In the digital marketing world, SEO has always been considered a basic, fundamental skill. The SEO world has shifted dramatically over the last few years as we have seen updates to Google’s algorithms which have put more weight on mobile-first indexing and voice search. With these changes, understanding how best to market and present your site in order to make it rank well across all platforms is key for your business’ success.
But the question begs is SEO easy to learn? The fundamentals of SEO is rather basic in principle. Getting a basic understanding of what SEO is will help you to decide if it is something that you need to learn. So let’s look a little deeper…
What SEO is and how it works:
SEO, or Search Engine Optimization, is the process of optimizing your website so that it will rank well in the search engines. The first step in learning SEO, is deciding which keywords you want to rank for. Choosing these with the assistance of a keyword research tool like the Google Keyword Planner will aid you in creating a foundation of relevant and useful content that will help your business to thrive!
Once you have determined which keywords that you want to optimize for, you can begin the process of actually carrying out this optimization. This is the process where placing your keywords in certain elements of your website pages will endeavour to put your site in the best position to improve its ranking ability. There are many different factors that go into making up this optimization, but the most important factors are:
Page Title – this is the title found at the top of each page, and should be around 30 characters long. It can be a different colour than your body text or background colours. It should also match your heading tags, as they will supply information to search engines about why people might want to click on that specific page.
Meta Description– this field is for an extra sentence which you would like search engines to read if they have not read your content yet. In this field, you would write about the content, so search engines know exactly what your page is about.
Headings (H1-H6)– this refers to the ‘heading’ of each individual page. It does not have to be in the same position as your title, and can even be below it! H1 and H6 are commonly used for headings, but it also depends on what type of information you would like your search engine users to find on your page.
Use of keywords in your pages – this is the most important step, as it shows that you know your keywords and are looking to rank for them! In order to do this, you might need to use some plugins or tools which can help you determine exactly what is the most searched phrase for a certain keyword. It is also advisable to read up on techniques such as keyword density so that you know how much of ‘your’ word should be used on every page. For example, a page about dog grooming might have different terms used than a page about food.
Internal linking- this creates a road map for the search engine to follow as it crawls your site. Make sure that you decide which pages are the most useful and important to your visitors and put them at the start of your list! They may be highly linked internally but not widely found on other websites, so make sure you include all of them!
External links- this refers to the links that you will find on your site. These are not necessarily the main links to your site. They are also not links that take people to other sites, but instead can be internal links from other pages that help search engines navigate your site. Understand how they work and where you need them before adding them out of habit.
The list could go on and on, but these are the basics that all SEO experts must know.
The Benefits of A Good SEO Strategy
Consider what your goals are for your business. Do you want to give potential customers a one-stop-shop with a lot of information? If so, you need SEO. Do you want to have a system where visitors can easily find their way around your site? If so, then SEO is the answer!
There are many benefits that come with having good SEO. Let’s look at the list of reasons why SEO is one of your most important marketing strategies:
Increased Traffic and Conversion
The best SEO strategies are ones that can easily be implemented and that can help increase traffic and conversions. One of the key factors in increasing your traffic is having keywords in your title. However, not all search engines are the same, so it’s important to choose the right one for your product or service.
Looking at your website statistics will show you exactly how many visitors you receive each month and which keywords are being chosen by these visitors.
Increase the Quality of Your Content
When you have good content, search engines will be more likely to find it and rank your site by it. They use content as a way to understand what your page is all about, so make sure you are creating great content that will help them understand your business.
You can also help with this by making sure that you provide a lot of external links. Having relevant external links will show search engines that this page is linked to other potential pages that might be of interest to them too.
Improve your Rankings
The best SEO strategies are ones that can help you improve your rankings. It is important to try and build links to your site from different places, but you should also ensure that they are relevant to your industry or type of business. You need to continuously be improving your rankings by finding new ways of increasing traffic, so keep at it!
Increased Exposure and brand awareness
Being visible online is a big part of running a successful business. When a potential customer is searching for information about your business, and they come across yours, they will likely become aware of you and your services.
There are many things that can help you increase the exposure you get when people come across your site. You can make sure that your website has several images that represent your company, different colours to show which type of service or product you offer and a logo or something else which gets noticed at first glance.
Should you learn SEO?
Content Writers Australia believes that SEO is a fundamental skill as being a solid content writer. It’s a very important part of any content marketing strategy that extends across many platforms on the web. Having such a strong SEO strategy is the key to gaining maximum exposure for your blog.
Whether you are just starting out or have been in this industry for a while, learning SEO can be useful for marketing your business. You can learn all about how to optimise your site by researching keywords, creating content and taking advantage of the benefits that you get from having good SEO practices in place.
We highly recommend SEO as a fundamental skill for any budding content writers, or anyone who wants to learn how to write better. If you want to get a better grasp on this subject, or just find out more about it, we have created the ultimate SEO Content Writing Guide to help you get started.
