Getting Started with Search Engine Optimization
If you have been trying to earn a living online or get traffic to your website at any time, you’ve likely heard of this mysterious thing called search engine optimization or SEO. In short, SEO is one of many ways to market your website so that you get more traffic, more subscriptions for your email list, and ultimately make more sales.
SEO practices enable people who are searching for your topic to find it (using a search engine like Google Search or Bing), due to the content and information that you put on and off your site.
There are two types of SEO: on-page SEO and off-page SEO. In this report, we’ll talk about both types of SEO and why you need to use it for your business.
SEO encompasses the code you use on your site to make it easy to access and load fast. Plus, SEO involves the titles of your articles, pages, and blog posts. SEO informs how you should format your content in terms of the URL, title, H1 and H2 tags. In addition, SEO helps you develop good titles, and write meta descriptions that get results.
It should be obvious at this point that SEO is an imperative for any business owner who wishes to get more targeted traffic and build their business, plus provide excellence to their customers. Remember, good SEO is all about improving the content on the internet, not stifling you. Search engines just want to send their audience to high-quality, relevant, honest content.
Now let’s start learning about SEO and how you can use it - starting today.
SEO Basics
When we talk about SEO, we must acknowledge that the number one search engine is Google Search. There is no way around it. With over 2 trillion searches happening every year, 100 billion per month, and 2.3 million per day, they cannot be ignored. Google’s job is to deliver quality information to their audience, and they’re serious about it.
Therefore, when you think about SEO you must think about Google and what Google teaches as best practices for webmasters, to ensure that your audience can find you. If you think you can reinvent the wheel here, or trick the system, you’re wrong.
But, thankfully, you can use good SEO practices to get found. The great thing is, this makes the internet better for everyone because their goal is to deliver top-notch results to please their customers.
Two Types of SEO
We mentioned the two types of SEO. On page, SEO consists of anything you do on your website to help search engines differentiate between important content and unimportant content. Things like the content itself, how you format the content, the titles you give the content, and more, all matter.
Off-page SEO concerns itself with anything you do off your site to help your website look more attractive to search engines and your audience, gaining backlinks to your site that help your audience and the search engines know that your site is knowledgeable about the topic you cover.
On-Page SEO
On page, SEO is a way to make the site more accessible, usable, and findable. There are many ways to use SEO tactics right on your website which will not only help the search engines find the content that your audience wants, but will also make the website more attractive to users. After all, users are the most important factor when it comes to your website. Here are the main factors affecting on-page SEO.
* Page content – All the content on your page and keywords
* Page and content formatting – How you format the content
* Smart URLs – Choosing the right URL structure
* Internal linking – How and what you link to within your site, internally
* Image alt text – The description within the alt text of all images
* Navigation – How users navigate your site and allow search engines to crawl your site
* Meta descriptions – How each page is described in the meta description
* Keyword density – This describes the ratio of keywords to other content
* Site map – Helps search engines index your site and (if public) helps users find things
* Site speed – How fast your site loads each page that your audience clicks on
* Usability and accessibility – How easily your users understand and use your site
Paying close attention to these parts of your website will improve your traffic, help you get more sign-ups for your email list, and hopefully make more sales. It’s one of the most important aspects of building an effective website that works for your business.
Off-Page SEO
Off-page SEO are techniques that you use off your website to improve search engine results so that you can get more traffic. Using off-page SEO tactics can help build your brand, build connections with your audience, and send traffic to your website. Using the right tactics depending on your goals, as detailed below, can improve your traffic and authority factor substantially.
* Social media platforms – Using the platforms your audience uses can gain you some respected backlinks to your website
* Discussion participation – Commenting intelligently on discussion boards, forums, blog posts, and on social media
* Guests blogging and writing – Submitting original and unique blog posts and articles to high-ranking authoritative websites and blogs
* Branding – Your branding should be consistent with all things you do on and offline
* Trusted directories – Use association directories like the Chamber of Commerce or well-known directories
* Apps – Offering your customers an app is another way to get them to come back to your site
* Press releases – Sending out press releases is a legitimate way to get attention and links
* Speaking – Whether it’s in person, in public, or on an online show, it’s a great way to build your brand
* Q & A sites – Getting a link back to your site by answering questions about your niche can make you an authority
* Video marketing – Using video through Facebook Live, Zoom.us, YouTube and other mediums to spread awareness
* Customer service – Providing amazing customer service
* Email marketing – Getting people on your list and then marketing to them via the list
* Influencer marketing – Using popular influencers to talk about your products and services
There are so many things you can do off page to enhance awareness and improve your image to customers and search engines. The more authoritative inbound links that go to your website, the better you look to not only search engines but also to users.
The best place to start with search engine optimization is with on-page strategies and tactics.
Developing Your Keyword Strategy
As quickly as the search engines change their algorithms, it seems like you must come up with a new strategy. But, if you use smart techniques designed to make your content better instead of trying to trick the system, you’ll always be ahead of the game. To ensure that you’re using a good keyword strategy, these tips will help.
