What is SEO? Down the Rabbit Hole
What if I told you there’s a way to increase your website’s visibility, attract more visitors, and boost your online sales? That’s the power of Search Engine Optimization, aka SEO. Here is the bubble buster. In today’s digital world, having a website alone will not bring you leads. Your website needs to be easily discoverable by search engines such as Google, Bing, and Yahoo. And not just discoverable. You want to aim for the most coveted spot on the internet––the first page. That is where the power of SEO can help.
How Does SEO Work?
With proper SEO, you can make your website appear higher in search engine results pages, driving more attention and potential customers to your website. But what is SEO? How does it work, really? Each search engine uses an algorithm to determine the order in which websites show up in the search engine results pages (SERPs). To get your website to the top of the first page of Google, you must understand the factors and expert strategies that govern the algorithm. Fortunately, Digital Marketing Inc. has the knowledge and experience to help your business climb the search engine rankings.
What Factors Affect SEO?
E-E-A-T
When looking at factors that drive search engine algorithms, you want to consider Google in particular. As the world’s most popular search engine, Google processes billions of queries daily, making it the go-to resource for online searchers. As a result, achieving high website rankings on Google’s SERPs can be a game-changer for your website’s traffic, leads, and revenue. However, in the ever-evolving landscape of SEO, staying ahead of the curve means keeping a finger on the pulse of Google’s latest algorithmic trends and changes.
E-E-A-T has become a crucial factor in Google’s algorithm, serving as a core determinant in its metrics.
- Experience
- Expertise
- Authoritativeness
- Trustworthiness
Google emphasizes the overall quality and credibility of a website, as outlined in their quality rater guidelines. Google wants to ensure that it provides its users with accurate and reliable information, so websites that demonstrate high levels of E-E-A-T are more likely to rank higher in search results. That seems fair right?
Technical SEO
While the content optimization and keywords of a website are critical for search engine optimization, the technical aspects of SEO cannot be overlooked. Technical SEO is the foundation that supports your website’s content and ensures that it’s discoverable by search engines. A website with poor technical SEO can suffer from slow loading times, broken links, duplicate content, and other issues that can negatively impact its search engine rankings––and it represents an example of poor user-friendliness. Technical SEO involves optimizing your website’s backend code, structure, and infrastructure to ensure it’s easy for search engine crawlers to navigate and understand.
Which leads us too…
Best Practices for SEO
SEO is a crucial component of any successful digital marketing strategy. However, it’s not just about optimizing your website for search engines; it’s about providing the best possible experience for your users. That’s why it is important to implement these key SEO basics to help users and Google, starting with…
Site Speed
You may have heard the term “content is king’ which is true. But the words on your website mean nothing if users can’t access them. A slow-loading website can negatively impact the user experience, causing visitors to abandon your site and potentially decreasing conversions. Site speed is a critical component of SEO, as Google has indicated that faster-loading websites tend to rank higher in search results.
Mobile Optimization
Mobile optimization is crucial for SEO success, with more and more users accessing websites through mobile devices. Google’s algorithm strongly emphasizes mobile-friendliness, and websites not optimized for mobile devices are likely to be penalized in search rankings. A mobile-optimized website is designed to provide an optimal user experience on smaller screens, with easy navigation, quick loading times, and content that’s easy to read without zooming or scrolling.
Navigation
Site architecture is a critical component of SEO. Search engines like Google use website navigation as a key factor in determining the relevance and authority of a website. Navigation also plays an important role in the user experience, as it helps visitors find the content they’re looking for quickly and easily. A poorly designed navigation system can negatively impact SEO by making it difficult for search engines to crawl and index your website. It can also hurt the user experience, causing visitors to leave your site.
Content Optimization
We are back to E-E-A-T. This is where the acronym is ready to hit the playing field. Google puts Trust at the center of this idea. The reason is that Google wants users to trust their search engine to provide the best and most accurate information. But how do you do that? By focusing on experience, expertise, and authority.
