Bot Friendliness
Never make a site inaccessable to bots. Said bots must crawl the pages of your site so they can index it for searching. Never use image or email verification or admin validation. Those are not good if you want a good PR. And on a forum, make sure you only give them member permissions, as you don't want them indexing the mod and admin control panels.
Keywords
Keywords are always good. Using them strategically on your site can help your site be found more easily. And using them in the domain name is even better.
Reciprocal Links
Search engines like google use reciprocal links to determine your PR. Make sure that you have valid links only and a large number of them. Make sure that those sites link back to you. Top Sites Directories are good because by linking to the votes page, you've got reciprocal links, and you improve your listing there, thus increasing your exposure.
Meta Tags
No, you don't need advanced meta tags. Title, Description, and Keywords are the only three important components. Some people use more advanced ones with extra fields, but they don't increase your success. Make sure you're meta tags are done properly and updates often.
Indexablity
There are three key parts here. Never use javascript links. Hide session ID's from robots. And finally, use a site map if you've got more than a few hundred pages.
Be Proactive
Eventually, search engines will discover you. But be proactive and submit it to them first. Plenty of free sites will give you a standard form and auto-submit it to dozens of sites. Make sure you fill out as many of those forms as possible so that you get noticed by as many search engines as possible.
If All Else Fails
If all else fails, drop some cash and get a program for SEO like SEO Studio
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