SEO Strategies We Love and Ones We’re Passing On

If you are on the hunt to gain organic traffic to your business, then search engine optimization (SEO) is key to your success. SEO is the process of improving your website’s placement on a search engine. You are more likely to get clicks when your site is found near or at the top of a search page.

There are many SEO strategies, and they change over time, so it is important to know what to use and when. Below are some great tactics and several that are simply outdated or have little to no chance of working. Focus on the attention grabbers to achieve success.

Strategy Winners

E-A-T – If you’re hungry for business success, then it’s time to E-A-T. Create content that shows your expertise, authoritativeness, and trustworthiness. Providing answers to your target audience’s questions is one way to show you are an expert in your field. When other reputable businesses backlink to your website it reinforces your position of authority. This also creates trust. When other experts trust you, your target audience and search engines do the same. You can also gain trust through authentic, transparent content.

How do you do this?

Create informative blog posts that address your audience’s questions and interact with your readers. A good way to engage is by asking questions and providing answers on social media. This form of communication builds a relationship between you and your target audience. You can also collaborate with other professionals to start gaining recognition.

Various Media – Using an array of media from video to images on your website helps. Eye-catching images and interesting videos are effective ways to reach your audience. Search engines and people are positively impacted by visuals. When search sites see the alt text describing your images, they rate you higher. People will spend more time browsing your website and engaging with the images. The longer someone stays on your site, the more likely they are to choose your product or service.

How do you do this?

Include informative data and statistics. Colourful charts and graph visualizations highlight specific information while gathering the attention of your audience. Another way to add media to your website is by incorporating an entertaining video with your blog topic. Media helps your audience better understand what you are describing.

Top of Funnel Keyword Phrases – When creating content speak to your audience while using top of funnel keyword phrases. What is a top of funnel keyword phrase? Phrases that centre around awareness, consideration, and decision. For instance, if you own a candy e-commerce business then you could use these three keyword phrases:

·  candy reviews

·  which candy is best

·  gummies or jawbreakers

How do you do this?

Incorporate high search volume and low SEO competition keyword phrases into your homepage and blogs. Make sure to focus on your target audience.

Strategy Losers

Keyword Stuffing – Use keywords naturally. They should have a flow throughout the written copy and only be used intermittently. Search engines are smart and know when you are trying to just add in keywords to grab their attention. People also want to read content that makes sense and sounds fluid.

How to Avoid This

Steer clear of adding the same keyword numerous times in one sentence. If the keyword is completely different than the topic you are focusing on, then eliminate it from your writing.

Slow Load Time – Images and video that take longer than two seconds to load is the silent SEO killer. Search engines have a difficult time crawling slow sites. Slow loading sites cause search engines to skip over your entire site and move on to the next one.  Many of the aspects that make your site great for SEO will be lost. Users also want information quickly. Waiting for content to load will have them jumping to another site that provides instant gratification. Their attention span is short so you must be able to capture it fast.

How to Avoid This

Choose good quality photos and videos that load reasonably quickly. Look for PNG graphics with fewer than 16 colours. For photos in particular make sure they are JPEG and compressed for the web.

Changing Backlink Pages to Click-Bait – If you told a friend to come over to share some exciting stories about your trip to Italy only to change your reason for inviting them over, and asking them to help you clean your garage, you would probably lose their trust. The same is true when you have a page that gets tons of traffic thanks to the link back from another site and then you change the content into an advertisement. Search engines and your loyal followers will be taken aback by this, and it could harm your relationship with them.

How to Avoid This

When creating content, stay on topic throughout the entire piece. If you are going to change your copy, make sure it is to provide updates instead of changing the purpose.

In Conclusion

It takes time to implement SEO tactics but incorporating these strategies will help improve your ranking. For further SEO help, connect with us at Digital Monk Marketing where we use our professional expertise to take your business to the next level.