How to Optimize Your Website for SEO and Conversions
Website optimization is a highly important practice for any online business selling products, as well as anyone wanting to build a brand for themselves. For your site to truly be successful, it must appear as appealing as possible, not only to real users, but also to the search engine results page. Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is all about practices that will help your page rank high in search results, while containing valuable content in order to drive your targeted users to stay and engage.
Why is Optimizing Your Website Important?
Whether you are with a small startup company or part of a large organization, optimizing your website is important for so many reasons. Search engines are unable to perceive images, placing a heavy importance on the text and HTML elements present in order to determine the content of each website. Ensuring that your site is appealing to search engines is a guaranteed way to improve visibility, which could lead to overall performance in general.
SEO Friendly Practices You Should Know
High Content Quality
Having both useful and engaging content on your website will encourage users to stay on your page for longer periods of time, positively impacting your search ranking. When creating new content, a great practice is researching what currently ranks in searches, allowing you to create content with the intention of surpassing that standard. The goal is to provide value that is unique to your website and displaying it properly so that users can understand and be more likely to share it with others.
Keyword Density
This is one of the most important factors to consider while creating SEO friendly content. Keyword density refers to the number of times that a specific keyword has appeared on a page when compared to the overall word count. It is important to use very specific key phrases, so the search engine can recognize your content for what it is before it displays it to other users who might be looking for that information. Keep in mind that you should try not repeat the same few words all the time, because not only will it be unpleasant for the reader, but the algorithm may penalize you for it as well.
Internal Linking
An internal link is any link from one page on your website to another page on your website. Both users and search engines will use this to navigate their way through your site. If there are no links leading to a specific page, the likelihood of that page being seen and indexed by Google is low. Using internal linking, combined with optimized anchor text, the rankings of the pages that are being linked to will be boosted.
External Linking
An external link is any link from your website that leads to another page on a different website, with the intention of connecting relevant content. By linking outwards to trusted and reputable sites, the search engines will recognize that you are trying to offer high quality information to your users, which may be rewarded and reflected in your SEO ranking.
Backlinking
A backlink is defined as any link from another website that directs to your own website. Search engines will recognize that another site is willing to share your content and bump your page rankings accordingly. While you should aim to have as many backlinks to your site as possible, the quality and relevancy of the website generating the link is what matters the most, as not all backlinks are created equal. Pages that are deemed to be high authority in the eyes of search engines are more likely to link back to your site if you produce original content such as blogs, infographics, videos, that can’t be found anywhere else online.
Heading Optimizations
Much like the title a magazine or newspaper, the heading of a page is what should grab the attention of the user. The heading is the first element that the user sees, so if it doesn’t immediately hook them into wanting more, they will simply go find the next thing that interests them instead. When there are various sections of a page broken up by headings, it will help the reader skim through the page quicker to find the information they want, resulting in lower bounce rates and the structured writing will provide a much more enjoyable reading experience overall. In addition, search engines will also scan these headings to determine the content that is available on the page. Optimizing HTML heading tags is an important practice for any website looking to be ranked. These tags range from H1 to H6 tags and are used to define the hierarchy of content available on the given page. A webpage should only have one H1 element present, as this is the primary theme of the page.
Optimize Images and Videos
Non-text elements such as images, video, and audio are a great way to engage and retain user interest, but search engines can’t recognize the content contained in these forms of media. For your images, consider using alt-text, which is a brief description of what the content depicts, located inside the HTML image tag. This text can be picked up and understood by both search engines and users that require screen reader software. For videos, a great practice is to host your content on a third-party site like YouTube and embed it directly it onto your site. Inserting keywords in the video file’s name, description, and throughout the video itself will all improve visibility on YouTube, while also allowing it to show up in web searches as well. For audio, the same rules apply here as well. Make sure the file and description contain the key phrases your users may be searching for.
Need Help with Your SEO Optimization?
Hopefully this guide has given you a better understanding of how to optimize your website’s content. Optimizing your website to be considered “SEO friendly” will forever be a constant, ongoing process. While it can be time consuming, when it is done correctly, even the smallest of changes can lead to a huge shift in performance.
If you’re looking for further help optimizing your website, reach out to us at Doukas Media today to learn more or to schedule a free discovery call!