Help:Search Engine Optimization
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See also Search engine optimization (SEO) for a general discussion of SEO.
Centiare contributors enjoy the effects of Centiare Search Engine Optimization. Centiare listings that utilize semantic tags achieve higher rankings in search results, through a combination of relevance and linkage.
Our amazing example
Here's an example we've noticed in December 2006:
The Church of the Loving Shepherd is located in West Chester, PA. Assume that you were driving by the church one day, but you only caught a glimpse of the church's full name. Later that day, you might search Google using a pretty common method: entering city + name fragments, which in this case might be the stream-of-thought keyword phrase West Chester church shepherd (because that's all you remembered from your drive-by observation). Click the following link to see the actual result you would get on Google:
See how the semantic tags recorded in the Church's Centiare Directory listing improve not only Google's search term relevance, but also trigger the correct address and contact information to be displayed?
In addition to context and relevance, semantic tags also improve overall rankings through the effect of Centiare's internal cross-linking. That is, the combination of Centiare listings, automatically-generated summary reports (at the end of each listing), cross-referenced ASK queries, and (probably) our tolerance of Google AdSense ads, all serve to improve overall search rankings by providing multiple reference points.
The Church's listing on Centiare was authored only as recently as December 9, 2006. We noticed that the Centiare listing had jumped to #1 or #2 for the Google search results above, as soon as January 4, 2007 -- less than one month for the Power of Centiare to impact the Church's SEO. Note, also, that the Church's own website comes up much lower in the search results.
The future
Centiare developers are currently working on two new "test cases" to explore the dynamic impact of Centiare on Google search engine rankings for small businesses. We will report those results here around the end of January.
What kinds of similar optimization results can you and/or your organization achieve using Centiare's semantic features? If you have an interesting story about SEO, please share it with us.