SEO Basics
Every website needs traffic in order to be successful.
Set up GSC and Bing Webmaster tools
Google and Bing offer webmaster tools that allow you to view your website through their eyes. This is useful for a number of reasons, including:
-Helping you to identify and fix crawl errors
-Understanding how Google/Bing see your website
-Submitting sitemaps
-Viewing backlinks
-Identifying manual actions/penalties
Setting up webmaster tools is a fairly simple process that only requires you to verify that you own the website in question. Once you have verified ownership, you will be able to access a wealth of data and information about your website.
Set up Google Analytics
If you want to track your SEO progress, Google Analytics is a must. Google Analytics is a free web analytics tool that gives you insight into how people interact with your website. It’s essential for understanding which of your SEO efforts are working and which need improvement.
To set up Google Analytics, you’ll need to create a Google account and then sign up for Analytics. Once you’re signed in, you’ll be given a Tracking ID. This Tracking ID is a code that needs to be added to every page of your website that you want to track.
Once you have your Tracking ID, there are a few different ways to add it to your website. If you’re using WordPress, there are plugins like Google Analytics for WordPress that make it easy to add your Tracking ID to your website. Otherwise, you can add the tracking code directly to your website’s code.
Once you have your Tracking ID set up, it can take up to 24 hours for data to start appearing in your Analytics account. But once it does, you’ll be able to see valuable information about how people are finding and interacting with your website.
Install and configure an SEO plugin (wordpress)
The WordPress SEO by Yoast plugin is a popular choice for configuring an SEO plugin on a WordPress site. The plugin allows you to configure many aspects of your site’s SEO, including title tags, metatags, and keyword density. Once the plugin is installed and activated, you will see a new menu item in your WordPress dashboard called “SEO”.
To configure the plugin, click on the “SEO” menu item in your dashboard and then click on the “General” tab. On this page, you can enter your site’s title and description, as well as configure other settings such as whether or not to display metatags in your site’s header.
Once you have configured the general settings, you can begin configuring individual pages and posts on your site. To do this, simply edit a page or post and scroll down to the “Yoast SEO” box. In this box, you can enter a focus keyword for the page or post, as well as tweak the page’s title and description.
As you edit each page and post on your site, be sure to keep an eye on the “traffic light” indicators that appear in the Yoast SEO box. These indicators will let you know if you are meeting the minimum requirements for each page or post in terms of keyword density, metatags, etc.
Keyword Research
The title of this article is a quote by J. Cole and it is also our focus keyword. Every saint has a past and every sinner has a future is a phrase that means everyone makes mistakes, everyone has a past, and everyone has the potential for a bright future. We are going to be discussing keyword research and how you can use this phrase to help you with your SEO.
Identify your competitors
Before you can begin to understand how to improve your website’s ranking, you must first identify your main competitors. Once you know who they are, you can begin to track their progress and see where they are succeeding, so that you can replicate their methods.
There are a few different ways that you can go about finding your competitors. The most obvious way is to simply type your chosen keyword into a search engine and see who appears on the first page of results. If you don’t want to limit yourself to only those websites that rank highly for your chosen keyword, then you could also try typing in related keywords and seeing who appears for those too.
Another way of finding competitors is to look at who is advertising on Google AdWords for the keyword that you have chosen. You can do this by using the ‘Display Planner’ tool within Google AdWords. This will show you all of the websites that are currently running ads through Google for your chosen keyword. These websites are likely to be your main competitors, as they are willing to pay money in order to appear prominently in search results for this keyword.
Once you have a list of competitor websites, it’s time to start tracking their progress. You can do this using a number of different tools and methods, but one of the most effective is to set up Google Alerts for each competitor website. This will send you an email whenever one of your competitor websites is mentioned online, which will help you to keep track of any new developments or progress that they are making.
Conduct a keyword gap analysis
When conducting keyword research, one method that can be useful is a keyword gap analysis. This helps you to determine which keywords your competitors are ranking for that you are not. In order to do this, you will need to:
- Make a list of your competitor’s websites
- Use a keyword research tool to identify the keywords they are ranking for
- Compare this list to the keywords you are targeting
- Identify any gaps
Once you have identified any gaps, you can then look at ways to target these keywords. This could involve creating new content or optimizing existing content.
