10 Tips to doing your OWN damn SEO

Soon after starting a small business, I was faced with several dilemmas. The first was how best to advertise my business. After all...no exposure/ no business! The second was, after I realized what I needed to do, how to go about it?
Anyone with a business knows that the internet is the first place that most people search when they need products or services. The Yellow Pages are a thing of the past. Personally, I use the Yellow Pages to supplement my height in my computer chair. Everything has a purpose.
Knowing that your customers will search the internet FIRST, would you dare start a business without a web presence? I think not. Consumers look for your website online, as if finding it will prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that Joe's Diner does indeed exist.
Long story short, I ponied up a few bucks for a web site. It was cheap enough (to rent a hunk of internet real estate), but what to do now? I had absolutely zilch knowledge of how to set up a web site. Nineteen years of building log cabins, renovating homes, raising kids and driving the big rigs had apparently dulled my website-building-skills, assuming you're born with that ability. The jury is still out on that. Nor did I have a few hundred bucks to pay someone to set up my site. So I had two choices....wing it on my own, or drink wine. I chose both.
After turning out every drawer in my desk, I found the username and password to my site. Small victory, but I thumped my chest, nevertheless. I was the MAN.
I thumbed through the templates with apprehension. Hmmm...pre-fab or blank template? The pre-fabs were pretty, with funky patterns at the top, cool navigation bars, the whole 9 yards. But this was a business site. Was pretty required? I opted for the blank template....after all, I had managed to log into the control panel of my site, so I could do this. I chose a business-like side navigation template and hunkered down with a bottle of red zinfandel.
Once the template appeared on my screen, I froze like a midget in the NBA Finals. What to do now? And what the hell was an H1 tag, a meta-description and WYSIWYG? Good Lord. I was in deep.
Resisting the urge to wake my 14-yr-old for technical advice, I forged on. Turns out that WYSIWYG means "what you see is what you get". Who'd have thunk it? In retrospect, I appreciated the host server for making it so obvious, but it made me doubt my sitebuilding skills, nevertheless. Funny how a simple acronym can make you feel so stupid. And I was only on my second glass of zinfandel....it was gonna be a long night.
I managed to title my pages, fill them with text that I had written out beforehand, add groovy links and color my background. Indeed, I was mastering this website thing like a pro. Not even the "you smell like wine" as I crawled into bed could temper my enthusiasm.
Over the next few days, I proudly supplied my friends and family with the link to my site. Of course, they all visited it and gave me their glowing feedback. "Great site!". The website hits piled up, and I was sure I had a winner.
Then a funny thing happened. Nothing. I went from lots of hits to no hits on my site, seemingly overnight. Maybe I misunderstood, but I was relying on the "if you build it, they will come" strategy. So where were all my customers?
Doing a little research into the matter, I discovered SEO. That's search engine optimization for those of you who aren't as acronym-savvy as myself. As it turns out, SEO is where you tailor your website material, titling, content and linking so that it is picked up by search engines and Yahoo Slurps and the like. While being picked up by a Slurp sounds engaging to the average American male, I wanted to learn more.
Not that I've become an expert by any stretch, but I've been able to coach a few people on how to get more traffic to their site. It's fairly simple, but time-consuming if you do it yourself. As a local service-oriented business, it's even more challenging, because I can't take an order from someone in Brunei when they land on my site.
Anyway, for you beginners, like myself, I'll gladly share what I know. As for the SEO experts, they're a dime a dozen, as evidenced by the 200 emails I've gotten. Most are offering to put my business in the Top 10 search results on Google (for a fee, of course). If I'm figuring this correctly, the offers I've gotten mean that the 30,000 businesses they've made that offer to will all share the top 10 spots in any given niche. Crappy odds. Others offer the best keyword research tools available, the best optimization plan ever devised, or the promise of riches. That might work for an affiliate business, but not the local dude looking to tune up your Toyota Camry for $59.95.
Ok, I've compiled some tips for you locals looking to increase your website traffic. Free tips, from a guy who's had to do it himself....is there anything better?

