If you are just starting to explore the different strategies that you can use for your website, then you better get to know the basics of SEO or search engine optimization. Considered as the most cost-efficient online marketing strategy, SEO is specifically structured to boost your website’s ranking on the results page of major search engines such as Google, Bing, and Yahoo!. It is also a great alternative to expensive short-term options such as paid to click services and online advertisements.
Although SEO involves a broad range of topics, it shouldn’t intimidate you to learn the concepts by yourself and apply what you have learned to your own websites. There are tons of resources that you can find on the internet. These include ebooks, video tutorials, and beginner-friendly presentations such as this SEO Explained in Simple Terms (infographic) article.
To further help you understand the fundamentals of this online marketing strategy, here are the top five things that you should know about SEO.
SEO is more than just using keywords.
Ever since the Google Panda and Google Penguin update took into effect in 2011 and 2012 respectively, the rules of the game have considerably changed for search engine optimization. The updates were very instrumental in weeding out spammers who abuse the use of target keywords for their websites to show up on the higher rankings. Using keywords may still work in getting organic traffic to your website, but there should now be a greater focus on the content quality and improved user experience to get you to the top.
Pay attention to the content.
As stated before, high-quality content should still be your main consideration when developing a good SEO strategy. There should be a good balance between text and media content, and you should be aware of what you are putting on your website. Besides being interesting and relevant to the latest trends, the contents should also be factual, unbiased, and straightforward.
Speed is now an important factor in SEO.
Over the years, the approach of SEO has continuously evolved but the ultimate goal remains the same; and that is to achieve a high web search ranking. In order to do that, websites should be informative and good-looking but not to a point that the loading time of pages slows down. Consumers nowadays are more likely to leave a site that takes too long to load. Removing unnecessary web page elements, upgrading your server, and making the site mobile friendly are some of the steps that you can take.
SEO is also about interconnection.
A great website will not live up to its potential without a base of followers reading the content and interacting on the platform. Take advantage of integrating social media networking sites to share your content and to improve brand visibility. Spend some time connecting with potential partners and online influencers as well.
Invest your time in building quality links.
Link building can be compared to the ‘word of mouth’ in the world of internet. It involves the interconnection of relevant websites within a network using the power of URL links. Make sure that your website meets the highest of standards so that other site owners will be interested to add yours as a link. Similarly, you should also take time reviewing external articles that you will link on your pages.