SEO Basics • 10 ways to improve your website SEO

There are thousands of articles by SEO experts with advice on how to improve the SEO of your website. These articles are usually very long (which is good for SEO!) so I’ve summarized the main points here with links to articles for more details on each topic. Before you get started, you might skim Google’s 200 Ranking Factors so you understand how complex SEO optimization is.

1. Research keywords

Your first focus should be figuring out the right keywords for your site. Then you can use those keywords judiciously throughout your site as described below. Keyword research is both an art and a science, with tactics are constantly changing. These articles outline current best practices with suggested tools and methods for doing this research.

How to Do Keyword Research for SEO: A Beginner’s Guide (HubSpot)
Keyword Research:The Definitive Guide (2020) (Backlinko)

2. Use long-tail keywords

Long-tail keywords are a popular strategy right now. Basically you pick long phrases that are very specific and don’t have high search volume. But if you are a perfect match for a bunch of long-tail keywords, you scoop up all the traffic.

Why focus on long-tail keywords? (Yoast)
Long-Tail Keywords: The ‘Secret’ to Getting TONS of Search Traffic (Ahrefsblog)

3. Write quality content

Next focus on well-written content that naturally includes your keywords. Do not overuse keywords within your content, but use them regularly as appropriate.

What is SEO Content? How to Write Content that Ranks (AhrefsBlog)
SEO copywriting: The ultimate guide (Yoast)

4. Use headings and subheadings

Heading and subheadings help Google parse your content. You should break up your text as much as possible with headings that include your keywords and accurately describe the content in that section.

SEO basics How to use headings on your site (Yoast)

5. Regularly publish fresh content, aka write a blog

Your main website content will be static because it describes your company and your products/services, which don’t change frequently. But since Google likes fresh content, one way to tell Google to come back and look at your website is to regularly publish new content on a blog. Make sure to set realistic goals, like once a month, instead of trying to blog every week and giving up after two post.

Blog SEO: How to Search Engine Optimize Your Blog Content (HubSpot)
Writing for SEO: How to Write Blogs That Rank on Page 1 of Google (HubSpot)

6. Metadata

Every web page or blog post has metadata, which gives clues to Google about what your content is about. Don’t just stuff these full of keywords – Google recognizes this and then basically ignores it. There are three main areas that should have keywords: page title, page description, and page meta keywords.

Each page should have a unique title that includes a keyword and accurately reflects the content of that page. The description should be a real sentence, not a list of keywords. This description is not nessarily used in Google page ranking, but rather displayed by Google in the search results and sometimes on social media sharing. A good description encourages visitors and customers to click through and read your content.

Do Meta Tags Really Matter For SEO In 2020? (W3 Lab)
Meta Tags for SEO: A Simple Guide for Beginners (Ahrefsblog)

7. SEO-Friendly URLs

The URL of your page gives you another opportunity to use some keywords.

How to Create SEO Friendly URLs (neilpatel.com)
SEO Friendly URLs (backlinko.com)
The Ultimate Guide for an SEO-Friendly URL Structure (www.searchenginejournal.com)

8. Image titles and descriptions

Google also looks at the images to determine if the page content matches the search criteria. Make sure the “title” and “alt” attributes of your images include your keywords and accurately describes what is in the image. This also improves the accessibility of your site.

Image SEO alt tag and title tag optimization (Yoast)
Alt text (Moz)

9. Link building

Link building means getting other websites to link to you. This has been an important ranking factor for Google, but many websites have exploited this by paying for link placement and doing lots of guest posts to boost their SEO. If Google detects excessive bad quality “backlinks,” Google will rank that website lower. The quality of the site linking to your site matters more than the quantity of sites linking to you.

You should definitely look for opportunities for other websites to write about your business and link to you. But in general, link placement is not an effective use of time and effort for most small businesses.