Have you attained the top position in Google’s SERPs? You probably know what all goes into achieving that spot! But, that doesn’t mean that you’ve mastered it all. Neither does it mean that once you’re on the topmost branch of the tree, you won’t topple over ever again. Google is always on the go, coming up with algorithmic changes that can offer to the users a better search experience every time. These changes could knock you off the top spot, meaning that you have to keep up with the changes at all times. So, there’s no point at which you can sit back and relax. Every SEO company in Bangalore will agree that you constantly need to be employed in optimizing your website to ensure ranking at the top. This means you consistently work on your on-page SEO elements, like tweaking your content, tags, and website architecture, to improve your ranking, search visibility, and traffic. We’ll discuss below how you can work on all the three categories to help search engines better understand your website and rank you higher, so that you can gain traffic and business.
Content
Content is king, and the medium of communication between the target audience and the products/services/information you’re providing. Listed below are the content factors you need to consider to maximize your on-site SEO.
Writing
You need to write content that reads well as well as adheres to SEO best practices. Let’s help you know some key takeaways that can help you master the art.
- Your content should be easily readable
- You shouldn’t overuse keywords in your content
- You should keep your sentences short and simple
- You should break down your paragraphs and assign subheadings to them
- You should use lists to break large information into easily digestible chunks
Keywords
In order to grab the attention of both users and search engines, you want to show that you’re answering user queries; and one way to indicate this is by featuring keywords in your content. You need to first understand what your target customers are searching for, and create content that include these terms. Include, in your content, both short-tail and long-tail keywords that users are using when they type a query. And for this, you need to do a good keyword research strategy to ensure that you’re not missing out on any opportunities.
Visual elements
All the visual elements on your website like images, videos, and infographics should be such that they make your pages visually interesting to your visitors. More than 35% of people make their decisions of purchase after looking at the visual elements on a page. So, if you’re not having visual elements on your pages, you’re missing out on traffic. And, if you’re not optimizing them, you’re failing to impress your visitors. Some things you can do is include relevant visuals, be aware of the sizes to prevent slow loading, include alt-text for easy understanding, and making them shareable to identify opportunities for backlinking.
E-A-T
Expertise, Authoritativeness, and Trustworthiness are the three factors that determine a page’s quality, making it helpful to the users. These indicate the expertise of the content creator; and the authoritativeness and trustworthiness of the content, the website, and the content creator. If you want to improve your E-A-T , you need to provide meaningful content, high quality local landing pages, and customer support. You must also address bad reviews, and work on improving them. At the same time, you also want to stop putting up auto-generated content, overwhelming CTAs, distracting ads that are hard to close, and paid link campaigns.
Tags
HTML is the code used to structure your webpages and their content. They tell the user’s browser what to show and where. It also tells search engines what the page is all about, and how it should be ranked. And, tags are a very important aspect of HTML. Let’s help you know some tag-including factors you need to consider.
Title tags
Title tags, and the way you use them, can impact the traffic coming in, and the ranking of your site. When you have an attractive title tag, you grab the attention of the searchers. More attention gained, means more people will click through to your site; and more traffic means more value in the eyes of Google. The search engine giant will consider your site to be important, relevant, and appropriate, thus ranking you higher than the others. But, there are some small things you need to consider if you’re looking to have an attractive title tag for your page. For instance, you need to keep your title tag short and effective, wherein a 50–60-character length will do, while including a strong keyword and call-to-action anywhere in between. Also, you may transform your title tag into a question for greater effect, targeting a problem or query your target audience may have. If possible, you may also include a number in your title tag, signifying “n” number of steps, “n” number of solutions, “n” number of ways, etc. All such tiny elements can club together to form a unique and attractive title tag.
Meta description
Another very important tag is the meta description, which helps both Google and the visitors to understand what the Web page is all about. While they have no direct relation to SEO or ranking, but when they help Google and visitors understand what the page speaks about, it indirectly affects click-throughs by visitors, and the value gained in the eyes of Google about your page’s relevancy and appropriacy. Make sure to have a meta description that defines all the aspects about a page in brief, in a way that it tempts the visitor to click through and find more about the details.
Geotagging
When your business is looking to target the local audience geotagging is of prime importance. You can connect with the people in your neighborhood by optimizing your on-page local SEO. There are three main tactics to do so.
- You begin by optimizing your name, address, phone number, website URL, business description, working hours, and every other essential detail mentioned appropriately and correctly.
- You optimize your content by accommodating for “near me” searches, and providing location-based content.
- Last, but not the least, you optimize and build links with other local businesses and organizations.
Website Architecture
Having a well-structured website is of utmost important, as a website laid out in a logical manner will be crawled more effectively by search engines, and will also satisfy the visitors, making it easy for them to browse through your website, thus creating richer user experiences.
Having a well-structured website is important for two reasons: First, a website laid out in a logical manner will be crawled more effectively by search engines, and secondly, it will create richer user experiences. Here are the website architecture factors you need to consider to maximize your on-site SEO.
Navigation and responsiveness
Mobiles today account for major internet searches. Because most of the users, almost 70% of them, are on mobile devices, Google has prioritized sites with responsive designs. There needs to accessibility to both portrait and landscape orientations; and there should be typography responsiveness. Also, you must design for thumb, as visitors using smartphones, tablets, and other such devices use their thumb mainly for browsing through. Another important consideration is the positioning of important elements on the site. What may be appropriate for a desktop website may not be for a mobile version of the same site. for instance, desktop versions may welcome a navigation bar at the top, but for a smartphone, it is best to position the same at the bottom of the page. In every way, you should make it possible for the visitors to navigate important content on any device without any difficulties.
URL structure
URLs are another aspect that can help you rank higher. If you follow some tactics correctly, your URL itself can help you gain attention. For instance, you must match your URL to the page title, but making sure that it is short and simple to understand. Any unnecessary clutter should be avoided, any special characters eliminated, and hyphens used (instead of underscores) to separate words. You must also choose HTTPS over HTTP, and include strong keywords in your URL for greater effect. Last, but not the least, always use lowercase alphabets to avoid confusion, and shun using dates which may showcase your content to be old and outdated in the future.
Site speed
The website architecture does not stop at how the website is designed and laid out. It also includes one other very important element – the site speed. A slow-loading website can frustrate the visitors, and drive them away, thus affecting both your business, and your search ranking. Page speed has thus been considered as a very important factor for ranking. You must thus ensure that your website loads fast, nothing more than 3 seconds. And for that, there are a few minor things you need to consider, such as using small-sized compressed visual elements, optimizing your images, reducing redirects, leveraging browser caches, and eliminating all that is unnecessary.
So, you have all the most important on-page SEO elements spoken of above. But, it just doesn’t stop here. There are so many other on-page SEO factors you need to know about and work upon. Other than that, you also need to focus your efforts on other off-page SEO factors too! While on-page SEO can help boost your rankings with internal efforts, off-page SEO is all that happens externally to impact your site’s ranking.
This includes elements like backlinks and social mentions. Obviously, you have a lot more control on on-page SEO, but, you need to also keep your eyes on off-page SEO. You want to build links and promote your site once you’ve put in all your efforts into building a good and relevant website that is completely optimized for search engines and visitors. Your goal is to demonstrate your value to search engines, by offering richer experiences to the visitors. But remember, this is not a one-time job. You need to keep reading and keep working, and you’ll certainly reap the results you deserve! If you think it’s not your cup of tea, there’s always an SEO company in Bangalore you can hire to help you with every on-page and off-page SEO strategy.
