SEO 101: Getting The On-Page SEO Basics
If you don’t get the basics of on-page SEO right, you have very
little chance of securing top spots for competitive key phrases, even if
you’ve got a fantastic outreach and PR campaign and an awesome link
profile! It’s a common mistake to ignore the basics of SEO and focus on
getting links instead of what’s in your control…the optimization of your
own site. On-page SEO is the foundation to your campaign. Get it right
and you’ll succeed on the search engines, get it wrong and you’ll never
hit the top, whatever else you do.
With this in mind, here’s a brief guide to getting on-page SEO right,
looking at the basics as well as the other essentials you need to
ensure are in place if you want to outrank your competitors. SEO is
constantly evolving, however this should set you right over the next few
months unless anything unexpected comes along.
The below isn’t in any order of priority, it’s all important and should be used as a bit of a check list:
1. Title Tags
Ensure you place your main keyword and variations in the title tag of
a page. Always ensure you target one main keyword and variations per
page and don’t try and trick the search engines by optimizing multiple
pages for the same keyword. Write your title tag in a natural way which
uses your main keyword at the start with variations added too. Think
about what looks natural and will entice searchers to click on your
site.
Historically, Google would display around 70 characters of a title
tag but since recent redesigns, they’re now displaying based on pixel
width. There unfortunately no longer is a magic number for how long a
title tag should be, but Moz has a great tool (which you can find here) which lets you preview what title tags will appear like in Google’s latest redesign.
Spend time putting together title tags which include your main
keywords for a page and also look natural, aren’t stuffed with keywords
and read well! There’s nothing worse than spammy, over optimized titles!
2. Meta Descriptions
Meta descriptions don’t contribute as a ranking signal anymore, but
they’re still an incredibly important aspect of on-page optimization.
They’re the first introduction potential customers get with your brand,
so it pays to get them right.
Meta descriptions should be well written, approximately 156
characters and essentially a sales pitch for what the landing page is
about. As with title tags, don’t spam or over optimize and always think
about what works for users before the search engines.
3. Heading Tags
If you’re not using H tags in a strategic way, you should be!
Starting with your pages’ H1 tag, ensure you utilize headings correctly
without over-optimizing them. Place your main keyword in a H1 tag, again
making sure it works for users ahead of search engines, and split the
rest of your content up with ascending H tags…H2 comes next then H3. You
get the picture. One thing to remember is to only use one H1 tag.
Others can be used multiple times if needed.
Don’t keep repeating your main target keyword in each tag, rather use
variations which enhance the value of the content and help break it up
into readable and easy to digest sections. These tags essentially signal
the descending importance of page headings so think carefully as to
which H tag should be used in each instance.
4. Content
You’ve probably heard that content in king and that couldn’t be more
accurate! With Google’s Panda algorithm, you can no longer get away with
thin content and creating unique and informative content should be
where you spend the most time. Content needs to be written primarily for
users and secondly for search engines, however that doesn’t mean you
shouldn’t mention core key-phrases. Just make sure you do so in a
natural and organic way.
Keyword stuffing is a technique which has been long dead, so don’t
even consider mentioning your main terms in every other sentence.
Google’s algorithm works on latent semantic indexing, so simply writing
naturally about the topic of the page should mean you are writing
relevant content. So long as it’s unique and not copied from somewhere
else, you shouldn’t run into any problems.
Think about the message you want to communicate and keep that at the
forefront of all content you write. Are your primary goals to directly
sell and drive leads, to inform, or to build brand awareness? Your goals
should always dictate your style of writing and the way you structure
your content. As above, don’t forget to use H tags to break up your
content into easy to digest sections and always ask someone else to
proof read for you before going live.
5. Canonicalisation Of Duplicate Content
It’s a common fact that many CMS’ (Magento as an example) allow pages
to be accessible via a number of different URL’s, however from a search
marketing perspective, it’s bad news! In such instances, you’re not
trying to manipulate search results via having a page live on duplicate
URL’s so you shouldn’t have a problem in adding a canonical tag to
reference one main page for Google to index and assign PageRank to.
Google themselves offer a great example on implementing canonicalisation here
and it makes sense to spend ten minutes getting your head around it
there rather than re-publishing. Getting canonicalisation right,
however, is something which should be considered primary importance.
6. URL Structure
If your site uses query strings for page URLs, this is something you
need to look at as a priority. It’s far bestter to use a search engine
friendly URL structure such as www.domain.com/page-name/ as opposed to
www.domain.com/index.php?id=1. It makes more sense to both users and
search engines and should be regarded as a priority.
Always use hyphens rather than underscores and try not to have main
pages sitting too many directories deep in your site. Don’t forget,
however, to implement 301 redirects from the old URL to the new if you
do make changes, otherwise you’ll see crawl errors pop up in Webmaster
Tools and users being faced with 404 pages.
7. Crawl Error Resolution
Following on from the above, you should always check Webmaster Tools
for crawl errors and find a way to resolve any showing. It’s not good
from either a user or search engine point of view to have crawl errors
and it’s usually a fairly easy job to fix with 301 redirects (assuming
the pages are permanently removed. If it’s only a temporary removal, use
a 302).
When it comes to deciding which page to redirect to, use common
sense. Don’t redirect to a page just for the sake of it — try to
redirect to the closest alternative. If there isn’t one, consider
permanently redirecting to a 404 page.
8. Check Your Robots.txt File
When it comes to first optimizing your site, check your robots.txt
file which will usually be located at www.domain.com/robots.txt to make
sure no key pages are being blocked from being crawled by the search
engines. If you see Disallow: / followed by any directory or page name,
ask yourself whether it should be accessible to search engines. The best
practice is to block admin panels and low quality pages which need to
be in place but you don’t want search engines indexing, however if
there’s anything you regard as a core page in there, take it out!
9. Multi-Device Friendly
Some may argue this technically isn’t an on-page SEO factor, given a
site being multi-device friendly isn’t always a prerequisite of
attaining top search positions, but it should always be looked at…if
only from a conversion optimization perspective.
If at all possible, opt for a responsive version of your site which will resize to each device. There was a fantastic post by the team at Koozai
who recently touched upon the importance of having a responsive site
and how they’ve got a whopping 7 versions of their site for different
devices.
We certainly live and work in a multi-device world and with rumours
that mobile usage set to surpass desktop usage at some point this year,
perhaps now is the time to start designing sites for mobile devices
first and desktops second?
10. Page Speed
Take a moment to analyse your site’s page speed using the Page Speed Insights tool
from Google to outline how fast they can load your site as well as
receive a whole host of suggestions as to how you can improve things. As
a general rule, try and get it as far above 90 as possible to ensure
you’re not a search position lower than you should be because your site
is sluggish.
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