What do you do if you need to solve a problem? Google it. It’s efficient, easy and free – what more could you want? With over 3.5 billion Google searches per day, and more people saying “Hey, Google” than “Hey, Mum”, it’s time to start focusing on your SEO. But of course, it is not an overnight process and there are a lot of processes involved to get it right. Whilst we’re not promising to turn you into an SEO expert, here’s 5 things you can do to give your website a boost in the right direction.
A clear site will deliver clear results
Gone are the days when Google would rank sites based on how many keywords you could stuff onto one page, now it’s all about the consumer. You need to create content with your audience in mind, because after all, they are the ones who will be viewing it and ultimately, taking action to help you achieve your business goals.
From producing content that provides value to your audience, to ensuring your site loads quickly and is easy to navigate: it’s all about getting the user experience right. If your audience is happy, then it’s likely that Google will be, too.
R&R
Whilst we could probably all do with a bit of rest & recuperation after the year we’ve had, on this occasion ‘R&R’ is referring to ‘regular’ and ‘relevant’ – which is exactly what your content needs to be if you want to improve your SEO. You need to be posting high-quality content that addresses your audience’s needs; remember your site is there to help humans, not just to impress Google.
The more regularly you upload high-quality content, the more relevancy your site will gain. This type of content can not only help increase traffic to your website, but can also help build authority and get your business established as an industry expert.
The more meta, the better!
Whilst your audience is the star of the show, you can’t forget about Google. Metadata is what helps search engines to understand your page, and whilst there isn’t as much of an emphasis on metadata as there used to be, it is still important. Let’s have a look at two different metadata elements: alt text and meta descriptions.
Alt text is the text that appears when an image on a webpage fails to load. It not only helps search engine crawlers to index images correctly, but can also be used by visually impaired users to help them gain an understanding of your image. The best alt text will be relatively short, but still provide context and describe your image clearly, and include a keyword or target phrase.
It’s all very well having a website that ranks well on Google, but if people aren’t visiting your site, what’s the point? Whilst not as important to SEO, your meta description can have a big impact on your click-through rates from the search engine results page. It’s the text that appears under your headline in the search engine results, and should perfectly summarise your page, providing users with an idea of what they can expect from your site, and more importantly, giving them a reason to want to visit your page.
Lights, camera, action
By using a range of images, videos and text, you will be showing Google you have a lot of valuable content to offer users. If you read our post on explainer videos, you will know that pages containing video have increased engagement levels and are a whopping 50x more likely to rank on the first page of Google’s search results.
As clever as we like to make Google out to be, it still needs a helping hand sometimes. To optimise the performance of your videos, you may want to consider including transcriptions to help Google understand the content. Equally, including relevant images can help improve user experience – which is great – but to reap the benefits of your images from Google, you will need to remember to include alt text!
Google loves links
For your content to rank, it needs links. When you add a new page to your website, you’ll want to make sure you start by adding internal links to help Google navigate and establish a hierarchy on your site, and determine the value of your content.
Inbound links are what will bring your page the biggest SEO benefit, but they do require a bit more effort to obtain. To Google, every link is equal to a recommendation and indicates high-quality, trustworthy content. But be warned, Google knows how to spot a fraud; so if you’re thinking of spamming online forums or blog comments with links to your new page – don’t – it will come back to bite you eventually.
With more people than ever turning to Google for the answers, it’s time to improve your SEO and turn your site into the solution your audience is searching for.
