In this article, we will talk about how to increase your SEO in your DotNetNuke site. DotNetNuke (DNN) is an open source content management system powered by ASP.NET/Microsoft IIS web-based technologies. Although the CMS is open source, the web component platform is proprietary. The most common database used in DNN is Microsoft SQL Server, while as of June 2010, most DNN websites can be run using ASP.NET 3.5.

Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is a cross-functional discipline and to achieve findable websites, a variety of tactics must be employed. When building DotNetNuke (DNN) websites, optimizing your websites for findability can be exceptionally challenging. DotNetNuke has many SEO features. These SEO features, however, can have a dramatic effect on how your DNN website is indexed by Google, Bing and others, and as such, can have an effect on your page rank and search results.
Start Using Semantic Markup in the Skin
Semantic markup is crucial to providing context to your content. As modules are added to the page to create the content of your site, additional markup is often a necessary evil in providing the features native to DotNetNuke. By using semantically correct markup in your skin, you’re boiling the cream to the top.

Site Settings
Here we’ll talk about one of things NOT to do when it comes to SEO in DotNetNuke. In the “site settings” of DotNetNuke, administrators have the ability to enter descriptions and keywords. By doing that, those items will then be placed in the META tags for EVERY page on the DNN website. For SEO, this is an extreme no-no, as it will confuse the search engines and reduce the relevancy and page rank of your overall DNN website. It may be an easy way to get keywords throughout your site… but it will definitely hurt you in the long run!
Make your URLs Friendlier
DNN has been making a slow journey toward a friendlier URLs. If you’re interested (and you should be) in moving faster toward full control over your URLs there are a number of extensions that will give you a long list of features make your URLs even friendlier.
Page Titles
One of the nice features about DotNetNuke is its ability to add dashes between spaced words in your page title. For example, if you title a page “DNN SEO Tips”, DNN will title the actual URL as “DNN-SEO-Tips”. This ensures that the individual words in the title will be relevant to Google.
Submit a XML Sitemap
Each DNN site automatically generates a XML sitemap (sitemap.aspx) Page Priority Starting in DNN 5.01, individual pages can have a specific priority assigned in the XML sitemap. Starting in version 5.01, DNN allows you to explicitly assigning page priority to your pages to instruct search engine bots on the hierarchy of your sites’ pages. Additionally, it is important to submit your XML sitemap to search engines.
Robots.txt
OK, this one gets a bit technical for the casual DotNetNuke administrator, but robots.txt is an important factor when comes to SEO, so what we’ll do in this section is give you enough information that you can intelligently go to your IT person or your hosting provider to ask questions.
DNN Takes Care of Meta Content
The last consideration is not so much a task, but a reminder to take care of your page meta content. DotNetNuke does a lot of the work for you in generating Demonstrate the source of meta content in DNN. It is arguable as to whether this content is relevant or considered in search engine rankings, but it can’t hurt to provide more context for your site.