Have you ever wondered what the secret ingredients for organic growth are? If the nitty-gritty of how SEO works still appears a mystery to you, then continue reading.
If you own an online business or a website, being listed on the first page of a Google search will impact your business’s level of success. Hence, marketers need to consider SEO and how to build a result-based strategy when developing a marketing strategy.
What Is What Knowing About The 3 Pillars of SEO
According to Global WebIndex, 81% of people use search engines to find products and services. It becomes necessary that website owners take conscious steps to optimize their sites for search engines to improve visibility and traffic.
According to research, most entrepreneurs have tried without success to take advantage of SEO; only about 30% of business owners can boast of a workable SEO strategy.
Search engines, especially Google, have over 200 ranking factors which in most cases prove pretty tricky to know and understand- a factor which leaves the majority of the ‘trying’ website owners dismayed as only constant efforts can result in success. Indeed, many companies and individuals have given up and, in reality, missed out on one of the top-rated digital marketing strategies and their attendant benefits.
Yours could be different; below, I will show you the three pillars that make up an effective SEO;
1. Keywords
2. Relevant content
3. Link building
1. TARGET THE RIGHT KEYWORDS
For a practical example of how keywords function in the SEO process, imagine yourself attempting to open your apartment door with your car key. Ridiculous! Isn’t it?
Using the wrong keywords on a website or content can truncate your SEO strategy, so it is crucial to get it right at this fundamental phase.
Keywords represent the search queries or topics a user needing information would type. We know very well that both the car and shop keys are opening agents- being keys, but yet, they function differenly so that slotting one into the wrong place results in failure. This is why you should consciously use appropriate keywords in every aspect of your site.
Keywords are like passwords. They feature best in important spots such as meta description, URLs, content, title and header tags, and one must avoid “keyword stuffing” or unnecessary words/phrases.
Knowing the importance of keywords should propel you to ask questions about what keywords are suitable for your website. How do I discover the best keywords for my brand?
How to Identify the Right Keywords?
Three keyword variables make the right keyword: search volume, competition, relevancy & search intent.
• Search Volume: keyword search volume refers to the frequency of the search for a particular keyword in a given time frame, usually one month on average. Keyword search volume is significant as it is an SEO metric that accounts for the frequency a particular keyword receives on search engines over a while.
This variable helps gauge the popularity of different Keywords and further predicts the search traffic likely obtainable from ranking for such keywords. Now, what less does an entrepreneur seek if not “visibility”- the type that a good search volume can produce?
• Relevancy & User Intent: it is not about what you think people are looking for, but what your users are searching for that matters. It is important to ensure those search terms (keywords) are relevant to your business. For example, if you’re a brand that sells fashion wears for women, you will want to rank for keywords like “women’s shoes” and “high-heels for women’’.
Also, knowing what the user wants when searching with your chosen keywords is very important to your overall SEO strategy. Not everyone who searches for women’s shoes is interested in buying one. Some want to see pictures, others for price or design research purposes.
So incorporating intent-based keywords like ‘purchase’ ‘shop’ into your keyword strategy will drive the website visitors to your page who are looking to take the desired action you want them to take.
• Keyword Competition: This dictates the level of competition for a particular keyword by different websites. By extension, it measures how difficult or otherwise it will be to rank for a specific keyword.
In a nutshell, the appropriate keywords for your website should have moderate search volume. They should favourably compete in different search engines, i.e., it must be good enough for these engines to deem it “searchable” in the first place before a competition can ensue.
2. RELEVANT CONTENT
Search engines like Google have a mission to deliver the correct information at the right time to users. Therefore, search engines reward websites with quality content relevant to the searcher’s query.
At the core of ‘content relevance’ is that the better a title or content soothes a search query, the closer it gets to ranking higher and boosting visibility in the long run.
Content relevancy tells how well a website’s available information or content corresponds to or answers the searchers’ enquires. This has proven to be of utmost importance for search engine optimization. It is one of the primary ranking factors employed by Google, particularly in evaluating a website in its index.
How do search engines determine relevance?
Content relevance is logically an extension of appropriate keywords, but it goes beyond finding a page with the right words or content to match results to searchers’ queries.
Search engines assume that the more valuable the information or content of a page, document or site, the more incredible popularity it attracts. Neither relevance nor popularity is determined manually. Web content continually undergoes a process of ‘separation’ by the search engine to set aside what I will call ‘the sheep from the goat’. It doesn’t stop here anyway; at the end of this first separation, search engines still rank the now separated ‘sheep’(relevant content) in order of popularity to arrive at the ‘most’ relevant ones.
While you strive to maintain relevance, remember that quality and quantity matter as the widespread provision of relevant content on one’s website indicates ‘mastery’. This is not necessarily a case of a ‘jack of all trades, but a clear example of a ‘master-of-one’. A deserving title capable of increasing traffic and convincing your audience that you have the passion for your field and are ready to deliver both in quantity and quality.
3. LINK BUILDING
Backlinks, individual hyperlinks that link to your website or webpage, are an important part of link building- link building functions as a driver of organic traffic via search engines, particularly in competitive industries. You should ‘reference’ other pages by adding a link or links to another webpage with related content when developing website content, a blog, or a specific webpage.
Is Link Building Important for SEO?
In the late 1990s and early 2000s, search engines such as Yahoo and Alta vista ranked their search results based on the content provided by the website. However, times have changed, and Google, the leading Search engine, does not just analyze the contents of a page but also considers how many other relevant websites, pages or contents are linked to that page.
For ease of operation and expertise, an anchor text- a text in your webpage content that links to another webpage- is recommendable. Backlinks are synonymous with a vote of confidence from trusted websites in your content.
Higher rankings are rewarded by search engines when there is more relevance offered. Do not forget that using low-quality or irrelevant links could spell danger for your website as Google may consider it “spam”, thereby attracting a penalty, which you should avoid by all means.
To summarize, effective SEO strategies rely on keywords, relevant content, and backlinks. Leveraging keywords, creating relevant and informative content, and building links to your website are incredible ways to leave your potential customers more engaged, stay top-of-the-game, and be more visible to search engines and, by extension, your audience.