SEO, or Search Engine Optimization, is the process of signaling to search engines such as Google that your website contains high-quality, relevant information on your topic. For example, if you had a website about dog training, you'd be setting up your website with certain pieces of information about dog training so that Google will display it in the results when people search for that information.

Think of it as proving your site's worth to your target site visitors, so that Google will want to point them in your direction. Alongside pay-per-click (PPC) advertising, this is one of the biggest methods affiliates employ to get visitors to their websites.

There are many SEO elements to consider, both on your website and off the site, all of which are covered in the lessons in this category.

On-Page SEO
On your website itself, you'll want to make sure you have some well researched keywords (see the Market Research lessons section for more information on keyword research) in strategic locations. Here you'll learn about placing those keywords, the correct use of a title tag and meta description, as well as the use of h tags and alt tags. Basically, you're making it easy for web crawlers like Google bots to read your website, directing their attention to your information. 

You'll also want to ensure you have a solid site structure, some multimedia in your posts, and rich text markup, which you can learn about in these lessons as well.

Off-Page SEO
The other way of encouraging a higher ranking for your website is to have other websites linking to yours, providing you with what's known as a "backlink." This works like a reference on a CV, and just like a reference, the higher the reference's authority, the more weight it will have. A backlink from a high-ranking website is a lot more valuable to you than a couple of backlinks from websites that have lower rankings with the search engines. To learn about how you can implement SEO strategies, both on page and off page, head on through to these lessons.