These 5 simple SEO tips for beginners will assist you in getting your website to rank higher on Google and other search engines.
What is SEO?
Search engine optimisation is the practice of increasing your ranking on organic search engine results.
Think of what you do when you are looking for something online. You go to a search engine like Google or Bing and type in a keyword or phrase and the search engine will populate results.
These tips will assist you in getting your website to rank higher on SERPs (search engine results pages)
5 Simple SEO Tips for Beginners:
Speed Up Your Site
The speed of your website is vitally important for user experience. This directly affects your ranking with search engines. It has been noted that 40% of users will abandon your site if it takes more than 3 seconds to load. That is huge!
Google has used site speed in their search ranking algorithm.
Research Relevant Keywords
Keywords are extremely important for successful SEO. For most small businesses this will be a combination of what services or products you offer and where you offer them: plumber in Randburg
- Write down everything that is relevant. What services you offer, what products you offer, where you offer these products and services.
- Use a keyword research tool like keywordtool.io
- Make use of Google search suggestions. When you start typing in the google search bar you will often see suggestions pop up below the search bar. There will also be a list of related searches at the bottom of the page which you can make use of.
Write Easy to Read, Relevant Content
Many companies make content just to have the content and keywords on their websites. This is a mistake.
Content must appeal to the interest of your target market and/or answer their questions. Not all posts need to be about your product but they MUST be industry related.
At SA Web Technical we love using Yoast and their readablity analysis tool.
Figure out what your readers want and need. Write for people first and then for search engines. Basically write naturally.
Capitalise on long-tail keywords.
Optimise your Page Titles and Meta Descriptions
Your aim here is to get your keywords into the title of your page.
Page titles are shown in search results so you need to make it clear what the page is about and make people want to click on your listing. Best practice is to keep page titles must be less than 60 characters.
Meta descriptions purpose is to summarise the contents of the page. The meta description is displayed under the Page Title by SERPs. Meta descriptions must be unique and relevant for every page on your site. Best practice is to keep meta descriptions to around 160 characters.
Link to Sites with Relevant Content
Link building is a huge part of SEO. High quality links can make your content more more useful and authoratitive to your targer audience. Including links in your blog posts shows that your content is well researched and credible. Links also add value to your audience, giving them additional content which is not duplicated in your blog post.
Internal links – when you link to exsisting content on your own domain. (e.g linking to a product or service page)
External links – when you link to content that is not on your own domain. (eg. linking to an article you reference in your content)
Conclusion
I really hope you have found this article useful. If you follow these SEO tips for beginners you will be on your way to increasing your websites ranking with search engines.
If you would like some assistance with your SEO please reach out to our team.