Sometimes it is easy to get the impression that Google wants to drive SEO companies out of business.   Certainly there are many SEO techniques that Google considers “cheating” and would like to do away with.  Most notably would be link building for the sole purpose of increasing rankings.  Google feels that some of the practices of link building and buying sabotages the goal of presenting content that have the greatest chance of satisfying the searchers need.

However, Google actually appreciates and encourages some things that SEO specialists tend to do.  Here is a list of SEO practices that Google appreciates:

·         Modifying Site Structure:  Google realizes that its search engine can’t index all the content of some websites because of structure and coding issues.  A search engine specialist can identify these issues and modify structure so that all pages are easily indexed.

·         Search Engine Resources:  A good SEO specialist will address issues that can needlessly consume search engine resources.   One can identify all the pages and resources that a search engine should NOT index and identify those on a robots.txt file.  Also an SEO person can work to optimize download speed of pages, knowing that this helps search engine resources as well as improves the user experience.

·         Improve Content Readability:  Many web pages use industry jargon or are written colloquially so that search engines have trouble interpreting the content.  Search engine specialists can make sure that content is written in a manner that helps both visitors and search engines correctly understand the content.  Additionally, things like title tags, meta tags and header tags can be used to make it easier for everyone to understand the webpage content.

·         Engagement and Usability:  Search Engine Specialists know that the more engaging the website is, the more visitors will come back and the more preference Google will give it in rankings.   Making sure that users can find the information that they need by improving navigation and putting in appropriate calls to action is a win-win for everyone.  

While search engines ability interpret content and understand searchers intent continues to improve, it is still not perfect.  SEO specialists and webmasters can bridge that gap and help Google present the most relevant webpage’s to meet the searchers needs.