Content is the most important thing in this era where online presence is a must to create an opportunity.
But, there are thousands of content present online. How can anyone make their content win in the competition?
SEO is the answer.
SEO? What is this?
Let’s introduce it and dive into the process.
What Is SEO?
SEO is a process that helps a content/website achieve a higher rank in any search engine ( Google, Yahoo, etc.)
This is a process where you optimize online content in such a way that a search engine like google places it on the top of a page when someone searches for that type of content.
SEO is different from paid advertisements as it works organically. You don’t have to pay for this.
Let’s discuss with an example-
When you search ‘Best places to visit in Delhi’ on the Google search bar, you get so many search results. Some pieces of content among them take place on the first page and some of them can’t make it to the first page.
Those contents that appear in the higher rank are SEO friendly. They are well-optimized and as a result, they rank higher on google.
Importance of SEO
The majority of internet users prefer Google to search for anything and 70% of them don’t scroll beyond the first page of Google.
There are hundreds of results for any topic.
In this competition, if you want your content to stand out, you have to use SEO.
SEO can assist you to improve the engagement of your website. Making any content SEO-friendly helps a search engine to find it out easily and give more eyeballs.
ON-Page and Off-Page SEO
We can do the optimization using two paths- On-page and Off-page SEO.
On-page SEO contains-
- Making quality content.
- Including relevant keywords
- Using keyword-rich metatags
- Regularity in creating/writing content
Off-page SEO contains-
- Optimizing a website itself
- Creating and developing backlinks
- Creating content that can get shares
SEO Marketing
SEO is not a one-and-done process. It takes heaps of time and action to stand out. It requires daily actions to get deep-rooted and long-term success.
Let’s understand the process and elements of SEO marketing.
Making Great Content
Bill Gates predicted in 1996 that- “ Content is king”.
Today this is the most appropriate thing ever.
Producing valuable and great content is the first step toward performing well in SEO marketing.
Here are some elements that enhance the possibility to rank higher.
- Quality- The content you write should add value to your readers. Better quality content is more likely to rank better.
Eliminate all grammatical errors and make the content free from plagiarism.
In the era of competition in content creation, you have to research what your competitors are doing and simply add more value and make it more approachable.
- Intent- You have to study the intent of a searcher when he/she searches for something.
If anyone is searching for ‘ Benefits of having black coffee’ and your content ( that contains the same keywords) ends up with the process of making black coffee, the reader will leave your site as soon as the content can’t fulfill their intent.
The right answer for every single query is what a search engine craves for.
- Freshness- Keeping your content fresh and up-to-date helps with Google ranking. Incorporating new statistics, and renovating old and broken links are some great methods to show Google your content is still eligible to rank higher.
Keyword Research
The term ‘keyword’ represents what your content is all about.
It becomes easy to incorporate keywords if you know what terms your target audiences use to find a content/website that resembles yours. This process is known as keyword research.
After doing keyword research you can optimize your content accordingly.
I have a list of tools that you can use for keyword research.
- Google Keyword Planner
- Google Search Console
- Ubersuggest
- Semrush
- KWfinder
- Ahrefs
- Serpstat
- WordStream
- TubeBuddy
- Keyworddit
- QuestionDB
- AnswerThePublic
Here are some tips to select the best keyword-
- Rather than doing research manually, use keyword research tools. That will be more effective.
- Google always wants to match the intent. You have to understand the intent first. If your target audiences are buyers, your content should sell something. Answering a question will target the readers, not the buyers.
- To know the best keywords of your niche, spy on some websites that rank higher in the same niche. Don’t copy them but take inspiration. You can copy their URL and paste it into a keyword research tool to get the highest performing keywords and use them accordingly to optimize your content.
Site HTML
The HTML of your site is an important part of the SEO game.
Optimizing the elements of HTML assists in achieving a higher google ranking.
- Title tags are the blue/purple-colored headings that come first when a searcher searches for any content. Making it appealing and keyword-rich helps the content get more eyeballs.
- The meta description is the area below the title tag that should contain information that attracts the reader to read the full article.
- You also have to optimize the schema, subheadings, URL slug, etc in order to rank higher on a search engine.
Trustworthiness
Building trust is a much-needed element to create an impact on a search engine.
Here are some guidelines you can follow-
- Take inspiration from your competitors but don’t ever steal their creations and claim them as yours. Having plagiarism destroys the trust.
- Optimization has its limits too. Don’t make it over-optimized by stuffing keywords.
- Reposting the same content on a big platform (for example- Medium) hurts the ranking. As Medium is the more authoritative domain, Google will index the medium article first.
- Using ‘HTTPS’ in your URL helps to build trust. It increases security and safety as well.
Building Backlinks
Building links in the right way is one of the major factors that accelerate gaining a higher Google ranking. Following the right tactics will bring long-term engagement.
How to do this?
Well, you have to keep your eyes on some important factors in building backlinks.
- The quality of the links matters over the number of links. A backlink should refer to a right and valuable resource.
- Instead of taking shortcuts, invest time and pitch yourself to a site telling them about the value you can add to their website.
- Remove broken, spammy, unnecessary links and keep the content fresh. Google offers the ‘Disavow tool’ to remove such links.
EAT Guideline
Google has a guideline to evaluate any content- the EAT guideline.
- Expertise
- Authority
- Trustworthiness
These are the three parameters of EAT Guideline to judge any content.
Doing required research, making content that satisfies the reader, fulfilling the searcher’s need, and doing everything in a legit way can make your content stand out in the parameters.
Search Engine Algorithm
Any search engine implements an operation to rank a website. This is called the algorithm.
The algorithm keeps changing. Hence, sometimes it seems impossible to rank higher.
In this situation, giving too much attention to the algorithm is a waste of time. Rather you should focus on your content and leave the rest in the hands of time.
Still, need some help?
Here are some bonus materials (tools) to help you.
- seositecheckup – Free tool for website audit.
- buzzsumo- For content research
- search-console- To measure the traffic on your site
- Grammarly- For grammatical-error-free content and check the plagiarism ( both free and paid version is available)
- Trends.google.com – Predicts the popularity of a search term
- quora – For long-tail keyword research and searching for content.
- pagespeed- To make your website fast and bugs-free.
What now?
Learn SEO, practice it, implement the skill and be an SEO expert.
