Search engine optimization (SEO) is a key part of any successful website because most internet users will find your site via a search engine. It’s a good idea to check your site to see if there are any areas you could easily improve in order to maximize your search engine rankings.

There are two tools I like to use, both free, shown below. It is unlikely that you will get a perfect score, so don’t fret if your score is low the first time. Some factors that impact your score are out of your control, such as inbound links, retweets, etc. The key is to improve as much as you reasonably can.

In each case, the tool will grade your site based on criteria that are important for high search results. From that, you can make a to-do list of improvements. I suggest working on the “low-hanging fruit” first – if there are any easy changes, do those right away. Then, you can consider the more difficult tasks and weigh out their relative importance for your particular site.

I’ve shown some examples below for my own site. In each case, I spent about an hour making small improvements, but there were also several things that I don’t plan to do, or can’t reasonably do. For example, I don’t plan to list myself in Yahoo!Directory because I do not need the additional marketing boost, so my $299 could be better spent elsewhere.

So, take a moment to grade your site and see where you can make easy changes – every little bit helps!

Website Grader

Before: 78
Interim: 81 (domain name renewal not included)

SEO Warnings:

• The domain for this website is set to expire in less than a year [Fixed]
• Permanent Redirect Not Found for designedbykrista.com to www.designedbykrista.com [Fixed]
• designedbykrista is not listed in the Yahoo! Directory. [Um, yeah - like that's gonna' happen at $299 a pop...]
• We could not find a Twitter account associated with your website. [Fixed]
• The web page does not seem to contain any type of signup form where visitors can subscribe to a newsletter or future updates. [Imagine Dana Carvey saying, "Not gonna' do it..."]

SenSEO Firefox Addon

Before: 85
After: 93

SEO Warnings:

• Meta Keywords: use only keywords found in content of page [Fixed]
• Too many meta keywords – keep it to 10 or less [Fixed]
• Use Robots declarations to control Search-Engine access. [Fixed]
• Use H2 and H3 tags. [Fixed]
• Domain should include all keywords. [Don't I wish...]