1. Understanding Search-Engine Optimization
A SEMINAR REPORT
SUBMITTED BY
Nandu B Rajan (12151210)
In partial fulfillment of the requirements for the award of Degree of
BACHELOR OF TECHNOLOGY
IN
COMPUTER SCIENCE AND ENGINEERING
COLLEGE OF ENGINEERING KARUNAGAPPALLY
COCHIN UNIVERSIT OF SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY
SEPTEMBER 2017

2. COLLEGE OF ENGINEERING KARUNAGAPPALLY
(KOLLAM -690523)
CERTIFICATE
This is to certify that the seminar report entitled “Understanding Search-Engine
Optimization” is a bona-fide work carried out at this department by Nandu B Rajan
(12151210) of S7 and semester under our guidance and supervision, in partial fulfillment
of requirements for the award of the B.Tech Degree in computer science Engineering of
Cochin University of Science and Technology and Department of Computer Science and
Engineering, College of Engineering Karunagappally.
Seminar Coordinator
Dr. Smitha P
Assistant Professor
Dept. of CSE
College of Engineering Karunagappally
Seminar Guide
Ms. Remya R S
Assistant Professor
Dept. of CSE
College of Engineering Karunagappally
Head of the Department
Dr. Binu V P
Associate Professor
Dept. of CSE
College of Engineering Karunagappally

3. ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
Success and happiness are directly related to the achievements of the predetermined
goals. The success of this seminar work is due to the varied contribution of several
distinguished personalities.I take this wonderful opportunity to thank each and every one
of them.
First up all I thank God Almighty for being the guide light throughout the seminar
and helped us to complete it within stipulated time.
I remember with grateful thanks, the encouragement and support rendered by our
principal Dr. Jaya V L. We express our deepest sense of gratitude to the head of the
department, Dr. Binu V.P. for his valuable guidance.
I also express our heartfelt gratitude to our internal guides, Dr. Smitha and Ms.
Remya R S (Assistant Professors of Department Of Computer Science, College Of Engi-
neering, Karunagappally for timely suggestions and encouragement given for the successful
completion of the seminar.I would always oblige for the helping hands of all other staff
members of the department who directly or indirectly contributed in this venture.
My overrunning debt also lays with my family members, all my friends and well-
wishers who helped me in bringing out this seminar successfully.

4. ABSTRACT
Because users rarely click on links beyond the first search results page, boosting
search-engine ranking has become essential to business success. With a deeper knowledge
of search-engine optimization best practices, organizations can avoid unethical practices
and effectively monitor strategies approved by popular search engines.

5. Contents
1 INTRODUCTION 1
2 SEARCH ENGINES 2
2.1 How does search engines work? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2
2.2 Search Engine Rank . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
3 ORGANIC AND INORGANIC RESULTS 5
4 SEO 7
4.1 Importance of SEO . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
4.2 SEO Techniques . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
4.2.1 On Page SEO . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
4.2.2 Off Page SEO . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
4.3 Types of SEO . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
4.3.1 White Hat SEO . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
4.3.2 Black hat SEO . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12
5 ADVANTAGES 14
6 DISADVANTAGES 15
7 CONCLUSION 16
8 REFERENCES 17

6. List of Figures
2.1 Working Of Search Engine . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
3.1 Search Engine Result Page . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
4.1 SEO Periodic Table . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10

7. Chapter 1
INTRODUCTION
Whenever you enter a query in a search engine and hit ’enter’ you get a list of web
results that contain that query term. Users normally tend to visit websites that are at the
top of this list as they perceive those to be more relevant to the query. If you have ever
wondered why some of these websites rank better than the others then you must know that
it is because of a powerful web marketing technique called Search Engine Optimization
(SEO).
SEO is a technique which helps search engines find and rank your site higher than the
millions of other sites in response to a search query. SEO thus helps you get traffic from
search engines.
1

