Does Your Website SEO Really Matter?
Your website SEO (Search Engine Optimization) is basically the things you can do to your website so that it gets noticed by the search engines like Google, Yahoo and Bing.
If you want to be a successful online entrepreneur, you need to do certain things that keep the search engines happy. When you take action in your business according to particular methods and systems, you effectively tell the internet what your business is about. The search engines will then send you traffic (web surfers) that they think will benefit from what you offer.
There are several reasons why some sites rank at the top and others rank at the very bottom of the search engine results. Are you ready to check your website SEO?
FREE Checklist: SEO For Beginners
Are You Ready To Play The Website SEO Game?
In reality, website SEO isn’t a game. But it can be seen that way. In the old days, there were several tactics you could use to “trick” search engines like Google and manipulate the system. After all, search engines are just large pieces of code that have 2 basic functions:
- Crawling the internet to build an index of webpages and,
- To give web surfers a list of webpages the search engines think are relevant to whatever people are searching for.
When unethical website owners tricked the system it let really poor content get massive traffic. The web surfers weren’t happy and they let Google know what they thought. Google updated it algorithm so now poor and spammy content either gets ignored or blacklisted (also known as being put in the sandbox).
What Type Of Content Ranks Best?
People often ask SEO experts what type of content ranks best in today’s search engine. The answer is and will always be the same. Google wants one thing, and that is quality content. Google strives to provide its users with the best possible results.
So first and foremost, don’t try to trick the search engines with ‘black hat’ website SEO techniques. Yes, they may work for a short while, but eventually the search engines will catch up and put your website in the sandbox.
Once in the sandbox, Google won’t send you any more traffic. Instead of spending hours trying to find a way to trick the search engines why not spend an hour or two writing a valuable piece of content the search engines and people will love?
There are two main things Google looks at to determine if content is of good quality.
1. Engaging Users
The first one is engagement. How engaging is your content? Are people actually reading the entire article or are they hitting the back button as soon as they see it? This is how Google measures engagement. They want to know how long people are sticking around to read your content. If they stick around for several minutes, they know you are providing value.
This metric is measured by what is called Bounce Rate, and lower bounce rates can help rankings. If users typically click back, and your site has consistently high bounce rates, this can affect rankings in Google.
2. Backlinks
The second thing they look at is linking patterns. Google and other search engines learned very early on that people link to content they consider valuable. Content that is considered useful almost always is shared by users. Content that is considered useless doesn’t.
In addition, while linking algorithms have advanced quite a bit over the last several years, the basic principles of this concept still hold true. So if you want your content to rank make sure it’s valuable. Make sure it helps the end user. That’s the key to getting your content ranked. There are no magic methods or solutions.
Make Content For Users Not Search Engines
If you create a web page for search engines only, your only focus will be the keywords that you are trying to rank for. You can get so bogged down making sure the Google bot understands what keywords the page should rank for, and overstuffing your content with keywords, that it may become unreadable to the human eye.
This types of ‘black hat’ tactics rarely work. And if they do, it’s only for a short while and then the your website is hit with a big fat penalty and ends up in the dreaded ‘sandbox’.
Make every effort to provide useful content. It’s sort of a merry-go-around. Useful content leads to happy users and a low bounce rate, happy users link back and spread the word about the content through social media, which leads to more traffic, which leads to better rankings in Google. It’s all about useful content. That’s what Google wants and that’s what your potential customers want.
What Is SEO Marketing?
Anytime someone uses Google to make a search, they have an intent. They want to either find out about something, learn about something, solve a problem or buy something. Google is going to provide users with information that fulfills that intent.
So do your research and find out what type of content your target audience is searching for.
Make it a point to create your content around their wants and needs. This will not only increase your rankings, but it will also increase your conversions and sales.
The one thing to keep in mind is people read content, not the search engines. Do away with the keyword stuffing and anything else that is designed to trick or manipulate the search engines. True SEO marketing is about providing good content that people will love to read and share. Do that and your content will be ranked.
Free Checklist For Your Website SEO
Without web SEO, you’re just hoping that Google and the other search engines will somehow stumble across your website, figure out what your content is all about, and then hopefully send relevant and targeted traffic to your website. You’ve put a lot of work into your website so it makes no sense to just pray for luck where traffic and success is concerned. To boost your website SEO download my free checklist, SEO For Beginners.