SEO Compliancy

What is SEO Compliancy?

I am not even sure there is a definition at this point in time.  One can wonder, is it technical in nature? content related? Server related?  Maybe it is all of the above.  Now that would hurt.

I would imagine before we look at compliancy, we would want to look at the acronym "SEO", most would say this means "Search Engine Optimization".  Then the question comes in, What is "Search Engine Optimization"?  Is it putting a bunch of words in that keyword tag at the top of your HTML page?  I seriously doubt it.

So again it brings up back to the question "What is SEO Compliancy?".  Well, we first know that SEO stands for search engine optimization.  Second, compliancy means "adhering to specifications or regulations".  So what specifications are we supposed to adhere to?  are there any?  Let's make some.

My definition of SEO Compliancy would start with what areas we normally would work with to test this.

1. Is your page code clean?
2. Is the content focused and well written?
3. Do the meta tags match the content?
4. Is the HTML code that makes up the page compliant to W3C consortium?
5. Is the page title consistent with the content of the page?
6. Is the navigation easy to follow?
7. Is the content useful to the web searcher/visitor?
8. Is the site easily crawled by a search engine robot?

The above in my opinion would be a good start on the road to SEO compliancy.  A good beginning definition could be.  The ability of a web site to adhere to standards set forth by:

• W3C Consortium
• Search engine acceptable use policies
• User demands and expectations
• Acceptable methods of optimization and targeting of keywords.

I am sure we could go on and on and the discussion could lead down many roads.  If you look at the above and apply these practices to your site, I believe one would be able to say that your site is "SEO Compliant".

Of course there are many other practices and things that would come into play regarding your rankings but the above is definitely a good start.  Site Search Architect is a tool that will help you achieve both SEO Compliancy and good rankings for your content.  Good luck with your site.

Dave Barry
Advanced SEO Positioning Instructor