Organic search engine optimization (SEO) sets out to accomplish two goals:

The first is to modify a website's content and code structure so that its pages are more likely to indexed by search engines, and ultimately,

The second is to help the search engines view the site as being highly relevant for certain phrases or keywords, with the goal generally being to achieve rankings on the first one to three pages of natural search results. These results appear as non-paid listings that are deemed to be relevant to a user's search query by the search engine's algorithms.

The overall goal of SEO endeavors is consistent with other marketing activities - to develop relationships and further qualify prospects along the buying cycle continuum with the final goal of sales conversion. There is some benefit to purely gaining high rankings: it does assure a company that they are receiving the most visibility and credibility for the topic being searched. This is somewhat akin to accomplishing brand awareness as one would with a traditional PR effort.

However, as with other effective marketing tactics, it is also important that SEO efforts focus on gaining a response. It is most desirable that the prospects choose to click through the listing to a page where they find relevant and engaging information and further interaction opportunities, so that they accomplish their information pursuit goals. Those goals could be actually completing a purchase transaction, or smaller steps towards a decision in a longer buying cycle.

The core components of a successful SEO program are:

Getting Your Site Indexed. There are common technical site structure barriers that can prevent a website from being crawled and indexed by search engines, ruling out any possibility that the site's pages will be shown in the organic results. Analyzing your site for these limitations and eliminating is the first step to a successful SEO effort.

Achieving Optimal Relevancy through on-page optimization. There are key considerations for the content, tagging, and structure of your site, which all factor into how highly your pages are ranked by the search engines' relevancy algorithms.

Understanding the Impact of Link Referrals. Search engine algorithms are known to award sites that have numerous credible, relevant websites linking to them. In essence, these are votes by the community and peers that your site's content is valuable and relevant to the particular keyword phrase that you want to rank high for. Seeking out these links is a worthwhile endeavor to gain higher rankings. It is important to favor quality links over the quantity of links you gain.