Search engine optimization(optimisation) is a subject that many marketers try to avoid but believe me it's worth finding out what works and why. Once you've tried and taken action you'll only get better at it. Website search engine optimisation will pay for itself in the long run in the time that you spend on it.

First of all you must optimise your site with Google in mind. It is the single most important search engine on the world wide web and if you don't get on Google's first page for your site then you will not get much free traffic from SEO. This may sound impossible but it's easier than you think. However, it begins before you start to build your site or decide what it is you are going to sell.

The most important point about Google is relevancy. Google wants its clients to have the BEST search results of any search engine. That means that they want to please their customers by throwing up pages that are directly relevant to what the customer is searching for. This may sound patently obvious but if you don't get this fact drummed into your head you'll never succeed at SEO.

Okay, you've got a rough idea of what to sell and if you haven't first find out what people are buying. You can do this by going to:

http://www.clickbank.com http://www.ebay.com http://www.amazon.com http://www.froogle.com http://www.bn.com http://www.magazines.com Affiliate Directories

This is a huge subject on its own and I do not have room to deal with this in this article.

So, you've found what you're going to sell to those who are keenly buying. You are eager to start search engine marketing. Your next move is to choose your relevant keywords. You should do this first before you pick a domain name as your domain name should include your main keyword. Relevancy you see?

If for example you're selling Teddy Bears from your site www.teddybear.com You want keywords associated with Teddy Bears so first of all got to www.goodkeywords.com, grab the free software and write Teddy Bears. You will then get a list of associated keywords and the number of searches being performed. Another excellent tool is http://freekeywords.wordtracker.com Yet another is found at https://adwords.google.com Using this tool you will be able to find all the keywords you could possibly want.

The new kid on the block that claims it is the MOST ADVANCED keyword tool is www.keyworddiscovery.com but it costs from $69.95 per month.

Once you've used your keywords in your sales page copy - you should aim for 3-5 times per 100 words - and your web site is finalised and uploaded to your hosting service it should be submitted to the search engines. Go to http://www.google.com/addurl.html This is free but for Yahoo it costs to get a business listing so I would avoid Yahoo until you're making money.

Next go to the Open Directory Project at www.dmoz.org and browse to the directory where your site belongs and then click Add URL link at the top of the page. This is a very important directory to get into as many search engines use their data base to show results.

Then go to Lycos at http://searchservices.lycos.com where it costs nothing to submit one page. After that they charge you.

Finally go to Alltheweb at http://www.alltheweb.com/add_url.php3 and Altavista at http://www.altavista.com/sites/search/addurl

I hope this article on search engine optimization tips has been useful to you in your online marketing.