With all the talk over the latest search engine optimization buzz words, we often forget about the basic necessities for search rankings. Yes, all of those advance techniques work, but only if every effort has been exhausted through the basic fundamental steps for obtaining higher search engine rankings.

I often get questions about all of the advance search techniques and how to implement them. Then I look at the site in question and realize we have a long way to go before we attempt those.

Five Basic (and Easy) Search Engine Optimization Tips:

1. Title Tag – This is still the most important thing that can make a difference in rankings. Others may not agree, but I hold strong on this. To get decent ranking, the title tag must include highly targeted keywords. If necessary to include the company name, put that at the end. Don’t waste that valuable real estate with vanity.

2. Search Friendly URL’s – The URL’s of the site needs to be short and concise. Ideally, they should also include a keyword that is relevant to the content of the page.

3. Quality Content – It is said over and over again, but yet most still do not do it. It’s important for a site to contain quality information. Web editors do not need to focus on writing to please the search engines. If the content is well written and user friendly, then it probably is search-friendly. If not, sprinkle in a few keywords afterwards, do not adjust the content to please search engines. That only makes for an awkward user experience.

4. Link Building – The important word to remember about getting other sites linking to your site is “quality”. Focusing on a handful of popular and related sites helps a site’s popularity a lot quicker than mass link building efforts. It is also not enough to have just a link. The text of the link needs to include highly targeted keywords. A link needs to tell the search engines the keywords that are associated with that link.

5. Site Maps – This is probably one of the easiest things to do, even for a novice. Having one central page that tells the search engines the layout and link structure of a website make a big difference. Using this opportunity to connect highly targeted keywords with specific pages is a great way to give each page it’s own boost in rankings.

Keeping these basic fundamentals in mind search rankings will move up.