Search Engine Marketing Online – Part III of My Four Part Series

Today, in the third part of my series on Search Engine Optimization and Search Engine Marketing Online, I will provide tips for both off-page and on-page optimization which will help you improve traffic to your site.

SEO Checklist

Traffic generated by free search engines can do wonders for your website. The many benefits generated by these free searches include traffic growth to your site, new subscribers and increased sales. However, you cannot just sit back and wait. It does take some effort to improve your search engine rankings. This checklist is a convenient guide to steps for increasing your ranking, and the traffic that follows.

Off-Page SEO Tips

The following outside factors affect your search engine rankings. It is very important to consider these things when growing your business, as they affect the popularity of your site. Covering these areas will help you your chosen keyword phrases rank higher in the search engines.

• It is vital to generate excellent content. This will affect all of the following:

v  How often your content is shared on social media. Search engines use this information to evaluate the quality of your content.

v  The amount of time a search engine user remains on your site. You don’t want a searcher to find your site and then click back right away. This signals the search engine that your site may not be relevant for that keyword or phrase.

v  The number of links to your content. It’s important to have good content so that people will link to it. Beware of the outdated practice of self-linking. Search engines can detect quality links, so these harm, rather than help.

v  It is very important to have an active social media presence and always encourage viewers to share your content on social media. You need to be seen all over the web if you want Google to take notice in a favorable way and increase your rankings.

• Follow these tips to make sure you have quality engaging content to attracts search engines and customers:

v  Each page should cover only one unique topic.

v  Be sure your site is set up with clearly marked, efficient navigation, so that all content can be easily found by both visitors and search engines.

v  The use of attention-grabbing headlines is the best way to let visitors know they’ve reached the right place and entice them to read more.

v  Your content should always be easy to read. Attention spans are short, and few people will take the time to read a long block of print. Use short sentences and paragraphs and keep your words simple.

v  For the same reason, it’s important to use subheads and bullet points to break up your copy. Easy to scan print will keep viewers engaged.

v  Images are powerful ways to attract viewers and help tell your story. Articles with photos and other images always help attract and retain attention.

v  Socialize! Connecting with other website owners in your niche is beneficial to everyone, because friends are more likely to recommend and share your content with others.

On-Page SEO Tips

In addition to making a good overall impression on the worldwide web with your content, you should also pay attention to optimizing each page on your website. The following list includes a number of things you can do to improve your rankings, but be careful not to overdo it. Also, make sure the optimization feels natural and makes sense. You don’t want to put off your visitors, and search engines are savvy. They will catch on to any attempts to ‘game’ the system.

• Try to make sure all content is at least three hundred words long. There may be occasions when this is just not possible, but it is a good guideline to follow. Search engines are looking for a meaningful amount of content.
• Use tools that are available online for keyword research. You want to find phrases which generate considerable traffic, but don’t have too much competition.
• Make sure you put this keyword phrase in both the title of your post and in the title tag. At the same time, it’s important to work it in naturally so that the title reads well and appeals to visitors.
• Also put your keyword phrase in the description tag for your post. Make sure the description includes the phrase, and is also interesting enough to make people want to read more.
• Your keyword phrase should be incorporated into your site’s URL. For example: best-party-themes.html.
• Use ALT tags to add the keyword phrase and any useful description to images on your page.
• Make content easier to scan by using H2 and H3 tags. These are also good places to include your keyword phrase and variations on it.
• It’s a good idea to include your keyword phrase in the first paragraph of your content. Also try to sprinkle some variations on it in a few other places within the body of your content.
• Providing a link or two out to related pages on another site will mark your site as a hub of useful information.

It’s important to track your rankings to see how implementing these tips affect your traffic. Inevitably, it will take some tweaking as you progress until you are happy with the results. But it does take some time before search engines update their listings, so make sure to give any changes enough time to gauge their effect before discarding them for something else.

Tomorrow’s post will wrap up this series on Search Engine Optimization. Stay tuned for my final words of wisdom.