Much conflicting information about search engine optimization abounds on the internet. I can go to just about any WAHM message board and find incorrect information, including:

• Adding meta tags will increase your search engine rankings
• You must submit your site to Google
• Submit your site to top sites to increase your traffic
• Making sure you have the right keyword density will increase your search engine rankings

Adding alt and title tags also will not improve your traffic or search engine rankings (however, these elements will help with usability of your website for people with disabilities).

None of the strategies mentioned above will improve your search engine rankings. Search engines (of which there are only four, btw: Google, MSN, Yahoo and Ask) do not use meta tags to rank your site. Google predominantely relies on Link Popularity and the content of your website. The other search engines also rely on similar criteria.

You also do not need to submit your site to a search engine. All you need to do is get another site, that is already indexed in the search engine, to link to you. Because search engines use “bots” to crawl the internet, you don’t need to do anything else. They will find you.

Top sites are also not a good idea — unless you’re running it. They are great at driving traffic to the top site owner’s website, not so much to yours.

Making sure your keyword density is also a misguided effort at gaming the search engines. Just don’t. Write naturally. Which brings us to what you SHOULD do when optimizing your site.

Proper Website Optimization Techniques

1. It is worth mentioning again: Write naturally, for your customers. Your customers are the people who are going to buy your products, not the search engines. You can get tons of traffic, but if no one buys, all you’re going to get is a higher hosting bill.
2. Do proper keyword research, so you know what keyword phrases your customers use to find your site. And don’t just stick with one-word phrases, like candles. Look for “long-tail” phrases, such as “cotton blossom scented candle.”
3. Use one appropriate keyword phrase for each product on your site, for each category and for each page. Include the keyword phrase in the page title, the product title (and meta title, which is the title at the top of your browser window — not the same as a meta tag) and the headline on your page or category.
4. Write product descriptions that include your keyword phrase and all the information your customer needs. (Learn more about writing product descriptions.)
5. Encourage people who link to your site to use the appropriate keyword phrase in the anchor text of their link (the text between the linking tags).
6. Write such great content that other people are compelled to link to your stuff in the content of their websites. Including your link in a directory or on a page of links isn’t good enough. Get linked in the main content of the site, such as on a message board, in a blog post or in a site article.
7. Setup a weblog on your site and give people several options to subscribe to the RSS feed, set it up in technorati and other blog directories, and write often about your products and your industry. Make sure it is interesting to your customers. Tell them about yourself as well.
8. Write articles to submit to article directories and other websites, who will publish your content with your author bio, which includes a link back to your site.
9. Write newsworthy press releases and submit them to online press release sites and to your local media.
10. Did I mention write great content that your customers will read?!

For more SEO and Internet Marketing information, check out Michelle Waters Online and Product Seller’s Talk Radio.