Have you ever wondered why some sites rank higher in Google then others? Well, before we get into why SEO is important to your online business, it might be useful for you to understand how a search engine functions. Search engines have a couple main functions: crawling and building an index, and providing users with a ranked list of websites they’ve determined are the most relevant. But how do search engines determine relevance and popularity? There are hundreds of factors, but search engines usually determine a site’s popularity by the value of its information. The engines use algorithms, often composed of hundreds of variables, to sort through information, ranking quality over quantity.
So how do you make sure your content search engine is optimized? One key factor is staying in the know about any algorithms that Google has updated. Here are a few blogs you can follow to keep up with SEO:
SEMrush Blog is the world’s leading competitive research service for online marketing. For marketers, by marketers.
Moz Blog is more than an SEO consulting company. They are “the industry’s top wizards, doctors, and other experts offer their best advice, research, how-tos, and insights—all in the name of helping you level-up your SEO and online marketing skills.”
Search Engine Roundtable reports the most interesting threads taking place at the search engine marketing forums. Their mission is to provide a single source of the most interesting threads covered at the SEM forms for readers.
Search Engine Land is a leading daily publication that covers all aspects of the SEM industry. They also feature articles by experts across all digital marketing disciplines, which are filled with practical tips, tactics and strategies for running a successful marketing program.
Google Webmaster Central is the “official news on crawling and indexing sites for the Google index.” This is a great source of any upcoming updates from Google.
If you’re feeling a little “information overload”, don’t worry; SEO is a constantly changing environment so you need only learn a few things at a time.
Another factor is listening to your analytics and ranking tools. There’s no such thing as an all-inclusive marketing tool. Good SEO experts make it a habit to look at top sites and see what strategies they’re using. They experiment a little, but never stray from the numbers. They also look at the SEMrush report in order to see who’s winning and losing.
Great SEO artists are doers. Not only do they strategize and crunch numbers all day, they make projects happen. Here’s just a few ways you can implement a project quickly:
- Create a PowerPoint that showcases any analytics backing potential gains.
- Include a coercive case showing promise for ROI.
- Set a timeline with routine check-ups.
SEO professionals know that one of the primary ways search engines decide which pages should rank well is by looking at the links on those pages. This is why building links is just as important as having quality content. Search engines want to rewards sites with “hard links” (trustworthy, diverse, and relevant), which take effort to gain. A guest post in a high-ranking publication is an example of a hard link.
Another great habit you can make is to anticipate keyword searches to your site. This is why its important to know your audience. If you sell lamps, SEO nubes may assume customers are searching for products using that word. But, maybe they’re searching for other words, too?
Fortunately, Google AdWords Keyword Tool is here to help. You can enter a word and see how often people search for that word and those similar. It’s important to understand this because although 10 million people are searching for “lamp”, 15 million are looking up “magic fire torch”.
Last, but certainly not least, a good SEO professional will understand and implement quality content into a site. Your customers and especially Google want to read great, original content about a topic, rather than phrases used over and over again. That tactic simply doesn’t work for today’s highly intricate algorithms. Sure, you can plug in valuable keywords, but the content as a whole should be a compelling read for anyone. It’s important that content creation is valued and praised in any marketing team’s agenda. Otherwise, your site may be missing out on countless potential clients.
SEO experts never cease to improve the quality of the content on the website, the backlink profile, their technical knowledge, or communication skills. As the algorithms evolve, so should they, working hard to make sure your site is up to snuff.
No comments:
Post a Comment