8. Chapter 2
SEARCH ENGINES
Search engines are programs that search documents for specified keywords and returns
a list of the documents where the keywords were found. A search engine is really a general
class of programs, however, the term is often used to specifically describe systems like
Google, Bing and Yahoo! Search that enable users to search for documents on the World
Wide Web.
Typically, Web search engines work by sending out a spider to fetch as many docu-
ments as possible. Another program, called an indexer, then reads these documents and
creates an index based on the words contained in each document. Each search engine uses
a proprietary algorithm to create its indices such that, ideally, only meaningful results are
returned for each query.
2.1 How does search engines work?
Search Engine perform several activities in order to deliver search results.
Algorithms
Search engines use algorithms to calculate how worthy a page is to a relevant search
query. There are hundreds of factors (Google uses over 200 ranking factors) that are used
to calculate the authority of a webpage, and PageRank (based on a scale of 0 10) is one
of them.
Google assigns PageRank to every webpage it crawls. When another website links to
your website, some of its PageRank is passed on to you. The more sites there are out
there linking to you, the higher your PageRank will be and the more trustworthy your
site will look to search engines.
Crawling
Process of fetching webpages linked to a website. For this task Search engines use bots or
spiders to crawl billions of pages across the web by following links they find from billions
of pages around the web.
Indexing
Process of creating index for all the fetched web pages and keeping them into a giant
database from where it can later be retrieved. Essentially, the process of indexing is iden-
2

9. SEO
tifying the words and expressions that best describe the page and assigning the page to
particular keywords.
Processing
When a search request the search engine processes it, i.e., it compares the search string
in the search request with the indexed pages in the database.
Calculating Relevancy
It is likely that more than one page contains the search string, so the search engine
starts calculating the relevancy of each of the pages in its index to the search string.
Retrieving Results
The last step in search engine activities is retrieving the best matched results. Basi-
cally, it is nothing more than simply displaying them in the browser.
Figure 2.1: Working Of Search Engine
Search engines such as Google and Yahoo! Often update their relevancy algorithm
dozens of times per month. When you see changes in your rankings, it is due to an
College Of Engineering Karunagappally 3

10. SEO
algorithmic shift or something else beyond your control. Although the basic principle of
operation of al search engines is the same, the minor difference between their relevancy
algorithms lead to major changes in the relevancy of results.
2.2 Search Engine Rank
When a search query is entered, a search engine digs into its index for pages matching
the users search query, then sorts and displays the most relevant results to the user.
The order in which the pages are displayed are calculated by search engine algorithms,
taking into account hundreds of ranking factors. Each page is then given a ranking score.
In order to rank highly on the search engines, your site needs to score higher than all
the other sites that are eligible to show up for a relevant search query.
SEO is the process of designing and developing a website to attain a high rank in
search engine results.
College Of Engineering Karunagappally 4

11. Chapter 3
ORGANIC AND INORGANIC
RESULTS
Figure 3.1: Search Engine Result Page
Organic Results
Natural way of getting top ranking in SERP (search engine result page) without paying
any amount to search engines for the placement. This is more preferable and trustworthy
method of securing high rank on SERP.
Benefits:
ˆ Results are long lasting on search engine result pages.
ˆ Organic results are more trustworthy than inorganic results.
ˆ Organic service is cheaper than inorganic services.
5

12. SEO
Inorganic Results/ Paid Results
Paid services such as PPC Pay Per Click, banner ads, classifieds etc. This service is very
expensive. But those who wants immediate results, they can go for inorganic service/
search engine marketing.
Benefits:
ˆ More effective result in very short time.
ˆ Site gains more visibility.
ˆ More traffic in short time period.
College Of Engineering Karunagappally 6

