Get the Most Out of Your Blog

Why you should sync your blog with your home page

A site filled with interesting, engaging information can only do so much if your audience cannot find it. Getting high-placed rankings for specific keyword searches on Google can be the difference between a successful website and an unsuccessful one. But by integrating your blog into your company's homepage, you can optimize your presence on search engines. Google's ranking algorithm puts significant emphasis on "keyword density," or the ratio between the searched-for keyword and the rest of the content on your page. In other words, when your potential customer searches for a keyword in your company's field, one factor determining where your site places in the results list is the number of times that keyword appears on the page. For example, if you own a glassblowing studio, example keywords could include "glassblowing," "hand-blown vase," "glassblowing class," and "custom blown glass."

So, why integrate your blog with your homepage? Combining your blog and your company's homepage will produce several positive results. First of all, you can organize your articles in an easy-to-find way while still keeping them in the most visible places your customers see. They can go to the same place online for the steady, necessary content featured on your home page, as well as the exciting, constantly updated content of your blog. However, integrating can also have the added benefit of optimizing your keyword density.

As far as where you should place keywords, you can only work in your keywords so many times on your homepage copy without annoying your visitors and diluting your message. However, blog posts allow you to repeat important keywords more "organically." For example, in an integrated homepage and blog, you can work keywords into the following:

• Headlines and subheads of blog posts
• Content of blog posts
• Blog post categories
• Core home page content
• Your home page footer

See how this integration can spread keywords out nicely over the content of your website? And by increasing your presence on Google this way, you should see your web traffic increase significantly.