There are a lot of things in Search Engine Optimization when done to your site that can increase you rankings. But one aspect that always comes up and that always affects your rankings in a huge way is altering the title tag.

The title tag is perhaps the most important tag out of all your html tags that can make or break your optimization process.

The reason why this is so is because the title tag is seen and always present in the search engine results pages.

The search engines always take the contents out of the tag and inserts them into the contents of the result pages in the search engines. And this is why the title tag should compile the contents or summarize the contents of your website to a "T".

It is this summarization of your site with the title tag that can take you into the top rankings, (along with some other aspects of course) or leave you in the bottom rankings.

With the title tag, each search engine looks at it and uses it primarily the same way, to summarize and compile the websites contents for its search engine users. It is primarily the HOW and WHERE the keywords are placed within the tag thats most crucial.

The HOW and WHERE your keywords are in your title tag are the most important element with to which you can get benefit from using title tag.

Below are a few items with which you can compare your title tag against before launching your webpage.

** Be sure your title tag is keyword rich
** Try to put the more important keywords in the first part of your title tag (in the first half of your title)
** Try to keep your tag to a minimum in length, including spaces
** Try not to use to many, if any, stop words(a, the, it, etc.)
** Try to weave in and implement webcopy tactics too if possible.

To sum up, search engines use the title tag primarily to sum up the sites content for its users, and also weigh it most heavily compared to the other tags, so it pays to take the time to craft an award winning title tag as it's the most used and most visible tag within the search engine result pages.

This article was written by Burke Ferguson of the-ace-ezine.com. Burke holds both a BSc. degree in Computer Science as well Certification in Search Engine Optimization and Marketing Strategies. He also regularly publishes The ACE! newsletter, in which he shares his experience, methods, and knowledge with others. Burke can be contacted by his main website AltaCanWeb.com.