We’ve all heard that search engines love blogs. With frequent updates and relevant keywords, a blog - any type of blog - can be optimized for most search engines. How? Writes Search Engine Optimization expert Lee Odden:

* Consider keywords when writing your blog post titles. Some blog software allows plugins that can suggest keywords. Otherwise, you can use Google Suggest or one of these free keyword suggestion tools: Digital Point, SEO Book or the Google AdWords Keyword Tool Aaron Wall mentioned yesterday. Keywords should NOT determine your content (unless it’s an AdSense blog).

* Optimize the template. Make sure post titles appear in the title tag and append the title tag (hard code) with the most important phrase for your blog.

Example:

“50 Ways To Write a T-Shirt Slogan - Search Engine Journal”
Search Engine Journal is included on every blog post title tag automatically.

Also use the blog post title as the permalink. If you’re using keywords in the blog post title, then they will occur as anchor text in the permanent post link. While you’re at it, just make the post title a permalink.

Read the entire article.

Update: More SEO - “You can never be too rich, too thin, or have too many links.”

Absolutely!

I always advise my clients to write and submit articles to generate traffic and establish expertise in their niche. Fellow consultant Wayne Hurlbert recently blogged about this topic:

By writing and submitting informative and interesting articles, on your topics of interest, free long term publicity for you and your blog are achieved. Articles have a very long life expectancy on other websites. Website owners are constantly seeking fresh and informative content for their own site visitors. Your articles can provide them the content. In return for the free article, your blog or website receives a return link.

It’s not unusual for a long forgotten article to send brand new visitors to your blog. As the reader of the article discovers you and your ideas, the attached link to your blog included with the writing, sends the visitor to find out more.

Here’s a service that will help you write articles, but in my opinion, such services may not be necessary. If you already have a business blog, select a few posts, edited them (shorten/lengthen), add a few more relevant keyword phrases, and submit. Submission sites won’t pay for articles, but as Wayne wrote, your articles could lead to paying assignments. And more customers.

Most bloggers with traffic meters on their blogs have discovered the power of search engines. For some, search engines bring in over half of their visitors, and it’s quite easy to optimize web sites to generate even more.

Mainstream media (MSM) are discovering the power of search engines, which are an important reason blogs are more accessible. Search engine optimization per se is not the focus of the story I link to, but in my view, search engine traffic is partly responsible for the popularity of blogs. From the AFP:

Internet “blogs” get a boost from the big search engines, which make the personal journals more accessible and move them toward mainstream journalism….Previously, search leader Google said it launched an engine tuned to scouring blog entries for fresh news and views.

While blogs have long been frowned upon by traditional media as amateurish, analysts say the public is increasingly looking to blogs for a fresh view on news.

Blogs and traditional journalism are natural enemies, it seems, but as blogs become mainstream, MSM will have to adapt.

Producing a good blog is akin to building a better trap to “catch” more mice. As long as you’re committed to blogging and following a few simple guidelines, you will attract search engine traffic, which may convert to customers.

Blogger Priya Shah outlines what can now be considered universal guidelines for beefing up your blog’s search engine rank:

1. Fresh, Updated, Relevant Content

When you write a good blog about a theme that you’re passionate about and post to it frequently, you’re creating fresh, keyword-rich, content that search engines love.

Let’s say you detail cars for a living, and you have a business blog. Blogging at least three times a week about car detailing in general, your business specifically, and the latest car-washing techniques and products, for example, allows search engines to rank your blog according to similar themes. Depending on how often you update and whether you’re blogging about the most popular subjects in your niche, your site could end up near the top of the results. The more you use specific keywords, the more differentiated your blog will be. For instance, if your business is located in coastal North Carolina, make sure your blog and post contents contain references to that area.

2. Natural, One-Way Links

Search engines view links to your site as a recommendation of your site content. More links pointing to your site or blog boosts your visibility and search engine rankings.

Google gives more weight to natural, one-way incoming links, and blogs make it easy to get two types of one-way links to your site.

One-way incoming links, as opposed to buying links from sites known as “link farms,” will greatly enhance your search engine ranking. Google places greater weight on incoming links from similar sites. For example, a link from a car wax manufacturer to your detailing site is worth more than a link from a mortgage company site.

Read the rest.

Some readers may have questions about search engine optimization (SEO). A series of basic articles about the subject is on my to-do list. In the meantime, visit the Search Engine Watch Blog and Priya’s SEO articles.

Here’s a quick, do-it-yourself method to determine how people are finding your site. A traffic meter is a must-have. Site Meter offers a free web counter that tracks visitors, but I recommend their Standard service at $6.95 per month. With this service, you will have access to search word terms that led visitors to your site and which terms are the most popular.

Signing up for Site Meter may not be necessary if you have the ability to measure site traffic through your current hosting service or blog platform.

Update (7/29): From Inc.com:

Be sure to know your keywords.

Blogs can help customers find your business when they are searching on Google or other sites. Therefore, it’s important to know: What words do customers most often use to find you via the search engines? What words show up in competitor or industry blogs on a regular basis that help place them high in Google’s index? Knowing which words to drop into your posts on a regular basis will help boost your search rankings. “Small businesses get more search engine benefit from blogs than larger businesses,” Campbell says. After all, your marketing budget probably is a fraction of what GE will spend this year. Writing frequently and dropping keywords into your posts to help boost your search standings can go a long way for a business owner on a tight marketing budget. But don’t overdo it. Readers will see right through any obvious attempts at self-promotion.

The blogosphere has grown large enough to justify having its own search engines dedicated to mining the prolific output of blogs of all topics and genres, and not just engines like Technorati. The new medium has become so pervasive so quickly, traditional media, the corporate world, and fortune-hunters of all stripes will spend years trying to catch up.

Business Week has the story:

No, if you’re looking for today’s buzz, the first place to click is a Web log search engine such as Technorati, Feedster, or Blogdigger. By picking up the latest posts, minute by minute, from some 12 million blogs, these sites showcase an ever-changing mosaic of what is on the world’s mind.

TRAFFIC DRIVER. From politicos to ad execs and plaintiff’s lawyers, lots of people are hungry for just that.

Now a surge of traffic to blog search sites has raised expectations that giants Google, Yahoo!, and Microsoft’s MSN may soon plunge into blog search.

Blogs would give them yet another vehicle for the search-based ads they sell. Just as vital, blog search promises to be a big traffic driver as more surfers — some 40,000 to 50,000 a day — take up blogging.

CRAWLING ALONG. The time looks ripe. Industry incumbents appear vulnerable as they struggle to sort through the avalanche of new data pouring into their servers. Adam Hertz, Technorati’s chief engineer, says the company handles 850,000 daily blog postings, up 70% in three months. Adding servers is a snap, Hertz says. But revamping systems to digest all the data “is like changing a flat tire on a moving car.”

What all this portends for search engines like Google and Yahoo! and for businesses in general is anyone’s guess.

Tags: technorati, search engines, and technology.

Americans use search engines more often than telephone books to find information, according to a new study by icrossing, a search engine marketing agency. The study examines why people use search engines and which ones are used the most.

Search engines are the vehicles that drive web traffic. According to the Search Engine Guide, a definitive source for search engine information, between 78 - 84 percent of all web site traffic comes from search engines. Business owners must learn to harness the power of online searches to attract visitors and potential buyers. Static web pages aren’t enough. You need a blog. Why?

Search engines love blogs.

Stay tuned for more Search Engine Madness.

(Hat tip: Lexblog)