13. Chapter 4
SEO
SEO or Search Engine Optimization is the process of affecting a websites visibility on
the search engine results pages (SRPs) for a target set of keywords/key phrases.
The higher the position of a webpage on the organic search results pages, the more
visible the page will be.
4.1 Importance of SEO
ˆ Brand awareness A web site having a high ranking means more people see the
name of the company and become familiar with the company and its products, even
if they havent made a purchase.
ˆ Targeted traffic Search engine optimization brings paying customers to your door
step. The customers that SEO services bring you are long for your products/services
as they have entered your websites keywords/phrases into the search engines.
ˆ Your competitors Keeping ahead of your competition in the organic search results
can help boost the perceived position of your company in your marketplace.
4.2 SEO Techniques
Optimization of websites is a very important strategy to deliver the best results. SEO
or search engine optimization using the best proven strategies helps to make business
websites appealing to search engines. This in turn improves the ranking and enables the
website to appear among the top ranking websites on search engine result pages.
SEO techniques can be classified into two groups:
ˆ On Page SEO
ˆ Off Page SEO
On page SEO deals with aspects on your website that can be optimized for search engines.
Off page SEO involves aspects on other websites on the internet that can be optimized to
improve the ranking of your website on leading search engines. Its important to under-
stand the difference between on page and off page SEO.
7

14. SEO
4.2.1 On Page SEO
On page SEO is what you do on your own website or blog in order to enhance the
traffic. It is the first thing that every webmaster should look into. On page optimization
needs constant revision of the site in order to improve and maintain the ranking. In this
technique, the role of keywords or key phrases that the user might type has a prominent
position. It includes headings, page titles, domain names and images. But all these
elements have to be search-engine friendly. The size of the site should not be too large or
too small. It should have genuine, interesting and relevant content.
The main components involved in on-page optimization are listed below:
ˆ Headings
ˆ Title of the page
ˆ Meta description and tags
ˆ Image and pictures
ˆ URL structure and domain information
ˆ User-friendly navigation and quick loading
ˆ Fresh and quality content
ˆ Optimized external and internal links
Let us consider some of the important on page optimization techniques:
Title optimization
The most important web optimization element is the title tag. The title tag should
be a short but descriptive one, which will help the visitors learn more about you and
your business. The title tag is indexed on the search engines, so the title tag has greater
importance than other components. Your title should be good enough to attract users
looking for specific information.
Meta tag
Meta tag is a short description about your website, its focus areas and the services you
provide. In the Meta tag its important that the title, keyword and descriptions written
are distinct from other sites.
Content writing
Content writing is a very important feature to drive more traffic to your site. Regu-
larly updating your content with fresh information, and appropriate keywords and phrases
increases the ranking of your site. Good content is important for your articles, newspaper,
blogs, and press releases as well.
Keyword optimization
College Of Engineering Karunagappally 8

15. SEO
A keyword is a term that is used to match with the query a person enters into a search
engine to find specific information. Most people search phrases that consists of two or
five words, such phrases may be called search phrases, keyword phrases, query phrases,
or just keywords.
Good keywords phrases are specific and descriptive. Keywords are words that appear
the most in a page.
Adding keywords to your site is important but keyword stuffing can make your site
unreadable.
Link optimization
Proper link building improves your sites quality. There should be effective external
and internal links to secure high-ranking in search engines. The link should be taken from
a genuine and unique site.
Image optimization
Image optimization can make your site unique but it should be done according to
certain criteria. The first one is the file size and loading speed of an individual image
and the second is proper file naming and optimization. Search engine spiders can only
read text and not images, so special tags are used to make them comprehensible to search
engines.
4.2.2 Off Page SEO
Unlike on page optimization, off page depends on another web page to improve your
site or blog. Off-page optimization deals with link building factors. Its an ongoing process
and needs regular new links that are given priority by search engines. In this technique
if you obtain a high quality link, then your site can rank higher. Strategic link building
increases the traffic to your website and its position in Google.
Off page SEO is a combination of social media, social bookmarking and link building.
Link building
The ranking of your website depends upon link building, not on the quantity of links
but the quality of links. Adding external links to your site can increase the quality of
your site and make it rank higher. It is not the number of links pointing to your site that
is the important consideration, but the websites from where these links come. You need
to add links from websites that are rated high.
Social media marketing
Almost everyone has a social media account either on Twitter or Facebook or Google+.
Effective social media marketing will make your profile more attractive and more people
can find your profile and visit you. Social media optimization is a very efficient method
for promoting online business.
College Of Engineering Karunagappally 9

