SEO+Write+up

=Search Engine Optimization (SEO)=

Search engine optimization is an integral component of generating organic traffic to the Website. It is particularly important in Phenu's case as it is a service exclusive to the Web. In order to gain the interest of restaurant owners which are a primary source of revenue, it must be demonstrated that this service has potential to generate leads for them. Providing them with Web traffic statistics can serve as a foundation towards this.

The SEO pyramid will be followed, starting with accessible, quality content, followed by keyword research and targeting. Once these two steps have been done correctly, we can engage in link building and social media to further boost search ranking.

Accessible, quality content
Currently, the site lacks quality text content. It is primarily just photographs of menu items from participating restaurants. Adding descriptions of each menu item which include ingredients, and perhaps what makes the item unique from others can provide Google more details on how to index the pages. Also, the images currently do not have any 'alt' and 'title' attributions. The 'alt' attribution provides a textual description of the image which is used by screen readers. However, this attribution is also used by search engines to look for keywords so it can better understand the content. Similarly, the title attribution in images also carries weight in terms of keywords.
 * Unique text content:**

Each menu item does have a commenting section which can provide some user generated text content. However, most of the comment threads are empty. This problem will likely resolve itself once the site begins to generate significant amounts of traffic.

The URL's should be more human friendly then they currently are. For example, the URL to the student burger from College Kebob is 'phenu.com/Dish.aspx?DishID=e5f83c05-4b2d-4190-ab2b-4622b6339b16'. All menu items follow this structure which provides zero semantical value to a search engine. These URL's need to be re-written so that they contain the restaurant name, and the menu item. I suggest the following URL structure: 'phenu.com/[restaurant name]/[menu item]. For example, the URL to the student burger from previous example should read 'phenu.com/college-kebob/student-burger'. This is a rather simple task for a skilled programmer to write a script which dynamically manipulates the .htacess file which contains rules for the URL rewrites.
 * URL Structure:**

A sitemap is basically a document which maps out all the pages on a site in a hierarchy. They are very useful to Google as it makes the process of crawling the site more easy for the bot, and has a better chance of finding all the pages. Currently the site does not have a sitemap, and one should be created. Since the site has dynamic content generated by users it may be more challenging. A programmer would need to create a script which dynamically generated the site map each time it is requested, as new content will be added regularly. This will be much easier then manually updating the sitemap.
 * Sitemap:**

Keyword Research
Choosing the right keywords is key. A common mistake is to assume particular keywords or phrases are popular. Therefore, keywords need to be researched, and Google Insights for Search is an excellent tool for this. It allows one to check the popularity of keywords and their trend over a period of time.

When using this tool, we narrowed down the statistics to Ontario, Canada as this is the region our target audience and market is. At this point we are not interested in worldwide search trends. The top 5 keywords found are 1)Toronto Resturant, 2)Cheap Resturant, 3)Resturant Menu, 4) Mississauga Resturant, and 5) Resturant.



The Key phrase 'Toronto Restaurant' is the most searched term out of these five, and should be focused on at this point in time. As seen in the screenshot above, this key phrase has gone down in popularity in late 2008, early 2009. It is assumed this is a result of the recession, since people may be eating out less due to financial reasons. Nevertheless, this keyword should still be targeted.

The keyword 'Toronto Resturant' needs to be included in every single title tag on the website. Title tags are very important for Google to determine keywords. Currently, the website uses the title tags very poorly. For example the home page title tag is 'Phenu - Photo Menu (top ten food dishes from restaurants)'. The structure for the title tag on each page should be 'Phenu - Toronto Resturants - [name of resturant]: [name of dish]. For example, the title tag for the student burger page should read 'Phenu - Toronto Resturants - College Kebob: Student Burger. This not only targets the popular phrase but also the restaurant name. So even if someone just Googles this resturant name, the Phenu page for it should also come up in the search results.
 * Title Tags**

**Boosting Link Popularity**
A very important aspect in improving PageRank on Google is the global link popularity of a particular page. The idea is that if lots of pages link to your page, then Google assumes it is important, and hence improves its ranking. Several things can be done to increase incoming links, including using social media, requesting linkbacks from business partners, and creating a blog which is separate from the main site.

