First, let’s just check what an SEO profile is about. An SEO profile for a website is just like a marketing plan or a business plan – basically, it’s a strategy document, putting your decisions into words.
Writing your SEO profile should consist of the following:
An introduction – This should include a BRIEF description of your company as well as a purpose statement of some kind. If you can describe your company in a neat, tight format, you will be one step ahead of most in the SEO game.
Goals relating to your Search Engine Status – What do you want your page rank to be? Where do you want to be listed under specific key words? top 50? 25? 10? How many pages of your site do you want search engines to index? Do you want to pay for listings? These questions will get you started, but you must go more in-depth into your SEO goals. Also include the search engines and directories that you feel are necessities such as Google, DMOZ, Yahoo!, and MSN.
Information regarding SEO actions and achievements – This one is pretty self-explanatory. List everything that you do regarding Search Engine Optimization as well as any successes caused by these actions.
Once you’ve written an SEO profile, you can compare it from time-to-time with what’s going on with your site, before either adjusting the site to reflect your strategy or adjusting the profile to reflect a strategy change. Generally, it is wise to stick to the plan, but occasions may arise when you find that this is simply not logical anymore. In these cases, you must re-evaluate your entire plan because one change can effect the rest of your strategy.
If you have an extremely intricate strategy that depends on one thing going well, you may want to diversify your strategy. Your profile should especially focus on special things you plan to do that aren’t standard SEO practice. Standard SEO work can get you only so far. Every one of your competitors is probably doing the same things so get creative. This is one place where doing something for yourself can really push you to the top. If you already have a high-ranking site, you should use your profile to document the reasons why it has happened, to help you maintain your high ranking.
Keeping your SEO profile updated will allow you to stay current not only on what’s going on with your website, but also on what’s going on in the SEO industry. The SEO industry is very fickle. It can change suddenly without warning to reflect what a search engine or directory believes to be the opinion or benefit of the market. Remember that search engines are always in competition with one another to deliver the most results of the highest quality. If you stay on top of your quality, changes in the SEO industry will have minimal effect on you. It is still important to track these changes in order to ensure that your site gets maximum exposure.
Evaluating your website and profile regularly give you an advantage in the market – you should never let a profile get older than 3 months, and you should refer to it and update it every time you make major changes to your site. These changes include additions of services or removal of services as well as design changes and SEO work.
There is software available online that can help you evaluate your site’s SEO profile. Some of these software apps are very useful, others are very overrated. The difference that these programs will make in your fight for page rank and listings depends on your interpretation of the results nearly as much as it depends on the value of the software itself.
