So you understand what you see in the image above, yes?
When you are involved in a website project, you have to realize that the image above shows how a search engine sees your website.
A search engine can't see, it can't hear - all it reads is the coding of your site. It pays no attention to your photographs, flash, videos or fancy graphics; it can't hear the ill-advised music you insisted on having on your website.
It 'sees' the nuts and bolts; it 'sees' under the hood, as it were. The coding shown in the image above is what the search engine is 'looking' at. You might think that your website looks fantastic and it probably does, but do the search engines think that?
Remember that the search engines are your most important visitors because without them, they might be the only visitors your site will get.
The coding of your site has to be up to scratch and so does the copy. The copy is the thing the search engines are going to pay attention to the most.
So there you are, a search engine, and you're looking at a website's code. You know that your job is to determine what the website is about. Once you've done that, you return to the mothership and let them know. This way, the site will be classified correctly in the search engine's index.
Because you're a computer, you're pretty simple, so the way you work this out is by seeing which words occur frequently. If you read the word restaurant more than any other word, you think Aha - this site is about a restaurant. And further investigation might tell you that it's a restaurant in New York. Simple.
So now, you're a happy little search engine and you go home to the big boys and confidently tell them that this site should be classified in New York restaurants.
So someone searches for restaurant new york and they find your site. But unfortunately, your restaurant is in Chicago.
But because your copy says that your chef is from New York and one of his specialties is a New York strip and that you serve New York-style pizza, and because you haven't mentioned Chicago, the search engines have classified you in the wrong place. A simple example, but it's surprising how often people forget this when writing copy!
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