A habit should be made to request a linkback to phenu.com from each restaurant that signs up for the service. However, some restaurant owners may view this as a threat since our service provides alternatives. The fear would be that such a linkback will drive potential customers to the restaurants competitors. One way to alleviate such fears would be to reverse the argument by letting them know that other restaurants are also linking to phenu.com, and hence are driving potential customers towards them.
 * Linkbacks from subscribers / business partners**

In the event that most restaurant owners object to providing linkbacks, a 10% monthly discount should be offered.

It is important that we have many restaurants linking to our site as it lets Google know that our website is relevant within this industry. It only makes sense, as we provide a restaurant search engine for other sites within this industry to link to us.


 * Blogs**

Starting a Blog on a separate domain which reviews the same restaurants available on Phenu can result in easy additional links to the website. The technical aspects of the blog do not need to be developed from scratch. Simply using Blogger, or WordPress.com with a premade theme will be sufficient. The blog articles should review restaurants that are subscribed to Phenu, and each post should have a link to their photo menu of the Phenu website.

Also, getting in contact with local bloggers who write about restaurants to link to various pages on Phenu can be very beneficial. A good starting point would be to contact writers at Cheap Eats Toronto (cetoblog.com) and BlogTo (blogto.com/resturants).

Social Media has made it relatively easy to boost link popularity by allowing users to create profiles and share content. This aspect of SEO inevitably leads to social media campaigns, which are a separate discipline but have benefits towards improving search rankings.
 * Social Media** (Can we collaborate this part with the social media promotion?-sarah )

__Facebook__

Facebook provides the ability to create Fan Pages which are essentially a profile page for an organization. These pages are quite capable of generating traffic while increasing link popularity. In order to use these pages effectively, three factors need to be considered: Social capital, the timing of posts, and quality of content. Social capital in this context is the amount of followers (or fans) the Facebook page has. The first step in building social capital would be to invite all your friends to join the page. However, this is only effective in the early stages as a way to build a fan base. Adding a Facebook fan box to the website is crucial, as it allows site visitors to join the Facebook page directly from the website by clicking like. We cannot expect users to find us directly on Facebook, so by providing them with a simple way to join while browsing our website will definitely have a positive impact on increasing social capital. Once a user joins the Facebook page, any content posted by an admin will end up in the users home feed. This is why it is important to time the posts during busy times on Facebook. It makes more sense to make posts during evenings and weekends when more users are signed in. For example, posting something a 3am will get less exposure in people home feeds then something posted at 7pm. The content posted needs to appeal to people in order for them to click through. A suggestion would be to post several 'deals of the day' spread out throughout the day. Each post should be considered as currency which generates some traffic, so spreading out the posts so a wider range of users sees them is important.

__Twitter__

Twitter should be used primarily to announce deals of the day from the various restaurants. Each Tweet should include a link to the Phenu page with the particular deal. In order to build social capital on Twitter, and Twitter feed should be added to the main sections of the website. This will allow people to easily follow Phenu, by providing a link to the Twitter page.

**Sustaining Search Ranking**
It is important to realize that search engine optimization is not a one time project, it is a ongoing process. We cannot quit once we rank high, as our competitors will be constantly doing things to also get better search ranking. We need to continue to monitor keyword trends and adjust on-page SEO accordingly to these trends. Link building should be focused on regularly, and every opportunity for a linkback should be perused. To summarize, everything discussed in this section (SEO) should be the continuous job of a search marketing team, whether in house, or sub-contracted out.

Google Analytics needs to be used to monitor traffic to the website. This tool provides detailed information about visitors, such as how they got to the website (i.e. directly, referral from another site, keywords via search engine). The insights from this information should be used to better understand the visitors and how they find the website, which can then be used to further optimize search ranking.