search-engine-optimization/readme.md

# [Search Engine Optimization (SEO)](http://marcobiedermann.github.io/search-engine-optimization/)

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A helpful checklist / collection of Search Engine Optimization (SEO) tips and technics.

## Table of Contents
* [URL](#url)
* [Accessibility](#accessibility)
* [Meta Information](#meta-information)
* [Keywords](#keywords)
* [Content](#content)
* [Images](#images)
* [Links](#links)
* [Mobile](#mobile)
* [Sitemap](#sitemap)
* [Social Media](#social-media)
* [Tools & Services](#tools--services)

## URL
* **Descriptive URLs:** use a descriptive page url, which should reflect your targeted keyword
* **[Subdomain or subfolder](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_MswMYk05tk):** subdomains are seen as separate domains
* **[Hyphens](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AQcSFsQyct8):** split words using hyphens
* **[www or no-www](https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/44231):** provide both domains, but set a prefered version in Google Webmaster Tools
* **[Localisation](https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/62399):** chookse a country-specific domain, for better local search results
* **[HTTPS](http://googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.be/2014/08/https-as-ranking-signal.html):** Security is a top priority for Google
* **[URL builder](https://support.google.com/analytics/answer/1033867):** Use this tool to add custom compaign parameters to your URLs
* **[File extension](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dSG6C33GwsE)**: do not strip out the file extension on URLs

## Accessibility
* **403:** provide a 403 - Access denied page
* **404:** provide a 404 - Page not found page
* **Robots:** block pages which should not be indexed via the `robots.txt` file or  
`<meta name="robots" content="">`
* **File not found:** avoid `404 FILE_NOT_FOUND` errors
* **Redirects:** Avoid redirects if possible. Use 301 redirect instead of 302
* **[Pagination](https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/1663744):** implement the `rel="next"` and `rel="prev"` attributes to links
* **Moving a website:** redirect all your links to the new location via `.htaccess`
* **Performance:** performance and loading time is important
* **Validation:** write valid code ([HTML Validator](http://validator.w3.org/) [CSS Validator](http://jigsaw.w3.org/css-validator/))
* **[WAI-Aria](http://www.w3.org/TR/wai-aria/):** use WAI-Aria tags to help machines understanding your code
* **[RichSnippets](http://schema.org/):** markup your code with rich snippets, they show up on the search results page
* **[Custom Search](https://developers.google.com/structured-data/slsb-overview):** with sitelink Google Sitelink search box, people can reach your content more quickly

## Meta Information
* **Title:** each page shound have a unique speaking title (60 - 100 characters)  
`<title>Website Title</title>`
* **[Description](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W4gr88oHb-k):** each page should have a unique description (max. 160 characters)  
`<meta name="description" content="">`

## Keywords
* **Single:** every page shound have a single unique targeted keyword
* **Research:** rank for keywords with high traffic and less competition
* **[URL](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rAWFv43qubI):** keyword should appear in URL name
* **Title:** keyword should appear in page title
* **Heading:** keyword should appear in headings
* **Content:** keyword should apear in ~3% of article length
* **[Meta Tag](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jK7IPbnmvVU):** you can ommit the `<meta name="keywords" content="">`,  
search engines do not use this meta tag

## Content
* **Content:** Content matters the most in SEO
* **Headings:** Clear structure `H1` -` H6` max. 70 characters long
* **Strong:** use `strong` tag to highlight your targeted keyword
* **[Uniqueness](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mQZY7EmjbMA):** do not provide duplicated content, use unique content types
* **Length:** article should be at least 300 words
* **Freshness:** new content is important. Updating pages or regulary posting is recommended
* **Flash:** avoid Flash content and flash pages. They are not accessible on mobile phones and will be ranked lower

## Images
* **[File name](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h2SWuUobbr0):** use a short descriptive name
* **[Alt tag](https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/114016):** add an alt-tag this a description of the image (60 - 70 characters)
* **Dimentions:** add the `width=""` and `height=""` attributes to the image
* **[Responsive Images](http://www.w3.org/TR/html-picture-element/):** serve the most optimized image corresponding to the window size
* **Size:** keep the filesize as low as possible
* **[Optimization](https://imageoptim.com/):** Optimize images by removing some meta information

## Links
* **Title:** add the title attribute to links
* **Backlinks:** Only add external links if you got a backlink to your site
* **[nofollow](https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/96569):** add `rel="nofollow"` attribute to external links only to prevent spam and bad links
* **Internal links:** add ~3 internal links to your content
* **Naming:** Use a descriptive link name: “Click here” or “Read more” are bad link text. Better “Read more about SEO and Web Accessibility”

