What is Search Engine Optimization (SEO) positioning?
Search Engine Optimization (SEO) positioning is the process of optimizing a website to improve its visibility in the organic search results of search engines like Google. The main goal of SEO positioning is to increase website traffic by obtaining higher rankings in search engines. This is achieved through optimization of website structure, content, usability, technical SEO, and content marketing. SEO can also be used to improve the quality of traffic to the site by increasing traffic that is relevant to the site’s content.
SEO is an essential tool for businesses as it helps improve their online visibility and increase traffic to their websites. SEO helps businesses improve their ranking on search engines like Google, which increases their reach and the amount of traffic their website receives. SEO also improves the user experience as search engines display relevant content to users. This increases the likelihood of users interacting with the website, which in turn increases sales and ROI. Finally, SEO helps businesses improve their online reputation, which increases their credibility and the trust of potential customers.
What SEO positioning techniques can we work on?
No matter how much effort you put into creating SEO content and building links, you need a consistent SEO strategy if you want to enjoy organic search visibility. Everything must be synchronized.
Because search engine optimization has significantly changed and website owners know it, building a consistent SEO strategy is no longer just about sitemaps and meta titles. Today, it’s a different game; the scale now points to the Authority and Relevance of your website.
Your consistent SEO strategy should be a reflection of your brand because after all, search engine marketing helps position your brand in front of your potential audience. Ultimately, if you want to succeed in SEO, your best strategy is to help Google make more money.
Here are some tactics that can help you in the process of your SEO strategy:
Create an SEO content strategy that answers your ideal customer’s questions.
Help search engines understand what your content is about; this is called on-page optimization.
Demonstrate to search engines that you have the authority to answer user questions; this is called off-page optimization.
Ensure search engines can easily find your content on mobile; this is called Google mobile-first optimization.
Optimize the SEO of your website to be found in local search results.
Establish SEO KPIs to track your strategy.
Let’s take a closer look at each one below.
SEO Content Strategy
According to Andrey Lipattsev, former Senior Quality Search Strategist at Google, high-quality content is one of the top three SEO ranking factors. But what is great content? And how can you develop a content strategy that supports your business initiatives?
Answer: Build your content strategy around an SEO strategy.
An SEO-focused content marketing approach not only provides Google with an understanding of your relevance but also helps you offer a top-notch user experience that starts the moment your audience searches for answers related to a specific topic.
As a result, you’ll get tons of backlinks to your website that will also satisfy your customers’ needs.
On-Page SEO
Even the most amazing content in the world won’t generate organic traffic if it’s not properly optimized for the keywords people search for.
The most important SEO ranking signals on pages come from the page title, H1, and subheadings. However, on-page SEO techniques go far beyond your headings and metadata.
This is what On-Page optimization is all about, which is the process of improving your page content to make it easier for search engines to understand what it’s about.
Despite how sophisticated Google’s algorithm is, it can’t understand the content of a web page as easily as you and I can.
Robots are amazing, but they haven’t quite got there yet.
Primarily, search engines will look for clues in the content in the form of:
Keywords (and location of those keywords on the web page)
Synonyms
Contextually relevant keywords
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The topic of the website that published the web page.
To do this, you must take into account the search intent, backlinks, depth and breadth of coverage, and especially internal links. And while the meta description isn’t a direct ranking signal, it can still benefit SERP click-through rates.
To improve efficiency, map out your entire on-page optimization project. Then, develop a repeatable process to systematically tackle one page at a time.
SEO Off-page
Off-page SEO (also known as off-site SEO) refers to any action you take outside of your website to improve your SEO. This often includes link building, guest posting, and interviews on third-party websites.
Google values what others think of your brand, so on-page optimization isn’t enough. You must show search engines that others view your brand as an authority. To truly maximize your organic search results, you must strategically reach out to credible and high-quality websites and influencers.
Authority and trust are paramount. However, make sure the linking websites are also relevant to your brand.
A car insurance company with backlinks from a math tutoring website is a major red flag for link manipulation.
Finally, diversify your backlink profile. It’s not as valuable to get 100 backlinks from the same website as it is to get 100 backlinks from 100 unique and high-quality domains. Therefore, you should look to scale your link acquisition process.
Mobile Search Strategy
Mobile search now accounts for 64% of all Google searches, according to Statista. And this trend is growing rapidly. The percentage of mobile devices in Google’s universe has increased by 56.1% over the past five years.
With the increasing popularity of smartphones and mobile search, it makes sense that Google has moved to a mobile-first index model or Google Mobile First.
This means that it’s now very important to optimize sufficiently for mobile devices or risk damaging not only your mobile device results but also your desktop and tablet search engine results.
How can you ensure your website is optimized for mobile devices?
Create a responsive website that can be easily viewed on smartphones and loads quickly. If your mobile content differs from desktop, evaluate whether your SEO copy sufficiently covers your target keywords.
Finally, observe how Google views your mobile compatibility using their Mobile-Friendly Test tool. Within Google Search Console, you can also use Google’s mobile usability feature to uncover potential mobile errors.
If you know developer tools in web browsers, you can also check how your content is rendered in different mobile viewport windows without leaving the page.
Local SEO Strategy
Local SEO, which involves optimizing a website to be found in local search results, is an important discipline to include in your SEO strategy – especially if you’re a retailer or service provider with physical locations. It’s also important if your market is geographically driven, even if you don’t have a physical store.
Local SEO is especially important when it comes to translating interest into actual sales.
According to Google, 46% of all Google searches have local intent. And according to a report from the Local Search Association, search engines are the most used channel for finding local business information, and 87% of respondents have used a search engine to find a local business. By 2021, mobile devices will influence over $1.4 trillion in local sales, according to Forrester.
To stand out in local SEO, keep your Google My Business account updated, along with many other online local listing sites. This would include Yelp, Citysearch, and similar local directories. Maintain a consistent NAP (name, address, and phone number) across all local listings.
Optimize your pages and content for local content, such as state names, cities, and even neighborhoods. You can also optimize “near me” searches for greater local coverage.
Reviews can also play a significant role in the results of your local search efforts. According to Qualtrics, 82% of consumers read an online review before buying a product. To this end, it’s best to establish a program that solicits reviews from your satisfied customers.
There are many SEO techniques for ranking a website, but some of the most important and well-known ones include:
- Content optimization: Creating quality, relevant, and unique content is one of the primary SEO techniques for businesses. This means that the content should be optimized for relevant keywords and provide real value to users.
- Link building: Building high-quality links from trusted sites is an important part of SEO, as it helps to improve a company’s ranking. This is achieved by creating quality content that other sites are willing to share and link to.
- Page structure optimization: The structure of a website should be optimized to help search engines crawl and understand the content. This means using appropriate tags and titles, SEO-friendly URLs, and structured content to make it easy for search engines to index and rank.
- Page load speed optimization: Page load speed is one of the primary SEO factors for businesses. Slow load times can decrease traffic and affect a company’s ranking on search engines. Therefore, it’s important to optimize page load speed.
- Mobile optimization: Most internet users access content from their mobile devices. Therefore, it’s important to ensure that a company’s website is optimized for mobile devices. This means designing a website that adapts to the screen size of mobile devices and is easy to navigate.