SEO is crucial to your business’s success so you must have a coherent strategy in place. SEO is the process of improving where you appear in search results. Google’s algorithm takes over 200 factors into consideration to determine where to place a website based on keyword placement and usage.
When your business appears at the top of the search results for your chosen keywords, you’ll generate more traffic, sales, leads, and engagement. This comes from how people use search engines. For example, if you appear on the second page of Google then only 5% of the people who type in your keyword will potentially land on your site.
If your goal is to make it to the elusive first page of Google, then these tips will show you how to get started:
1. Optimise your website speed and performance
One of the most important factors in your SEO ranking is your website’s speed and performance. If you visit a site that takes a long time to load then you’ll probably get annoyed and be bounced after waiting.
A high bounce rate can hurt your overall SEO score and if you’re not optimising your website for speed then you may see many leads leave your site, which sends a bad signal to Google’s algorithm. Generally, your page should load in three seconds and when it takes longer than this then users start bouncing at a high rate.
When people leave without clicking anything else on your page, this tells Google that there’s nothing helpful for users looking for that specific keyword. As a result, your website gets pushed down in the rankings and your traffic will quickly drop.
There are several ways you can speed up your site and improve performance. You can start by compressing your images and deactivating plugins that you’re not using. These two changes can dramatically boost loading times, which will encourage visitors to stick around and browse your site. If you’re still experiencing issues then you should consider switching your hosting provider.
2. Create ‘link-worthy’ content
Almost every successful business has a company blog where it publishes advice, tutorials, and more. Small businesses with blogs tend to generate 126% more leads, which is a great lead. You can further improve this number and your SEO ranking by creating content that your users want to click on.
Google uses both the number of pages on your site and how relevant they are to user inquiries when deciding where to position your website in the rankings. If you frequently post helpful and engaging content, you can get nearly 434% more pages indexed by the search giant.
The best way to create clickable content is to publish posts that resonate with your customers’ goals, pain points, and questions. When someone sees one of your articles, they should want to read it because they feel like there’s something of value for them within the article.
You need to turn the promise of a value proposition into something all your readers can use. Think about why customers use your products, develop customer personas, and then create content that matches most of your customers’ personalities and desires.
The type of business that you operate will help you determine what kind of content you post. If you’re creating ‘click-worthy’ content then Google will recognise this trend and you’ll see your site gradually climb toward the first page of search results for your chosen keywords.
3. Look for external linking opportunities
Many new business owners assume that they can fine-tune their internal links and their site will instantly start ranking on Google. The reality is that you need external links to spread brand awareness, build connections, and boost your ranking position.
The average site with a number 1 page rank has at least 35 000 external links. This can seem overwhelming but there are plenty of ways to build external links on your site. One of the most popular ways to accomplish this is by looking for guest posting opportunities. Your goal is to find publications in your industry that use a blog to connect with their audience. Reach out to these publications and brands to see if they’re accepting guest posts on their blog.
Start thinking of clever topic ideas that you can pitch to provide value to their audience. Make sure to consider that their target audience might be different to your own and you may need to find a way to bridge topics between your brand and partner publication.
Generally, partner publications will let you include an author bio that links back to your website. When a reader finds your partner post, they may be intrigued and click your link at the bottom of the page, which drives more traffic to your website. Extra traffic and external links tell Google that your site has value and is worth ranking for specific keywords and phrases.
4. Focus on medium- and long-tail keywords
Instead of focusing on a general industry term, you must think about user intent and choose more specific keywords based on traffic for those words and competition. For example, if you run an online pet supply store, then you would probably start targeting the keyword ‘pet supplies’, which is problematic because it’s used frequently in the industry and you’ll have a difficult time ranking for that phrase.
However, if you choose to target phrases like ‘quality cat toys and scratchers’, then you have a better chance of improving your SEO position because this specific keyword has less competition. The more unique long-tail keywords you target, the more often you’ll appear in search results. You can quickly spread awareness and grow your lead list by actively targeting several low-competition keywords at once.
SEO has changed drastically over the last decade and this continually evolving aspect must be understood, tracked, and improved if you want to scale up to a globally-recognised brand.