Find your main ‘money’ keywords
Before you can even think about targeting any keywords, you first need to come up with a list of potentialsearch terms that your target audience might be using to find products or services like yours.
This can be a daunting task, especially if your business is new or you’re not sure where to start. However, there are a few tried and true methods that can help you come up with an initial list of keywords to target.
One way to generate a list of potential keywords is to simply think about the various ways that someone might search for your products or services. For example, if you sellwidgets, someone might search for “buy widgets online,” “cheap widgets,” or “widgets near me.”
Another way to research potential keywords is to look at what your competitors are targeting. To do this, simply visit their websites and take note of the terms they are using on their site, in their metatags, and in their ads. You can also use tools like Google AdWords Keyword Planner and Moz Keyword Explorer to research potential keywords.
Once you have a general idea of the kinds of keywords you want to target, you can begin thinking about how to narrow down your list and prioritize the best keyword opportunities. This process is known as keyword research, and there are a few different criteria you can use to prioritize your list of keywords.
Some factors you may want to consider include:
-Search volume: How many people are searching for each keyword?
-Competition: How difficult will it be to rank for each keyword?
-Relevance: How closely related is each keyword to your products or services?
- buyer intent:What is the goal of each searcher? Are they lookingTo learn more? To make a purchase?
Technical SEO
Technical SEO is the practice of optimizing a website to rank higher in search engine results. It covers a broad range of topics, including but not limited to: site structure, sitemaps, redirects, 404 errors, canonicalization, and more. Technical SEO can be a complex and daunting task, but it is important to ensure that your website is accessible and visible to search engines.
Leverage “Inspect URL” feature in GSC
Google provides a great tool for technical SEO called “Inspect URL”. You can find this tool under the “Diagnostics” tab in Google Search Console. The “Inspect URL” feature allows you to check if there are any issues with your website that could be impacting your search engine rankings.
Here’s how to leverage this powerful tool:
- Enter the URL of the page you want to check in the “Inspect URL” field.
- Click the “Inspect” button.
- Google will then show you any issues with the page, such as errors, warnings, and redirects.
- Fix any issues that are reported and resubmit the page for Inspection.
Ensure your website is mobile-friendly
It’s 2018, and if your website isn’t mobile-friendly, you’re losing out on a lot of traffic and potential customers. In fact, Google’s latest algorithm update, Mobilegeddon 2.0, prioritizes mobile-friendly websites in its search results.
If you want your website to rank well in Google’s search results, it needs to be optimized for mobile devices. Google provides a free tool that allows you to test whether your website is mobile-friendly. Simply enter your website’s URL and the tool will analyze your pages and tell you if there are any problems that need to be fixed.
Some common issues that can make a website mobile-unfriendly are listed below:
-Text that is too small to read
-Links that are too close together
- Pages that take too long to load
-Using Flash instead of HTML5
Check your site’s loading speed
Website loading speed is important for a number of reasons. Firstly, slower sites will rank lower in search engine results pages. Secondly, consumers are likely to click away from a site if it takes too long to load, and this will impact your bounce rate. Thirdly, slow loading speeds can negatively affect your conversion rate as potential customers give up before completing a purchase.
There are a number of ways to improve your site’s loading speed, including reducing the size of your images, compressing your HTML and CSS files, and making use of content delivery networks. You can also improve your site’s loading speed by optimizing your server infrastructure and database.
On-page and Content
Fix duplicate, missing, and truncated title tags
When it comes to on-page SEO, your title tags are incredibly important. They’re one of the first things that people see when they land on your website, and they play a big role in helping people decide whether or not to stay on your site.
Unfortunately, far too many websites have title tags that are either missing, duplicated, or truncated. This can have a major impact on your SEO and make it much harder for people to find your site.
