Search engine optimization might seem like a thing of the past, but most successful businesses still emphasize SEO in 2022. It’s a great way to drive traffic to your site and gain new visitors each day your content lives on the web. With so many competitors out there, everyone needs to find a way to stand out from the crowd.
Working with SEO requires three main types of practice. These items are on-page SEO, technical SEO, and off-site SEO. We’ll review what all three of these are, how you apply them at your company, and other SEO tips to excel in online marketing and sales.
On-Page SEO
Creating an on-page SEO strategy is exactly what it sounds like. You want to make SEO content that ranks on Google and search engines because the writing, pictures, and information is relevant and desired by consumers who search for it.
Take getting car insurance quotes online as an example. If you are a web user trying to find these quotes, you are going to be attracted to articles with keywords in this subject area. Terms like an insurance policy, annual rates, sedan insurance, truck insurance, etc. should all show up on a page instructing people to find insurance rates online.
Where these words show up on the page is just as important as their existence altogether. Readers want to be able to skim the work for what they are looking for rather than reading your whole article. Each sentence should be rich with information.
The best SEO content is easy to digest and it’s very understandable. You want to create catchy headlines, and informational subheadings, and write in short sentences so the search engine can pick up on vital bits of information.
Think about smaller ways you can infuse your content with searchable terms. Captions on images and videos are not often thought about by writers, but these items are great ways to add to your content. People love seeing visual aids in their articles because they explain what they’re looking for.
Diagrams, charts, or media can have keywords describing them underneath. This will bring your page to life even more than it already is.
Off-Site SEO
Once again, this type of SEO is right in the title. Whereas everything we talked about already has to do with what is on a webpage on your site, off-site SEO is the effort to direct people to your site from a different page. This can happen in a variety of ways.
Try to capitalize on social media for your initial off-site efforts. Getting topics trending on Twitter or Facebook (for example, the launch of new advertising campaigns with the most recognized insurance mascots — Progressive’s Flo and the Geico Gecko) will lead to people clicking on your content that is hyperlinked on these social media websites.
Make a hashtag related to a product or service. It has to be unique and tie back to your site so when people click on the hashtag, it leads to tweets or posts with links to your site. There’s also the matter of linking to your website through other non-affiliated websites.
This can be done through guest posting or other types of blogging. This makes the strategy of creating external links feel very natural. You incorporate keywords to other people’s work onto the page.
Form a relationship with a third-party site where you link to their work and vice versa. This will benefit both parties and lead to a solid relationship between websites.
Don’t partner with a competing site, though. Try to find a webpage that is daily unrelated to yours and partner with them to create a link-building strategy.
Technical SEO
Technical SEO is the most complicated part of content creation compared to on-page and off-page SEO. This is because technical SEO involves the structure of your website and how you’re setting it up to succeed. This isn’t as much about content, keywords, and links.
Technical aspects of SEO involve optimizing your site so the search engines can easily identify your site. Make sure your site is non-cluttered. Organize your content into categories. Having distinct sections on your site is a great way to make it easy to navigate.
For example, ESPN ranks very high on SEO searches because they categorize all of their articles by sport. There’s an NFL page, an NBA page, an MLB page, etc. These different pages that house all of the subject’s articles make it easy to identify what each piece of content will be about.
Make sure you check your site for bugs and malware. This is vital upkeep to maintain an innovative site. Ignoring and not adapting to technical SEO standards will make it hard to gain new readers because they can’t find or get through your site as easily.
You can see how SEO is still a valuable tool when advertising, marketing, and creating content. Put in the research, time, and effort to make sure your site is up to SEO standards and can continue to flourish for years to come.
About Author:
Shawn Laib writes and researches for the auto insurance comparison site, AutoInsurance.org. He wants to make sure people understand the value of SEO content marketing.
