Search engine optimisation, or SEO, is a highly effective marketing strategy that can help your organisation grow its visibility in the industry. Unlike paid advertising, organic search engine results do not disappear when your organisation’s budget does.
Including SEO as part of your digital marketing strategy can result in increased traffic to your website, increased company revenue and added credibility for your business.
Keyword research
Keyword research is a crucial part of any SEO marketing strategy. It helps you understand what people are searching for in your industry, which can help you brainstorm content ideas and form a system that can drive long-term traffic. Your chosen keywords also impact how well your paid and organic campaigns perform. Finding the right keywords is to focus on intent, not volume. The best keywords clearly and concisely describe what you offer and align with your target audience’s interests and needs.
The process begins with a list of the most important, relevant topics that come to mind when you think about your business. These keywords will form the basis of your keyword research. Next, you can build a more robust keyword list by typing them into a search engine and noting the suggested searches. It is often an excellent way to discover new search terms that are not as popular but might still be relevant.
You can also use your existing content to identify the keywords performing well for you, which you can add to your search engine optimisation strategy. Using the most relevant keywords will help you get in front of the audiences searching for those terms, improving your chances of driving high-quality, motivated traffic.
As you build your keyword list, you will want to consider both short and long-tail keywords. It is because different types of keywords are searched for at other times of the year, and some terms have a seasonality that can impact the amount of traffic they generate. For example, the search term “[Christmas lights]” will have a higher volume in November and December than in July.
Once you have a comprehensive keyword list, you can start organising it into buckets based on each term’s search volume and intent. It can help you make more informed choices about the topics you should cover in your content, improving the quality of your organic and paid search marketing efforts.
On-page optimisation
The on-page optimisation of a website is one of the most important aspects of SEO marketing. It involves a combination of several factors with regular monitoring. The main elements of on-page optimisation include content, page speed, and structure. High-quality content that is engaging and informative motivates visitors to stay longer on a website, which helps search engines rank the site higher in SERPs.
On-page optimisation is also about optimising the HTML elements of your web page. This includes the title tag, meta description, and other HTML elements that aren’t visible to your visitors. It is crucial to optimise these elements so that they convey the best possible message to search engines.
Another aspect of on-page optimisation is ensuring that your website’s navigation structure is easy for visitors to follow and that the content of each page is consistent with its title and metadata. Having an easy-to-follow navigation structure can help search engines index your site faster, and it will also improve the user experience. This is especially true for mobile users, who often have limited data plans and require fast page loads.
Lastly, on-page optimisation is about making your website as accessible as possible to search engines. This means you should use a sitemap and ensure that search engines can crawl and index all your web pages. You should avoid duplicate content by using canonical tags and assigning each page a unique URL.
Off-page optimisation
Off-page optimisation is a critical component of SEO. It is any process that can improve your search engine ranking without directly affecting your website. It includes activities outside your control, such as building links and promoting your content on social media. It can also include guest blogging and other methods of promoting your site. Off-page optimisation can help you increase your search engine rankings, expand your online visibility, and establish credibility in your industry.
One of the best ways to optimise your off-page SEO is by creating valuable content people want to link to. This can be done by creating informative, engaging, and helpful articles that answer your audience’s questions. Promoting your content on social media sites is also essential to reach a wider audience.