The SEO process...step by step

[IPIM]

In what order do you carry out your SEO? do you start with keyword research or competitor analysis or is it on-page and then on to link building, do you concentrate on article submissions and then move on to social networking?

List your step by step process here.

[EGOL]

Begin by learning about the client's business, then helping the client understand the opportunities and then make a plan based upon client's business objectives.

[SteveOllington]

Yeah it's always different really, depends on so many different things... and every client is different.

If you mean once the tech side of it starts, that would still be a hell of a list... you'd have to write a book to list everything you did step by step lol.

Often though yes, Keyword Research would be the starting point of the practical side of things, I would't say comp analysis came after it so much as being mixed in with it though.

[CPU]

I would always carry out analysis of the site I was working on before I look at competitor analysis.Keyword analysis would form part of this to ensure that I knew what relevant words and phrases should be targeted.

Next I would look at the content of the site to see if it contains the phrases in all the relevant places (title tag, alt text etc). A key task would then be to make sure there are no technical issues reducing the chances of your site ranking highly.

I would look to get the on-page elements sorted before focusing on link building as the site may not deserve a link until on-page issues are sorted out.

With regards to the benefits of article submissions and social networking I would advise you to research these areas a little more as low quality articles strewn across the web may not be the best course of action and social media aspects may or may not be worth chasing depending on whether there will be ongoing resource available to support the initial efforts.