It's paramount to understand that you just can't throw up a website (although there are still sites out there that look like they have been vomited up), and expect people to just show up and give you money for your product, service or information. That's like hanging a sign on your closet door and pronouncing yourself in business. It doesn't work. You have to be findable.

Now there are all kinds of magic bullet, secret, guru-type things that only the very elite (and very expensive) SEO experts know how to do to get #1 Google rankings for the most competitive keywords available, BUT there is hope for us small business folk and startups that are still spending money on testing and research all all those goodies too.

If you can't afford a guru, fear not, you can take advantage of the low-hanging fruit that really aren't hard to go after at all. Here are some tips for keyword optimization if you are a startup or small business with a tight budget. 

1. Do NOT neglect to optimize your site for your top 10 to 20 keyword phrases. It is worth it. Make this a priority for your web designer or learn it yourself if you have to. In fact, if you cannot afford to hire someone to do anything else for you, you may want to consider hiring a consultant for this area alone. It should (if the consultant is worth anything) include advice for your web site that you may be able to implement yourself.

2. Choose keywords that include your hometown. Guess what, if you do business in a small town, you may have a big advantage! I almost hate to reveal this powerful fact, but nobody seems to get this: People try to target the nearest big city when they market online when they could OWN their own town. My clients own their small towns when it comes to their particular niches. It's LOW hanging fruit. Take it. (Pssst. Real Estate Agents, call me. I've got a heck of a deal for you ;-))

3. Talk about what you want people to search for and find you with. That's really hard to put into words. No fancy tricks will ever replace good, solid, keyword-rich content. If you want people to search "dog grooming" and find you, then write articles about dog grooming and mention that term once in awhile. Don't overdo it for goodness' sake, but use common sense. Search engines love sites that are what they say they are, so BE what you say you are. (I'm trying really hard not to put a big 'DUH' here).

4. Use your favorite keywords in title tags, H1, H2, H3 tags, meta tags, description tags, image tags, etc. 5. If you make your site accessible to the handicapped, you make your site accessible to search engines. A good rule of thumb.

Okay, that's enough for now. I'll try to throw these up for you as I can. I am busy trying to raise my guru status for my clients, but I want to make sure you all are getting some good, solid information here as well. Here's to your online success.