Improving Website Ranking through Search Engine Optimization

Abstract

Internet is fast becoming critically important to commerce, industry and individuals. Perhaps the most important single component of this communication network is the Search Engine (SE). Successful Websites rank high in SEs hits, whereas unsuccessful Websites may not rank at all. In an effort to increase the ranking of Sultan Qaboos University (SQU) amongst international universities, it was recommended to apply “Webometrics” measures. Hence, it was necessary to enhance the university's Website ranking. Therefore, the primary aim of this research is to explore the factors and techniques that contribute to a page ranking highly in a Search Engine Results Page (SERP). The research is divided into two parts. The first part is a descriptive/interpretive analysis aiming to provide an outline of the current and relevant literature with regard to Search Engine Optimization (SEO). It covers how SEs work, and explores the guidelines that are available for Web designers to optimize Web pages, thereby increasing their visibility and ranking. Furthermore, it provides a short history of the most important SEs, differentiates between them, and reviews the approaches they use to crawl, index, and display search results. It also provides an account of the different factors/methods impacting Website ranking. The second part documents an action research project undertaken to enhance the visibility and ranking of the SQU Website. The main findings are that, for a site to rank well, it must use a combination of increasingly sophisticated techniques and tools, and not to rely on outdated methods such as Meta tags (especially the keywords). Fortunately, there are many online tools which can assist in tuning a site to work better, as well as other freely available good pieces of advice.