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More than half of web users rely on search engines (SE) to navigate pages.

Every web page is stored in a file. Using file names that are relevant to the content of your web page is important for numerous reasons. Beside your domain name, the SE spiders see your file names before anything else. If your file names are not relevant to the content contained on that page, the SE can algorithmically detect a disconnect. Taking the extra time to ensure that file names are properly designed can provide an added boost to your rankings. Creating descriptive categories and filenames for the documents on your website can not only help you keep your site better organized, but it could also lead to better crawling of your documents by SE.

When users link to a page from a search engine, they should know immediately how the page relates to their query. Highlight keywords, start the page with a summary, and follow the guidelines listed under Scannability.

Include in each page all possible query terms that can be used to search for the topic of the page. List the most important terms in a Keywords meta-tag together with all common synonyms (even ones not included in the body text). Include generic terms used by customers or competing companies to describe the topic of the page. Use only keywords that describe the main topic of a page.

Each page must have a Title tag. It is the first thing a visitor sees when finding web page on the SE results. Create title text of a single line, typically no more than 60 characters. Make sure that the first 40 characters of the title describe the topic of the page: titles are often truncated in navigation menus and by search engines. Make the first word of the title the most important descriptor of the page: Users often scan down long lists of titles to choose pages. Do not begin a title with a generic term ("Welcome to") or an article ("The"). The title should make sense when viewed completely out of context, as part of a long list of other page titles. Give different titles to different pages: Pages about the same topic can start with the same words but should end with words that explain the difference between them. Titles can contain no markup or highlighting. Titles must be written in mixed case. In rare cases, a single keyword might be emphasized by use of UPPERCASE (do not use for the first word in the title: being first is sufficient emphasis).

Each page should have a short summary in a Description meta-tag. This summary is shown below the page title by some search engines. The page description tag is a sentence, usually a maximum of 25 words (up to 200 characters, including spaces), that describes your page. Descriptions must make sense when read completely out of context of the site (though you can assume that they will be seen together with the page title). It comes up on a user's screen as the result of a search in some search engines. If there is no description tag, the search engine might use the first 25, 50 or 100 words appearing on your webpage to describe your site. Descriptions should tell users what the page is about and allow them to judge whether it is of relevance to their current problem. Do not fill descriptions with hyperbole or promotional language; concentrate on the facts. In the description tag, use as many keywords as possible, but make sure the sentence is coherent.

Example: ualberta.ca
The official website of the University of Alberta. The site acts as a portal to every web page on campus and to ExpressNews.