Your content should exemplify your industry knowledge (expertise) while becoming the primary information source for many users (authority). As an added strength, you can back it up with user reviews, case studies, or project highlights (experience).
We are transitioning to a world of AI-written content, and it is getting hard to distinguish between a human and a computer. Allowing the software to do all the writing for you may be tempting. But, this can also be dangerous, as Google has been known to crack down on plagiarized or duplicated content.
A website that doesn’t have authentic content will be penalized by Google for being unreliable. That doesn’t mean AI can’t help with content creation, but copying and pasting exactly what ChatGPT wouldn’t be a wise choice.
Does Your Website Need SEO?
The short answer is YES. But don’t just take our word for it. Here are some key facts.
Statistically, organic traffic (traffic from search engines) dominates website visits by 53%! Local searches make up 46% of Google searches! In 71% of cases, local searches lead to in-store traffic. And in a professional setting, there is a 12.3% conversion rate from organic traffic.
However, 90.63% of web pages see no organic traffic from Google, so utilizing SEO for your business is essential.
But that is easier said than done. While on the surface, SEO may seem easy… it can be a lot more complicated. That’s why you can always hire a trusted digital marketing company, like Digital Marketing Inc., to do the SEO for your business.
But it’s also important to know that SEO is a long-term game, as it takes time for Google to crawl and understand your business. That’s why you should be alert and wary of anyone who says they can get your website ranking quickly.
This brings us to…
Black Hat SEO
Like everything else on the internet, you must be careful of bad characters. In SEO marketing, some companies will use unethical and manipulative practices to “improve” your search rankings. These tactics violate search engine guidelines and can result in penalties or even a complete ban from search engines. Black hat SEO techniques include:
- keyword stuffing
- hidden text or links
- cloaking
- and link schemes
Keyword stuffing involves overusing keywords on a page to manipulate search engine rankings, while hidden text or links involve hiding text or links in a way only search engines can see. Cloaking involves showing different content to users and search engines to improve rankings, while link schemes involve acquiring links in a manipulative and unnatural way. Black hat SEO techniques can result in short-term gains but are not sustainable and can harm a website’s reputation and rankings. Remember E-E-A-T?
Of course, if you want to avoid being penalized and get quality results, you could always hire Digital Marketing Inc. We pride ourselves on our ability to keep up with Google’s ever-changing algorithm while delivering top-quality SEO solutions that drive tangible results.
Call DMI Today!
Do you need SEO for your business? Digital Marketing Inc’s SEO specialists have the knowledge and experience to help you climb the ranks and dominate your industry.
FAQs
How Do You Measure SEO Success?
This depends on why your business wants to use SEO. Is it to raise awareness? Then maybe more users landing on your website is your goal, emphasizing engagement.
Is it for leads or sales? Then you need to understand how more users can increase your conversion rates. Digital Marketing Inc. uses tools such as Google Analytics and Google Search Console to provide data on the number of visitors to your website, the pages they visit, and other helpful information. Ultimately, measuring SEO success requires a holistic approach, considering different metrics and how they align with your business goals.
How Do I Check My SEO Strength?
SEO strength combines technical expertise, analytical skills, and a keen eye for detail. Regularly assessing and optimizing the technical side of your website, keyword rankings, and content quality can help improve search engine visibility, website ranking, and overall SEO strength.
What are SEO tools?
SEO tools offer various functionalities to help website owners, digital marketers, and SEO professionals optimize their websites for search engines. SEO tools can provide insights into website traffic, keyword research, on-page optimization, link building, content analysis, competitor research, and analytics reporting. Some popular examples of SEO tools include Google Analytics, Google Search Console, SEMrush, Ahrefs, Moz, and Screaming Frog. They can help identify technical issues, track keyword performance, analyze backlink profiles, monitor social media, and generate reports.