## Mobile
* **Viewport:** tell browsers how to adjust the page's dimension and scaling to suit the device  
`<meta name="viewport" content="width=device-width, initial-scale=1">`
* **[mobile friendly](http://googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.be/2014/11/helping-users-find-mobile-friendly-pages.html):** mobile optimized sites are marked in search results. Test for [mobile friendly site](https://www.google.com/webmasters/tools/mobile-friendly/)
* **[AppLinks](http://applinks.org/documentation/):** apps that link to your content can then use this metadata to deep-link into your app
* **[Tap targets](https://developers.google.com/speed/docs/insights/SizeTapTargetsAppropriately):** clickable links should not be too small

## Sitemap
* **[HTML sitemap](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hi5DGOu1uA0):** An HTML sitemap allows site visitors to easily navigate a website.
* **[XML sitemap](https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/183668):** Help search engines to index your pages
* **[Image sitemap](https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/178636):** Increase that your images can be found in Image Search results
* **[Video sitemap](https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/80471):** Make sure, search engines know about all the video content on your site
* **[Mobile sitemap](https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/6082207):** For feature phones, you can create a mobile sitemap

## Social Media
* **Social Shares:** provide sharing options for your site
* **[Social Profiles](https://developers.google.com/webmasters/structured-data/customize/social-profiles):** add social profiles to your Google search results
* **[OpenGraph](http://ogp.me/):** The Open Graph protocol enables any web page to become a rich object in a social graph.
* **[Facebook](https://developers.facebook.com/docs/sharing/best-practices):** Sharing Best Practices for Websites & Mobile Apps
* **[Twitter](https://dev.twitter.com/cards/getting-started):** with Twitter cards, you can attach photos, videos and media experience to you Tweets
* Authorship information
* **[Google+ Authorship](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FgFb6Y-UJUI):** add Google+ authorship information to your page  
`<link rel="author" href="https://plus.google.com/u/0/[GOOGLE+ ID]">`  or  
`<a href="https://plus.google.com/u/0/[GOOGLE+ ID]" rel=author">Google+ Profile</a>` or  
`<a href="https://plus.google.com/u/0/[GOOGLE+ ID]" rel=me">Google+ Profile</a>` or  
`<a href="https://plus.google.com/u/0/[GOOGLE+ ID]" rel=publisher">Google+ Profile</a>`

## Tools & Services

### Webmasters
* **[Google Webmasters](https://www.google.com/webmasters/):** allows webmasters to check indexing status and optimize visibility ot their websites
* **[Bing Webmasters](http://www.bing.com/toolbox/webmaster):** allows webmasters to add their websites to the Bing index crawler.

### Analytics
* **[Google Analytics](http://www.google.com/analytics/):** generate detailed statistics about a website's traffic
* **[Piwik](http://piwik.org/):** is an open analytics platform
* **[Yahoo Web Analytics](http://web.analytics.yahoo.com):** is Yahoo!’s alternative to the dominant Google Analytics.

### Optimization
* **[PageSpeed Insights](https://developers.google.com/speed/pagespeed/insights/):** Page Speed Insights measures the performance of a page for mobile devices and desktop devices.
* **[feedthebot seo tool](http://www.feedthebot.com/tools/):** displays: domain strength, links, image seo, social counts & mentions, page/technical seo, pagespeed and more.

### Keywords
* **[AdWords Keyword Tool](https://adwords.google.com/KeywordPlanner):** plan your Search Network campaigns and learn what your customers are looking for
* **[Google Trends](http://www.google.com/trends/):** explore Google trending search topics with Google Trends.

### Structured Data
* **[Google+ Snippet Creator](https://developers.google.com/+/web/snippet/):** customize the snippet people see when your page is shared. 
* **[Structured Data Testing Tool](https://developers.google.com/structured-data/testing-tool/):** past in you rich snippets or url to test it
* **[Twitter card validator](https://cards-dev.twitter.com/validator):** Enter the URL of the page with the meta tags to validate
* **[Facebook Debugger](https://developers.facebook.com/tools/debug):** Enter the URL you want to scrape to see how the page's markup appears to Facebook.

### Bookmarklets
* **[OuiSEO](https://github.com/carlsednaoui/seo-bookmarklet):** An open-source bookmarklet that shows you on-page SEO and social meta data information.
* **[SEO Bookmarklet](http://twkm.ca/projects/seo-bookmarklet):** A One-Stop SEO Bookmarklet to Quickly Review On-Site SEO