Types of Keywords
There are single keywords, long-tail keywords, keyword phrases and more. Some keywords are related to the market and some are related to the customer. There are product-focused keywords, thought leader keywords, competing keywords, and related keywords.
Additionally, there are geotargeted keywords. For the purposes of this report, you’re going to want to find long-tail keywords, keyword phrases, and low-competition keywords. A low-competition keyword is easier to rank for because the big-name brands aren’t spending a lot of money trying to attract people to that keyword.
Keyword Research
The first thing you need to do is conduct keyword research. At first, don’t try to come up with too many keywords. But understand that each page needs to have its own main keyword for which you want it to rank, meaning that when someone searches for that keyword, you want them to find that particular content you’ve created for that keyword. But first, find the keywords. There are many ways to go about it.
* Guess - This might seem like terrible advice, but if you’re part of your own demographic then you probably already know some keywords. Make a list of what you’d search for if you were looking for information about your niche. That’s a good starting point for finding more keywords.
* Your audience’s vocabulary – Find where your audience hangs out and observe their discussions and questions. The type of words they use are words you should add to your keyword list.
* Use keyword tools – Google Keyword Planner and Tool comes with your Google AdWords account. You can use the planner to help you find good keywords and keyword phrases, as well as assess the competition level of the keywords you choose.
* Google Trends – This is a great way to find out what is trending in terms of what people are searching for in each niche. You’ll be able to find a lot of content ideas, especially during seasonal spikes.
* WordStream – This keyword search tool offers a lot of features that you can use, and they also have a free version for limited use.
(https://www.wordstream.com/niche-keywords)
* Amazon.com – This is a great way to get ideas for keywords. Just start searching with your guesses and see what comes up.
* YouTube – Like Amazon, finding keywords using YouTube is a great way to find what’s popular.
* Twitter – Twitter is an amazing search engine that you can use to find keywords, starting with other keywords to see what turns up in a search.
* Yoast SEO – This plugin for self-hosted WordPress will make keyword suggestions if you upgrade it.
(https://yoast.com/wordpress/plugins/seo/)
* Ispionage.com – Want to spy on your competitors to find out which keywords they’re using? This is great software to do just that.
(https://www.ispionage.com/Research/default.aspx)
The thing to keep in mind about keywords is that you don’t want to overstuff your website and content with them. Each page of your website - whether it’s your home page, contact page, about page or a blog post - should focus on only one keyword. In addition, you want to keep your keyword density between 1 and 2 percent.
Creating Your Site Structure
Your site structure tells Google, and your audience, what parts of your site are most important. The moment someone gets to your website they’re either going to find what they want, or they’re going to leave. The right site structure will improve SEO and usability too.
Plan Site Hierarchy in Advance
It can help people to write out on paper the navigation of their site. The best site structure looks like a triangle, with the smallest part at the top - which is the main menu. After that, everything links out further and further until you get to an individual blog post and content pages, which are going to mostly be discovered via internal linking.
Make It Logical
The linking structure should be logical in nature. The best way to think about this is to try to put yourself in your customer’s mind and start from the beginning. If you looked at your site for the first time, what would you do? Do you know? Fewer top menu items are better than more, but ensure that it makes sense for the audience.
Set Up Main Categories
When you set up your main categories for your blog, it’s important to choose fewer categories rather than more. You don’t want more than three to seven categories. If you feel like you need more, you’re likely going too far outside your niche. Don’t be broad.
Set Up Subcategories
You can have a lot more subcategories than main categories. Ensure that they go with the main categories very well so that the linking structure makes sense. For example, if you have a pet store, a good link might look like this: http://www.yourpetstore.com/cats/breed/mainecoon. This URL makes for a great keyword-rich link to that category.
Choose the Right Anchor Text
Anchor text means that when you click on a word, it goes to a place in your website. Anchor text needs to be clear so that when your audience or search engine notices the link, it makes sense. There are various types of ways to use anchor text: exact match, partial match, branded, naked link, generic ("click here"), and also images. However, with images it’s best to use text over an image, or an image and text, for the benefit of the search engines.
Keep Important Things Up Front
When setting up the structure, remember that you want to keep the important things up front. The main menu needs to consist of the things most people are used to seeing. For example, "Home", "Blog", "Shop", "About", "Contact" and so forth. Then put everything else lower into the wider part of the triangle.
Use Internal Linking for Deeper Content
To make navigation even more effective, it’s important to develop an internal linking strategy. One way to do that is to always link to more relevant content under any content that your audience is reading. If you do it right, you can take them to all the content you want them to read in order, leading them to your sales page to purchase your product or sign up for your email list.
The main thing is to make your navigation simple. It should be easy for your audience to look around, and easy for the search engines to crawl your website. Remember that using anchor text is better than using images when it comes to structure and linking.
