⏰TIMESTAMPS⏰ 00:35 – Research your keywords (Google Keyword Planner demo) 03:32 – Create great content for your website 04:40 – Make sure your website is mobile-friendly 05:29 – Understand metadata and how to use it 06:44 – Avoid duplicate content 06:54 – Showcase your reviews 07:28 – Understand backlinking 08:39 – Don’t play tricks 09:04 – Measure your success 09:32 – Submit your sitemap 10:44 – Speed up your website
It’s easy to fall victim to fads in your quest for success with search engine optimization (SEO). They’re quick fixes that sometimes offer temporary results, but ultimately end up hurting your website’s chances at ranking higher in search results. That’s why it’s so important to know current SEO best practices.
If you want to improve your business website’s organic search engine ranking, forget popular SEO tricks and shortcuts and focus on creating long-lasting results. Here are 11 SEO best practices that will help you build a website that appeals to search engines and your customers.
1) Research your keywords. You should take some time to understand the concept of long-tail keywords and how to use them. Long-tail keywords are highly specific and often easier to rank for than short keywords. In the long run, long-tail keywords have a higher potential of bringing you more high-quality traffic and visitors that are already primed to make a purchase.
2) Create great content for your website. When writing copy for your website pages, consider what visitors want to know, not what you’d like to tell them. More importantly. don’t keyword stuff as search engines are quick to pick up on it and will penalize your site for it.
3) Make your website mobile-friendly. You want your website to perform and look as good on users’ smartphones and tablets as it does on their desktop computers.
4) Understand metadata and use it properly. Metadata refers to page and post titles and descriptions that show up on the search engine results pages when a visitor searches for a particular keyword, phrase, or term. Using a keyword or two in your meta description will boost your SEO and increase the number of clickthroughs you get from the search engine results pages.
5) Avoid duplicate content. Search engines penalize websites that have pages with copy-paste content. Avoid using another website’s content or having the same content on multiple pages of your website — be original, because that’s what you are!
6) Showcase reviews and testimonials. The more online visibility your business has, the more traffic your site will generate. Incorporating social media and review sites (like Yelp and TripAdvisor) will help improve user engagement and credibility.
7) Understand backlinking. Backlinking refers to getting other websites to link to your blog posts and pages. Getting backlinks from relevant, reputable websites and blogs is a major ranking factor so consider using guest blogging as part of your marketing strategy.
8) Don’t play tricks. If you try to fool the search engines, your organic online success won’t last long. It’s best to avoid questionable shortcuts.
9) Measure success. Track your site’s performance. With website analytics programs, you can track the number of visitors to your website, conversion rates, and more — and thus your marketing success.
10) Submit your sitemap. A sitemap helps search engines crawl and index your website faster. Start by using a tool like XML sitemap generator to build a sitemap.
11) Speed up your website. Nobody likes a slow website, search engines included. If your site takes longer than two seconds to load, including on mobile, you could be losing out on sales. Your ranking in the search engine results will definitely suffer.
Now you know much more about SEO best practices, how to research keywords, SEO content writing tips, and mobile-friendly SEO. Put this knowledge to work for your website!
The Journey is what everyday entrepreneurs, like you, need to follow in the pursuit of online success. Our experienced GoDaddy Guides are here to take you through all the steps, both big and small, that you encounter every day.