16. SEO
Social bookmarking
Social bookmarks can be passed on to innumerable users and thus generate signif-
icantly increased traffic to your website. Search engines index top social bookmarking
websites, and this can help your website increase its ranking. You can bookmark your
pages, creating backlinks to your content. This is a great strategy for brand building, and
your content can go viral if it gets shared widely among users.
On page and off page optimization are the two important words in connection with
search engine optimization. Both of them have vital importance in the field of online
business. You need to understand the difference between on page and off page SEO to
implement the right strategies.
Figure 4.1: SEO Periodic Table
College Of Engineering Karunagappally 10

17. SEO
4.3 Types of SEO
As the colors of the types of search engine optimization suggest, there are stark dif-
ferences in the approach and long-term results of white hat and black hat search engine
optimization. Though both types of SEO have their proponents, most companies/websites
with long-term, stable, and sustainable goals will tend to stay away from the dark-colored
variety.
1. White Hat SEO
2. Black hat SEO
4.3.1 White Hat SEO
White hat SEO is ethical SEO. Its SEO techniques that search engines accept. White
hat SEO techniques are beneficial for site visitors as well as for search engines. The goal
of white hat SEO is to improve search engine result positions via methods that won’t
cause search engines to penalize the site.
Successful white hat SEO is slower than black hat SEO and is an ongoing process.
ˆ A SEO tactic is considered as White Hat if it has the following features:
ˆ It conforms to the search engine’s guidelines.
ˆ It does not involve in any deception.
ˆ It ensures that the content a search engine indexes, and subsequently ranks, is the
same content a user will see.
ˆ It ensures that a web page content should have been created for the users and not
just for the search engines.
ˆ It ensures good quality of the web pages.
ˆ It ensures availability of useful content on the web pages.
Always follow a White Hat SEO tactic and do not try to fool your site visitors. Be honest
and you will definitely get something more.
College Of Engineering Karunagappally 11

18. SEO
4.3.2 Black hat SEO
Black hat SEO is the use of techniques that are unacceptable to search engines to
boost a page’s position in search results. These techniques are intended to trick search
engines into giving pages higher positions in search results, and they have no benefit to
site visitors. The goal is to improve search engine result positions no matter what it takes
to do it.
Black hat SEO techniques are used for two reasons:
ˆ They work until search engines find out about them and they don’t work.
ˆ Some people don’t understand that black hat SEO techniques can get their sites
penalized by or banned from search engines
Even if search engines can’t detect the black hat SEO techniques, competitors of sites
that employ black hat SEO techniques can spot them and do report them to search en-
gines. Some black hat SEO techniques include: link spam, keyword stuffing, cloaking,
hidden text, and hidden links. Quick, unpredictable, and short-lasting growth in rankings.
An SEO tactic is considered as Black Hat or Spamdexing if it has the following fea-
tures:
ˆ Attempting ranking improvements that are disapproved by the search engines and/or
involve deception.
ˆ Redirecting users to a page that is built for search engines to one that is more human
friendly.
ˆ Redirecting users to a page that was different from the page the search engine
ranked.
ˆ Serving one version of a page to search engine spiders/bots and another version to
human visitors. This is called Cloaking SEO tactic.
College Of Engineering Karunagappally 12

