The principals of SEO have been the same since time began. Basically you need to build a large interesting site with relevant content, have an optimised site structure and get as many quality links as possible. All these things together will help you get to the top of the search engines.

This is more important than ever now due to the quality of search engines. When they first began you would probably have to go through several pages of results to find what you were looking for. Now it is unlikely you need to go past the first page to get the product, service or information you want. So saying this, it is absolutely vital that you get in the top 10 of the search results in order to get the visitors you want.

So what is different today that makes the search results so good? Well it is to do with search engines taking popularity into account. The amount of time a visitor spends on your website, the number of pages they visit and whether they come back will all count. The search engines will use this data to determine the best quality websites and will change your ranking based on your visitor trending.

The question is, how do you get people to stay on your website? Well it is fairly simple really. The first thing you need to do is make sure you rank for keywords that are relevant and the searchers will find useful. You also need to make sure your home page catches people instantly. If they leave immediately you will have failed. Make your site informative and interesting and people will use you as a resource. This will also increase your chance of conversions.

On the subject of SEO there are a few other things that you need to take into account. The first one being is that SEO is not a do it and leave it process. Even once you get to the top you need to make sure you continue your efforts consistently. The problem with search engines is they are always looking for new websites, so if others are working on their websites you will need to as well. If not you will quickly see your rankings drop.

In this day and age SEO needs to be part of a marketing campaign and you need to find as many ways as possible to drive people to your site and get them to stay. It is not as simple as it was in the past. Even if you get to the top if you do not use other marketing strategies and be very good at catching people you will see your site drop down.

The basic premise is that SEO is not just a process any longer it is a marketing strategy and anyone that is getting involved in SEO needs to have an idea of the processes but also needs to know about detailed marketing. What keeps people on your website and what drives them to your website. Without this knowledge you will see things slip quickly.