The ultimate beginners guide to SEO is here to help you navigate your way through your industry’s domain and gives you a competitive edge over your fellow contenders. If you’ve built a website and can’t understand what’s limiting the traffic to it, then you’ve come to the right place because it’s never too late to start the SEO journey of your brand.
So, what does SEO work? Let’s understand with an example: What’s the first thing you do when you want to research a brand? You Google it! According to Semrush, approximately 81% of all Google searches are based on organic results and the rest 19% through a Google ad. This basically means that if your website ranks organically, your audience is 5x more likely to land on your site.
With SEO-optimized content and the right keyword variations, you can steadily increase your authority on search engines and rank higher. So, let’s dive into the ultimate beginners guide to SEO in the year 2023!
The Comprehensive What & How of Using SEO in 2023
Search engine optimization (SEO) is a process of optimizing your website’s content in order to improve your rankings in search engines. This would help you in driving organic traffic to your website. According to BrightEdge, approximately 53% of website traffic comes from organic search with almost 92.96% of global traffic derived by Google engines.
SEO doesn’t just serve as an addition to your brand, but rather a necessity. Imagine writing powerful content that is full of statistics and credible sources of information but lacking keyword optimization and key metrics to help your content rank higher. Do ensure using white hat SEO content which is described as ethical and well-written content according to Google’s Webmaster Guidelines.
There are several tools available to help you boost your SEO score. For instance, to optimize long-format content, various content writers utilize Grammarly, WordPress, SEO Content Writing Assistant, and multiple other tools available online. Higher the SEO score, higher the chances of your content ranking on top.
In 2023, a few basic steps to get your website going is primarily for your website to be connected with Google Search Console (GSC). Next, set up an XML sitemap with “HTTPS” by submitting it to GSC to ensure that the search engine spider crawlers index your website.
A Step-By-Step Beginners Guide to SEO
After covering all the basic aspects of SEO, let’s dive into a comprehensive step-by-step guide to help your website rank higher than the Eiffel Tower (basically climbing your way to the top as compared to the competitors):
Step 1 – Keyword Research & Optimization
The first step of integrating SEO begins with your website. It’s important to ask yourself – what is your website about? Is it about providing marketing services to your clients? Then your website should be a juxtaposition of primary, secondary and variation of keywords specific to your domain.
- Content Optimization: Understand your niche so that you can target the right audience with the right content ideas. Conduct thorough keyword research to find the most relevant keywords that are currently trending. Include these into your content and continue integrating this practice into your work. One day, Google will find you and rank you at the top!
- On-Page & Technical SEO: From internal linking to generating backlinks, SEO optimization is integral for generating the crawlability of your website. In order to improve the user experience and engagement, embed links that add value to your existing content. Also, follow the golden rule of any page being at most only 3 clicks away from your homepage so that after traveling far from your website, they head right back to it.
Step 2 – Analytics & Metrics
There are several tools available over the internet to analytically measure your website’s performance. These metrics are crucial to understand where your website is acing the stage and where it’s falling off it. Google Search Console and Google Analytics are a couple of these essential tools that every website owner should use if they want to rank higher in search engines.
From insights into performance, URL inspection to ensure the link is secure, sitemaps to enhancing sitelinks, optimizing user experience and other aspects, these tools can bridge the gap between you and your competitors. According to BrightEdge, SEO drives 1,000%+ more traffic than organic social media. So, want to climb your way to the top? Make your website platform-friendly and keep a check on its performance regularly.
Step 3 – Realize, Refine, Repeat
Finding issues in the algorithm or website not loading on time? Fix it! For instance, Amazon has close to 400 million organic searches every month on Google and even a short-lived downtime can cost the world’s biggest retailer thousands of dollars. In August 2021, Amazon experienced technical difficulties and was unavailable in the United States for less than 15 minutes. Due to this outage, the brand suffered a huge loss of $2.64 million during that 13-15 minute window!
Just like heading off to a restaurant for a pleasant and fulfilling culinary experience, a customer landing on your website serves exactly the same purpose – curating the best customer experience. May that be in terms of the readability of the content or any other aspect, your aim should be to realize what’s going wrong, refine it the best way possible and repeat this practice in the long run.
Wrapping SEO to a “Content” Close
As digitalization continues to take over the internet like a storm, it’s integral for brands to create helpful, insightful and reliable content to keep hooking search engine crawlers onto your website. Use social media platforms to accentuate your website by adding it to your handle’s bio or linking it on posts.
As the website starts to become visible to more people, you can begin to track the bounce rate (the percentage of visitors that land on your website but then click away without engaging) and make refinements accordingly. By keeping an open mind and experimenting things for your website, SEO can serve as the backbone of the brand.
SEO-optimized content can significantly impact the success of your business. So, use it wisely and try to rank indefinitely. With time, you’ll begin to see results. Until then, stay consistent and ensure the best SEO practices are included in your work!
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