Search engine keyword optimization is the use of your keywords or phrases in such a way that the search engines rank your site for those keywords or phrases. Every Web site owner striving for success aims to rank on the first page for as many keywords or phrases as possible.

The whole process starts by choosing the best possible keywords for your Web site. Your goal is to choose keywords (describing your site or product) with the highest amount of monthly searches and the lowest amount of competitors. Google's Keyword Tool and Softnik's Good Keyword v3 software will be able to assist you with this process.

The following tips will allow you to fully optimize the keywords that you have chosen:

Include main keywords in the URL

This will increase the importance that the search engines allocate to the main keywords and thereby the ranking of these keywords on the SERP's.

The Title of your site should always contain your main keywords

The search engines look at the title of your site to determine what the site is all about. If your main keywords are included in the title this will improve the ranking of the keywords.

Keyword density in the body of the web page should be between 3

The search engines determine keywords describing your site by looking at the keyword density. Ideally your targeted keywords should be used between 3 and 6 times for every 100 words. Be careful not to overuse the keywords since this could lead to spamming. Always keep your visitors in mind when designing your web page. The content should make sense and should be easy to read.

Bold, italic and underlined keywords

More importance is given to words that are in bold, italic or are underlined.

Keywords in meta tags and meta description

It is very important to include your keywords in the meta description and meta tags of your site. Do not use the keywords more than once to prevent spamming.

Anchor text and links

Your keywords should always be used in the anchor text of the links from other sites. Be careful not to use the same keyword all the time since this can be penalised by the search engines. Rotate your keywords and description.

Writing and submitting SEO aligned articles

Article marketing is still one of the most effective optimization tools around. When writing articles always look at using your keywords in the article (3) and in the anchor text of the links back to your site. Also include them in the article tags.

Look at using your keywords in everything that you do that is related to your site. Effective search engine keyword optimization is achieved by placing your target keywords in positions of prominence.