What is the value of a website if no one can find it on the Internet? SEO Houston can optimize your website so that it will rank as high as possible on the search engines. This is called search engine optimization, or SEO. If you are a local merchant, you need local Houston Search Engine Optimization or Dallas Search Engine Optimization. If you sell products worldwide via the Internet, you need global SEO.

The first decision you need to make is: do you want to optimize for the local Houston or Dallas markets or for the global market? We can do both and have had success with both.

Most business is local. Most people shop in their local community. The goal of local Dallas or Houston search engine optimization is to have your website ranked near the top when a potential customer does a search for the product or service you offer, followed by the name of the city or metro area. Some examples: Houston dentist, auto repair Dallas, Dallas real estate, or if you were looking for our company, Search Engine Optimization Houston or SEO Houston.

We can optimize your website for the global market if you can ship your products long distance. If you have an eCommerce website, geography is not an issue. Customers can order online from anywhere in the world.

This assumes you have a website to be optimized. If you need web design we can also design and build your website. Read what Stanford University says about building a website that will have credibility on the Internet .

Houston or Dallas Optimization
Compared to Global SEO

When your website is optimized for the global market, your website is listed when someone does a search for your product, without stating a location. You will be competing against millions of websites all over the world, not just those websites in your local community. If your product is shoes, you must compete against the websites of companies like Nike and Florsheim.

Search engine optimization for a global eCommerce website will cost much more than local Dallas or Houston search engine optimization for an area merchant. Please read our fees page, where we explain the cost of SEO services. Remember that you do not need to sell world wide just because your product can be shipped. Consumers in your local community are much easier to sell to than consumers 6,000 miles away. If you have a limited budget, optimize for the local market until you can afford to compete world wide.

When you are ready to do business on a national or global scale, your SEO consultant should be a professional who specializes in global SEO. It is one thing to optimize a local business that draws its customers from a 20 mile radius; it is a much larger job to optimize a website to play on the world stage. The first question you need to ask your SEO consultant, before hiring him or her, is to name a few sites that he has optimized for the global market. Then go to Google, and type in the search terms (without stating a city) and see where his or her clients rank.

We follow the guidelines set by the search engines. We do not use deception or tricks to inflate your rank. We use ethical SEO. We will always be honest with you about what you can realistically expect from any Dallas or Houston search engine optimization firm. Please call us at (713) 670-6210 in Houston for a free analysis of your website's current search engine optimization.

We are not the only Dallas or Houston search engine optimization company. Consult the highly respected SEO Consultants Directory for a list of Dallas and Houston SEO firms that quality for membership. We hope you will do business with us, but if you select another firm, we want you to know who the good guys are.

Lets understand that any search engine listing could change before lunch. There is no way to guarantee that we can do for you what we have done for other websites. Search results change every few hours.

The Basics

Dallas Website Design and SEO Houston often get phone calls from people who wonder why their website does not get listed in the search results for specific key words. Many times when we look at the website we find and point out that those key words do not appear anywhere on their site. Web designers tend to be very creative, and while they build beautiful websites, many forget the importance of text or have no understanding of SEO.

If you want to be listed as a bank in Houston, you must use the words "bank" and "Houston" in the title, in the description tag, and at least twice in the text, near the top of the page. Do not use the phrase "financial institution" with a beautiful photo of the bank and a great view of Houston. Search engines read text. This is basic SEO.

Search Engines are also getting very good at interpreting text and the wording on your website must sound natural.  If you just repeat your keywords over-and-over chances are that Search Engines will view this as "Keyword Stuffing" and devalue or not rank your site at all for those all important keywords.  The text should be written so that it is clear, concise and easy to understand, without a lot of bloating just for the purpose of  keyword repetition.

Tips and Advice

Many web hosting companies offer services which could harm your search engine optimization. The most common is buying multiple domain names, and "pointing" them all toward one website. The problem is, most search engines consider this to be duplicate content, and can impose a penalty or drop you from the search engine index. There needs to be original, unique content at each domain name. If you move your domain to a new name, use a 301 redirect to notify the search engines that the site has moved and is not duplicate.

Very few web designers understand SEO or know how to do a 301 redirect. They will often tell you it does not matter. They know "lots of people" who point different domain names at a site without any difficulty. We suggest that you find a web designer who has read the search engine's advice to webmasters and knows how to do a 301 redirect. There are instructions all over the Internet.

Do not let a search engine optimization firm sell you or give you a "ranking report" that is computer generated. Google clearly states, on their website, that these automated ranking reports put a strain on their servers, and it is a violation of Google's Terms of Service. Why would any website owner who wants a good search engine ranking buy or sell a report that Google tells you not to use? We strongly suggest following the search engines's rules if you want them to rank your site favorably. This is common sense search engine optimization. We also do search engine optimization for web design firms.

Google gives priority to older, well established domains. If you have a new website, it helps to register your domain for the full ten years. The cost is only $99. It shows stability and demonstrates that you intend to be in business and keep your website on the Internet. Scammers put websites up for short periods of time, and then pull them down. A scammer will register his domain for the shortest period of time. The search engines know this. If your domain is paid for the next decade and your competition has a domain that expires in 90 days, what does that say about who plans to remain in business? All of these factors are a part of search engine optimization.

At the very bottom of this page, there are two icons marked W3C that you can click, to verify that our HTML code passes W3C validation. Some search engines give priority to websites that validate via W3C. MSN has stated that websites "must" validate. The purpose of W3C validation is to have one standard for HTML code that will work on every computer connected to the internet in every nation, and with every browser. When you see a W3C icon, click it, if the code validates you are dealing with a world class company. This will help the website's search engine optimization.

Yahoo and MSN challenge Google

MSN has launched new search technology and Yahoo is the #1 portal on the Internet, but Google remains the number one search engine in the minds of most people. Microsoft is spending several billion dollars on research and development, while Google is working hard to stay ahead. Yahoo has an advantage because AT & T is partnered with Yahoo and offering residential DSL service for just $14.95 per month and all of those users will default to Yahoo for search. It will be interesting to see how this evolves over the next few years, and how search engine optimization may change.

Search engine optimization will make your website a valuable resource for people seeking information about the product or service you sell. It is not enough to simply tell the public that you are open for business. Consumers want to know a little about you. They want to become comfortable with you.

If you are a jeweler, write an article and tell consumers what to look for, and what to avoid, when selecting a diamond. If you do not have writing skills, SEO Houston will interview you and write the articles for your website. This is Internet marketing.

The major search engines index every word of text on a good website, and as a result of good SEO, a well optimized website can appear in different types of search results. One of our clients is a very large home builder, who created informational websites about the communities they build in, giving free information on school districts, church locations, utility companies and other items of interest to people who may be moving to the area.

People moving to any town have a thirst for information about the local community. SEO Houston gives it to them, in an unbiased manner, along with a link to his website and a notation that his home building company provided the informational website free of charge. Some customers who buy homes from his company first found him when searching for other information. This is ethical search engine optimization and good public relations. This is what we get paid to do.

It is important to note that every page was honestly listed and given an accurate title. SEO Houston do not participate in schemes to trick a consumer into clicking on a page that has nothing to do with their search. At SEO Houston we help our clients post accurate information on the Internet, which customers will be searching for, and which will draw customers to our client's business. This is what is called ethical search engine optimization.