and earning more profit for your business.