SEO Tips from a guy who had to Google "WYSIWYG"

1: Fill out those Meta-tags on your site.
All the gurus on the web will argue, but it's been helpful. For each page, fill out the meta-keywords and meta-descriptions. It helps the spiders and bots that crawl your site in the wee hours to index your site content. Don't spam it out with repeated keywords...that will just piss off the Slurps and GoogleBots. If you do that, they might push your site down further in the rankings. Not that a LOCAL business will ever achieve Top 10 spots, but every step helps.
2: GOOD content on your site.
Nothing helps your site like good, original content. This means no plagiarism, no generic key-phrases, and using content that's relevant to your site, and the page in particular. After I update my site with new information, a new page, or a blog, the bots crawl it. Next day, I get 10 times the hits as the previous day. Use it to your advantage. Update your content every day if you can.
3: Find a good keyword tool.
A good keyword tool is essential to find the "phrase that pays". There are plenty of free keyword research tools and programs on the web. I use Traffic Travis...it gives me the most-searched keywords, traffic rankings, evaluation for keyword density, and suggestions for improvement.
4: DO NOT use the most popular keywords for your niche.
Example: You sell watches, and the most-searched keyword is Rolex. Let's say that 1 million people all over the world type "Rolex" into their browser on any given day. If you use ROLEX as the main keyword on a page, you stand to be 999,999th in the search results, based upon popularity of the search phrase. Expand upon your product or service....like ROLEX REPAIR, ROLEX MODEL #872052, whatever. The more specific you get within a niche, the better the chances that your customers will know what to expect from you, and the better your search engine ranking for that niche. Sounds self-defeating, but if you repaired Rolex watches, would you want 8 calls a day from people wanting to buy a NEW Rolex?
5: Directories.
Sign up for every directory you can find. Google, Yahoo, and Bing are the biggies, but there are hundreds of lesser-known search engines and directories to submit your URL to. Some require a reciprocal URL to be posted on your site, some don't. Remember that links IN are better than links OUT of your site. Reciprocal links are fine, as long as they are at least in the same general niche as your site. I'm guilty of a little link-weighing myself....sometimes getting listed in a popular directory outweighs the inconvenience of having a non-related link on your site.
6: Blogs.
Niche-related blogs are a big part of SEO. Two years ago, I would have said "Blog? WTF is a blog?" It has that metro-techie sound, like "cyber-cafe". Truth is, there are few tools on the internet that are more powerful than a blog. To be more precise, blogs with good networking, like an RSS feed. Search engines take note of interaction between blog sites and YOUR site. In addition, they can add credibility to your site if you write about subjects relevant to your site content. Use it!
7: Query searches:
A person will often type a question into their browser, hoping to find the EXACT answer to their query on the first try. For instance: "Who won the 1979 World Series?". For the record, I have no frickin' idea who won it. But if you sell baseball cards, you might use the search query to your advantage by titling a page or page title on a submenu based on queries like this. Research the most-searched-questions in your niche and title your pages or H1 tags accordingly.
8: Put your face on Twitter and Facebook:
These two internet bohemoths have been making headlines for awhile. Search engines absolutely love them, because of their ability to make the web-net a little more intertwined. After posting a few Facebook comments and dropping my website URL in a posting, my hits increased by almost 60%. Closer examination of my stats revealed that 93% of those clicking on my comment URL were locals (in my state), making them prime candidates for the services offered on my website.
9: Hub it up:
Admittedly, I'm still learning. Thus my first hub about making wine....I figured hey...it's popular, something I'm passionate about, and makes for a great buzz. Not very "connected" to my home inspection business, but it gave me an excuse to hole-up in the den and type away while I polished off a good cabernet. Seriously though: hubs are a great way to connect to your target audience by engaging them in articles and content that impact your niche. Use the RSS feeds to make your followers and subscribers aware of changes to your business.
10: Last and most important: FRESH CONTENT ON YOUR PAGES
I can't stress this enough....UPDATE your site. Never let the content get stale. For every update, you can expect a sizeable (haven't analyzed it) uptick in site visits. Add a comment, change a quote, drop a link to a related site in there. Whatever it takes to keep it fresh and engaging. Search engines ignore sites with never-changing content....you want yours to offer something new every time your repeat visitors pop in.

This concludes our SEO-by-Jethro lesson for now. I hope I've been some help to the poor bastards like myself who have to DIY and learn everything by trial and error. If you need further advice, contact the guys who promise to make your site #2 in the rankings for a mere $2000. HAPPY OPTIMIZATION!
You can view my DIY site at http://www.Altasup.com