Search engine optimization is the practice of guiding the development or redevelopment of a website so that it will naturally attract visitors by winning top ranking on the major search engines for selected search terms and phrases.

While the public generally refers to all Internet searching tools as “search engines, there are actually three different types:

Search engines -Inktomi, AltaVista, Google, Teoma, AllTheWeb, MSN, and others

Directories - Open Directory, Yahoo, LookSmart, and others

Portals - AOL, Netscape, iWon, Lycos, HotBot, Excite, WebCrawler, and others

Search engines and directories take the following variables into consideration when determining your site’s ranking in the results for a specific search:

Quality
Title
Description
Content
Popularity
Optimization

Search engines, directories and portals use the elements above in various combinations to determine the ranking of search results.