No matter how you look at it, search engines are still some of the most useful resources out there for getting traffic to a website. Therefore, ranking well in search engines is still top priority for most website owners.
While techniques, tips, and tricks tend to change year after year, the basic building blocks of search engine visibility and SEO-friendly content and design remain the same.
Below is a library of resources to help you make the most of your SEO efforts today.
Where To Begin
Beginners and experts alike will benefit from good SEO primers, such as What is Search Engine Optimization? SEO in 3 Minutes, a quick video produced by Search Engine Land to help people grasp the concept of SEO.
Two additional SEO primers to check out are SEO Books comprehensive SEO Glossary, which includes many terms used throughout articles and how-to guides, and SEOMozs The Basics of SEO Friendly Design and Development, which is an essential guide to creating websites that are structurally search engine friendly.
Videos
Sometimes, videos communicate information better than written text. SEO Link Building 101 by SEO Book is a short video on basic link building and the types of links that help websites rank higher in search engine results.
Matt Cutts Whitehat SEO Tips for Bloggers and BlogWorld and New Media Expo: SEO Tips for Bloggers are referenced extensively in articles and are great tools for beginning bloggers who are just getting their feet wet with SEO.
55 Quick (SEO) Search Engine Optimization Tips includes several useful pieces of information regarding everything from link building to content. While going through the video, its best to pause it at each screen and jot down the tips you find most useful or important for you.
Mobile SEO Tips for the Rest of Us is a great video from SEOMoz that helps make sense of mobile SEO, what the challenges are, and how to overcome them.
Mobile SEO
Speaking of mobile SEO, three great articles on the subject include Mashables 3 Tips for Better Mobile SEO, Search Engine Lands The New Mobile SEO: What You Need to Know, and Top Rank Blogs Quick Guide to Smartphone & Mobile SEO.
MobileSearchMarketing.com published a useful Guide to Mobile SEO which includes design and development tips for website developers as well as a link to a list of mobile search engines.
Advanced Link Building
An essential part of search engine optimization is link building; however, link building is not something you jump into without doing a little reading up on the subject. Start with The Professional Guide to Link Building, by SEOMoz.
At first glance, the sheer amount of articles listed is going to seem overwhelming, but if the end result of all of the reading is that your link building efforts pay off, the time you spend going through that guide will have been well worth it.
How to Make the Most of a $100 Link Building Budget by Ana Hoffman offers a wealth of great ideas for boot-strapping your way to high search engine rankings, and the tips can be used by individuals and small businesses alike.
Forums
Forums and question and answer websites are equally great tools for learning something new, and there are a few great online forums where you can find out more about SEO. Take advantage of the SEO forums at WarriorForum.com and v7n.com.
Both communities have incredibly knowledgeable and experienced users who will respond to your questions and offer advice, and they have been around for awhile, so there is a extensive amount of archived information on both sites.
SEOForums.org is another great place to ask and answer questions related to SEO, and the community is active and helpful. Forum topics there include link building, social media optimization, and on site optimization, among several others.
Content Creation For SEO
While there are many things you can do externally to increase search engine rankings, many experienced SEO professionals will agree that the most important work you can do is on your website itself. Part of on-site SEO is what you are actually writing, the keywords, the images included, and internal links. These things make up the content.
Check out Top Rank Blogs Core Content SEO Tools: Keyword Glossary and Editorial Plan for a comprehensive guide on how to create content that will get you the search engine traffic that you want. Then read Why Internal Linking is Crucial for Search Engine Optimization at Traffic Generation Cafe, to be sure that you dont neglect such an important part of content creation.
But perhaps the most important tool you should have is Copybloggers free report called SEO Copywriting Made Simple. This free download walks you through the basics of copywriting, dos and donts, and why writing for the web (and for humans) is less complicated than it seems.