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Getting Customers
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What's in a page title? EVERY THING!!! Although this is the most basic information.... It is impossible to exaggerate the importance of the <TITLE> in designing your web site and web pages. The first rule to remember is; TITLE IS EVERY THING!

You need to appeal to your audience; the people who are looking for the information, service or product your site is providing. In other words, your TITLE should make sense as well as profile your offering... But, you must also appeal to the computers that determine how the search engines return lists of potential matches to the given inquiries.

When a "search" is processed through a search engine, the search engine looks for the search word(s) in the TITLE first and usually gives preference to web pages that have that specific word or words in the TITLE.

This means that you MUST insert the "search words" (aka, "keywords") that your potential customers are likely to use when looking for your service between the <TITLE>your title goes here</TITLE> tags in your HTML code.

For example, a Recreational Vehicle dealer called Wilder R.V. should not use the obvious title: <TITLE>Wilder R.V.<TITLE> If you do, your website will suffer the consequences of not having the relevant KEYWORDS pulled up in a search of TITLES; which is usually the first order of business for a search engine. (You will actually see the unbelievable results Wilder R.V. got from the secrets and techniques outlined in our manual!)

Lets look at just a few of the improvements we suggested for Wilder R.V...

From a search engines point of view, a better TITLE might be

<TITLE> #1-A Wilder Recreational Vehicles, 5th Wheels, Travel Trailers, Campers, Service, Parts, Accessories, Clinton, Missouri</TITLE>

From a computer standpoint this is better because, alphabetically, the computer gives "#1-A" an advantage over any letter in the alphabet. It also contains most of the KEYWORDS related to Wilder R.V.'s offering. HOWEVER, remember that your TITLE also must make sense to a person who is looking for your product or service. In other words, what might look good to a COMPUTER in a "search" ...can also look "tacky" to a PERSON... and always remember, it is a PERSON who will ultimately "click" on your link... or not.

In the case of Wilder R.V., we suggested they use the first name of the owner - "Al Wilder" - as the initial heading, Followed by the KEYWORDS that we determined to be the most relevant to their business.

For example: <TITLE>Al Wilder Recreational Vehicles, 5th Wheels and Travel Trailers in Clinton, Missouri<TITLE>.

The words "Recreational Vehicles, 5th Wheels and Travel Trailers" are KEYWORDS in the TITLE that people are likely to look for when searching for this type of service. In addition, the words "Clinton and Missouri" are all words that may cause people who need your service in YOUR AREA to find you even when they are NOT looking for you. For instance, if someone did a KEYWORD search for "Homes" in "Clinton Missouri"... Wilder R.V. has a very good chance of showing up toward the top of the search results, even though none of the other KEYWORDS pertaining to recreational vehicles was mentioned in the search.

This is an actual example. If you go to "InfoSeek" which you will later learn is one of the "Big Eight" search engines, and do a search for the following: - homes clinton missouri - You will find that only two real estate companies show up in the top twenty listings. (and they're not even located in Clinton, MO!!) BUT, low and behold, "Wilder R.V." comes up number twenty nine!!!

Some search engines, namely YAHOO... give priority to "alphabetically advantaged" web pages. Although this is usually not your primary concern, whenever possible, try to start your <TITLE> with a letter toward the front of the alphabet. In some cases, you may find it advantageous enough to consider changing the name of your business, if ONLY on the Internet (you don't actually have to change your real name... just change it on the Internet to something similar, like in the case of Wilder R.V.)

The <TITLE> in the example just mentioned will make sense to a person as well as a computer. This achieves two goals:

#1. It will appeal to the computer, which helps it to hopefully show up in the top ten or twenty listings...

#2. It makes sense to a person who is reading it. If your <TITLE> looks like gibberish to the person who has the mouse in their hand, they will probably choose a site lower on the list in favor of a <TITLE> that makes sense to them.

This is the type of TITLE that will work with almost every search engine... Even the ones that are "smart" to alphabetical "tricks", like Yahoo! Also try to stay away from tacky names like "!!!AAA-1..." People are wise to these tricks and it takes away from the initial appeal of your site.

Search engines like Yahoo will penalize or even NOT ACCEPT websites with these kind of trick names. So be tasteful, AND smart in the way you choose to help position your website. You don't have to be #1 in every search engine. You need to be near the top, make sense to those looking for your offering, and not be too obvious that your site is penalized for using tricks.