Search engine optimization aka SEO is a very hot topic these days. From businesses to individuals, from professionals to naive technology users; everyone wants to dominate the search results for better prospects in terms of visitors and subsequent business opportunities. Everyone claims to know about SEO, but the truth is that not every one knows about it!

The simple definition of SEO - ‘the process of improving the volume or quality of traffic to a web site from search engines via natural or organic search results’ seems to trick everybody. Many people think that just by increasing the search volume will help them achieve top search engine rankings, but this is not necessarily true always! Though it is true that earlier a site appears in the search results list, the more visitors it will receive from the search engine; but the main point is that all the search engines will list the websites depending upon the relevance of the content with the keyword. Also, it may happen that a website may be ranking on the first page for a particular keyword, but after a few days – it sits on the second page. What do you think could be the reason(s) for this?

Well, there are two reasons for this:

1. Decrease in the relevance of content of the website with the keyword being searched, and

2. Change in search engine’s algorithm.

These two factors are very important for a successful SEO campaign. Though, we as SEO practioners have no control on the second option, but we surely can work on the first one. I will try to throw more light on the importance of relevance in my next post.

But till then, I would like to know your thoughts on SEO. The best and the worst part of SEO, what has been your benchmark as an SEO professional?