19. SEO
ˆ Using hidden and invisible text or with the page background colour, using a tiny
font size or hiding them within the HTML code such as ”no frame” sections.
ˆ Repeating keywords in the Meta tags, and using keywords that are unrelated to the
website content. This is called Meta tag stuffing.
ˆ Calculated placement of keywords within a page to raise the keyword count, variety,
and density of page. This is called Keyword stuffing.
ˆ Creating low-quality web pages that contain very little content but are instead
stuffed with very similar keywords and phrases. These pages are called Doorway or
Gateway Pages.
ˆ Mirror websites by hosting multiple websites all with conceptually similar content
but using different URLs.
ˆ Creating a rogue copy of a popular website which shows contents similar to the orig-
inal to a web crawler, but redirects web surfers to unrelated or malicious websites.
This is called Page hi-jacking.
College Of Engineering Karunagappally 13

20. Chapter 5
ADVANTAGES
1. Its cost-effective. You don’t have to pay the search engine to be ”advertised”. At
this point in time is when you have to pay for almost everything; it’s good to know
that there are still some things which are free. The best part is that you can use
this to your benefits, such as the simulative effect of the sale of your business.
2. If well ranked, has your company greater chance at becoming visible around the
world, while you stay at home. Internet is an effective marketing tool. It is actually
the marketplace itself with numerous potential clienteles. However, there is no
guarantee that your business will boom immediately but it sure will, little by little.
3. Once your website gets a good place, you somehow your reputation as one of the
best. This implies that somehow you are properly valued in the SEO community.
In reality, which ranked first in their field are perceived to be really good. They are
even considered to be one of the largest. Same thing in the virtual world. If you are
the highest rank, people will think that the product that you sell is a must have.
4. Need the money for search engine optimization is established, regardless of the
number of hits you get. This saves you some money. Plus, you don’t get confused
with the accounting part. Another thing, you don’t worry about the money that
you need to shell out for the case you a bulk of hits.
14

21. Chapter 6
DISADVANTAGES
1. Your position in the search engine is unpredictable. Everything depends on the
algorithm. As a result, you know not when the return of the investment will happen.
You don’t have the total control over everything, even if you have your website; you
maintain that you and the owner of the company.
2. This is time consuming. It takes a long time before you see your standing improve a
notch. Sometimes you have to wait for months or even a year to be in the spotlight.
You might ask yourself, ”How can my business flourish?”
3. Participants can make use of the black hat tactics. These unfair practices hinder
the tree of your company. You control not about other people’s heads. They can
choose for unethical strategies and you, your company could affect credibility and
negative.
4. It may mean the end of it all for entrepreneurs whose website are located on the
last few pages of the search engine.
15

22. Chapter 7
CONCLUSION
While nobody can guarantee top level positioning in search engine organic results,
proper search engine optimization can help. Because the search engines, such as Google,
Yahoo!, and Bing, are so important today it is necessary to make each page in a Web site
conform to the principles of good SEO as much as possible.
To do this it is necessary to:
ˆ Understand the basics of how search engines rate sites
ˆ Use proper keywords and phrases throughout the Web site
ˆ Avoid giving the appearance of spamming the search engines
ˆ Write all text for real people, not just for search engines
ˆ Use well-formed alternate attributes on images
ˆ Make sure that the necessary meta tags (and title tag) are installed in the head of
each Web page
ˆ Have good incoming links to establish popularity
ˆ Make sure the Web site is regularly updated so that the content is fresh
16

23. Chapter 8
REFERENCES
1. Hub Spot, All the Marketing Statistics You Need, 2014; www.hubspot.com/marketing-
statisticsSEO.
2. Bing Webmaster Guidelines,www.bing.com/webmaster/help/webmaster-guidelines-
30fba23a.
3. https://www.equinetacademy.com/seo-tutorial-step-step-search-engine-optimization-
guide.
4. https://bloggerspassion.com/seo-tutorial-for-beginners
5. https://moz.com/blog/visual-guide-to-keyword-targeting-onpage-optimization
6. http://www.bigapplemedia.com/differences-between-on-page-and-off-page-seo.
7. https://www.google.co.in/amp/s/www.betaout.com/blog/on-page-vs-off-page-optimization-
whats-the-diffrence/amp.
8. https://bloggerspassion.com/on-page-seo-techniques.
17