Here’s how you can fix duplicate, missing, and truncated title tags:
- Make sure that every page on your site has a unique title tag. Duplicate title tags are a major red flag for search engines and can hurt your ranking.
- If you have any pages without title tags, add them ASAP. Missing title tags are an easy way to lose out on traffic and rankings.
- Check to see if any of your title tags are being truncated in search results. If they are, try to make them shorter or add more information at the beginning so that they’re more likely to be seen in full.
Find and fix duplicate or missing meta descriptions
If you have duplicate or missing meta descriptions, it’s important to fix them as soon as possible. Not only do they hurt your SEO, but they can also lead to a lower click-through rate (CTR) on your website.
Here’s how to find and fix duplicate or missing meta descriptions:
- Use a tool like Screaming Frog or MozBar to crawl your website and find pages with duplicate or missing meta descriptions.
- For each page with a duplicate or missing meta description, edit the page and add a unique, compelling meta description. Be sure to include relevant keywords for your page.
- Save your changes and re-crawl your website to make sure the changes are reflected in the search results.
Find and fix multiple H1 tags
One of the most common errors we see on websites is having more than one H1 tag on a page. This can be a really quick and easy fix that can have a big impact on your website’s SEO.
Your H1 tag is meant to be the title of your page, and should be used only once. It should be unique to each page, and should accurately describe the topic of that page. If you have multiple H1 tags on a page, it can be confusing for both users and search engines, and can dilute the SEO power of your H1 tag.
To fix this, simply find all the H1 tags on your page (search for “H1” in your code editor) and delete all but one. Make sure that the remaining H1 accurately describes the topic of the page.
Off-Page SEO
Off-page SEO (also called “off-site SEO”) refers to actions taken outside of your website to improve your search engine rankings. This means everything from link-building to social media marketing. In this guide, we’ll show you some of the most effective ways to improve your off-page SEO and get more people to your site.
Analyze your competitor’s link profile
Off-page SEO (also called “off-site SEO”) refers to actions taken outside of your own website to impact your rankings within search engine results pages (SERPs).
One common method of off-page SEO is building backlinks. A backlink is created when one website links to another. Google views backlinks as votes of confidence and generally ranks pages with more backlinks higher in their SERPs.
Building quality backlinks can be a challenging and time-consuming task, but it’s an important part of any off-page SEO strategy. Here are a few ideas to get you started:
- Reach out to other websites in your niche and see if they’re interested in publishing guest posts from you. Make sure the post is relevant to their audience and includes a link back to your website.
- See if there are any industry-specific directories or resource pages that you can get listed on. These can be a great way to get high-quality backlinks from websites that are relevant to your business.
- Speak at conferences or events related to your industry. If you have a particularly popular or well-received presentation, see if you can get it posted on the event’s website along with a link back to your site.
Conduct a link intersect analysis
A link intersect analysis is a report that shows you which of your competitor’s backlinks are also linking to your site.
This is valuable because it:
- Helps you identify potentially valuable link opportunities
- Shows you which of your competitor’s links are most valuable
- Helps you understand why your competitors are ranking higher than you
To conduct a link intersect analysis, you’ll need to use a tool like Ahrefs.
Target your competitors’ broken backlinks
Backlinks are the backbone of any SEO strategy. They are how you rise in the SERPs, how you get more visitors to your website, and how you improve your domain authority.
In short, backlinks are essential.
But what if your competitors have better backlinks than you?
What if they have been in the game longer and have had more time to build up their link profiles?
There is a way to level the playing field, and that is by targeting their broken backlinks.
A broken backlink is a link on another website that points to a page on your competitor’s website that no longer exists.
These links are broken because the page they are pointing to has been deleted or moved.
Broken backlinks are bad for SEO because they are effectively wasted links. They are links that are not driving traffic or improving search engine ranking.
But where your competitors’ broken backlinks are bad for them, they can be good for you.
That’s because you can swoop in and claim those links for yourself.
You can do this by creating content on your website that is similar to the content that was on the now-deleted page. Then, reach out to the website owner and let them know that their link is broken and that you have created similar content on your website that they can link to instead.