As an Internet marketing professional, I get asked a lot of questions about doing business online. Recently, a friend turned me on to Yahoo! Answers ans asked me to respond to a few questions. Each day now, I'm spending about 15 minutes responding to questions related to marketing, internet marketing, and SEO. Here's a recent dialog that I wanted to share with my blog readers.

Question: What is On-Page Optimization and Why Is It Important To Your Website?

Answer: Search Engine Optimization is the combination of both on-page optimization and off-page optimization. Both are essential for reaching #1 rankings. I like to explain the concept in terms of building a house. If you want the tallest, most sturdy house on the block, you need a strong foundation. This is where on-page optimization comes in.

On-page optimization is what you do to make your sight highly visible to search engines. The easier your site is to crawl, the more accessible it is, and therefore, the easier to rank.

That said, you need to follow good on-page optimization principles. Many of which are listed in the various responses here. My favorites are: use of H1, H2, and H3 tags; proper Meta Tags including a robots.txt file, a keyword density between 3 - 4% and the use of bold and italicized keywords. Don't underestimate the power of good meta tags. Keep your title tag to less than 60 characters and your keywords to no more than 12. Make sure your description repeats your keyword phrase twice and your good to go.

Two final important mentions. Give a lot of thought to your navigation. Search engine spiders use this to access all the pages of your website. Make sure your links are easy to follow and minimize java. Lastly, use submit a site map to Google - you'll be glad you did.

I hope you found this question and answer valuable. When thinking about doing business online, all forms of optimization are important. Check back for my answers to other frequently asked questions!