SEO or Search Engine Optimisation is the process of gaining traffic from free, organic sources to improve your ranking on search engines such as Google.
In an ideal world, you'd set up your website, click publish and any search term relating to your business would cause your site to pop up on page 1 of any search engine you desire, but unfortunately, it doesn't quite work that way and you need to put some work in to improve and maintain your SEO before your goal of page 1 and being the go-to brand on Google will become a reality.
Luckily there are some simple, manageable steps you can take to improve the SEO of your website and boost your performance organically.
Analyse and optimise your existing content Take a look at website pages that haven't been updated in a good while, are they presenting your messages in a strategic way and making use of keywords relating to your business? Take time to comb through your old posts and site pages and give them a little refresh.
Make sure your site is mobile friendly Did you know that mobile users account for nearly 60% of all online searches? It has never been more important to optimise your website for mobile browsers. This means making sure your design is responsive, easy to read, understand and fun to navigate.
Create add value content and update it consistently Does your site have blog capabilities? If so then make good use of them or implement one. One of the best ways to improve your SEO is to create add value, quality content on your website you can update regularly, drive traffic to, and keep it there. Make good use of keywords relating to your business and the terms you want to be found via on Google and other search engines, but be sure to avoid 'keyword stuffing' which can harm your ranking.
Guest post on other blogs and websites We've all heard of backlinks, but it can be tricky to get organic, quality backlinks from trustworthy sources. Link up with fellow professionals in your network and offer to produce a blog post or piece of content for their website or you could share a piece of existing content from your site with a connection and ask them to share it on their site too.
Get rid of dead links quickly There is nothing worse than navigating a website to be hit with a 404 page not found error message, it's a surefire way to discourage audience members from remaining on your site and you'll see significant drop-off which will harm your search results.
Consider using tools like Semrush to identify your keywords Not sure where to start with your keywords? Tools like Semrush are great for helping show you useful stats on common keywords relating to your website. By making use of tools like these you can make a more informed decision about the sort of keywords to include on your website.
Improve the navigation of your website Does anybody have a map? Streamline the process of navigating your website and make it as user-friendly as possible. You'd hate having to go through a labyrinth of a store to find one product and it's the same with shopping virtually. Map your user journey and determine the best places to place your links to new pages.
Take a look at your upload speed Believe it or not the speed at which your website loads also sends signals to search engines about the quality of your site. Make sure your site loads quickly, doesn't buffer and makes for a smooth user experience.
SEO can feel like a minefield at times but if you tackle the process one step at a time you'll come out the other end with a slick and successful website audience members won't be able to get enough of.
Still feeling a bit lost? Let's work together on improving your website SEO.
Hannah, Heyday Digital Agency
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