Heading tags are used to specify significant portions of content. The most commonly used is the H1 tag though there are obviously others (or they wouldn't bother numbering them would they). The H1 tag is given a significant amount of weïght in the algorithm provided that it is not abused through overuse (it should only be used once per page). Try to keep your headings short-and-sweet. They are there to tell your visitor what the page is about, not your whole site.

Special formats are, for the purpose of this article, text formatting that distinguishes a set of characters or words apart from other text. This includes such things as anchor text, bold, italic, different font colors, etc. When you set content apart using special formats, MSN will read this as a part of your content that you want to draw attention to and which you obviously want your visitors to see. This will increase the weïght of that content. Now, don't go making all your keyword bold or some such - simply make sure to use special formats properly. Inline text links (links in the body content of your page) are a great way to increase the weïght of specific text while actually helping your visitor by providing easy paths to pages they may be interested in.

Offsite SEO Factors

With MSN, the offsite factors are much simpler to deal with than either Google or Yahoo! MSN will give you full credït for a link the day they pick it up, so link building while time consuming, is rewarded much quicker on MSN. When dealing with MSN and offsite SEO, there are two main factors to consider when acquiring links:

Relevancy. The site must be relevant to your site to hold any real weïght.

Quality is better than quantity. Because PageRank is Google-specific we can't use it as the grading tool for MSN. Spending extra time to find quality sites, however, is well rewarded. Also, obtaining one-way links as opposed to reciprocal links is becoming increasingly important, and I'd recommend utilizing both in your link building strategies.

You should begin your offsite optimization by running link checks on your competitors to see what you're up against. This is also a good place to look for potential link partners though those of you using a tool such as Total Optimizer Pro or PR Prowler will find it far faster and more effective to use these tools.

Conclusion

This entire article may seem fairly simplistic and there's a reason for that. What we've noted above is a list of the more important areas. However, to save you frustration and me from receiving hundreds of emails a few months from now noting that the keyword densities don't work, etc. I've tried to keep it general. Below you'll find a list of recommended resources. These are tools and SEO resources to help keep you updated and on top of the rankings