In terms of SEO, what’s the best strategy to use when ranking for a name with 2 different spellings?

I’ve created an interactive resume/electronic portfolio of myself online – but all of my site’s content uses my full name MICHAEL. What if people search for MIKE? My site comes up as the 4th listing for MICHAEL (LAST NAME) but not on the first page for MIKE (LAST NAME). Does anyone know what I can do so I can rank for both MICHAEL and MIKE?

Hi Mpax,

You can try to help the search engines position you for both terms:

Ex: Title Tag:

<title>John Michaels – John Mike – Resume – Atlanta Georgia Software Engineer </title>
what this does is use both of the names in the tag in a prominent position, and also detail other relevant info.

Ex Description: <meta name="description" content="John Michaels interactive resume and electronic portfolio. Learn more about this talented Atlanta, Georgia software engineer.">

Ex Keywords: <meta name="keywords" content="John Michaels, John Mike, Atlanta Georgia resume, Atlanta Software Engineer, knowledge">

You can also build external links from high page rank blog sites to the site with both spellings of your name. If you optimize the page for your primary name, and include a little bit of text to address the shortened last name, the links you build to this page will have more value.

I’d be happy to help you – drop me a line via email with your site.

Brian