How to Create a Basic SEO Strategy and Improve Your Website Visibility

So, you have a website for your business but it’s not showing up on the first page of Google’s search results. It’s not on the third page, or maybe even the sixth. Either you forgot to hit“publish” when you created your website, or your SEO strategy is lagging behind! Even a basic SEO (search engine optimization) strategy will improve your web presence. It will also get your website on a Google search results page by using in-depth SEO analysis and research. There are many dos and don’ts for SEO, and one of the most important dos is to keep your content up-to-date with the latest SEO trends and search engine guidelines. A digital marketing agency can help you create and maintain a successful SEO strategy with SEO analysis and keep your website ranking near the top. The following are some basic tips to get your website noticed with SEO analysis.

Find Useful Keywords

SEO keyword search — *Yes, this is a real SEO TWIST word search.*

Find keywords that are relevant to your business and your business size to improve your website ranking and visibility. A basic keyword may not help your ranking if you have major competitors (which is likely). Try to aim for more specific niche keywords; instead of relying on the broad keyword “belts,” for example, you can narrow it down to your region and specialty, such as “novelty belts Bobcaygeon.” Create a list of keywords using programs such as Google’s Keyword Planner, and also research what keywords your competitors are ranking and bidding for.

Research Who Your Competitors Are

An easy way to find out who you’re competing with online is to use your newly-created keyword list to search for competitors on Google. Take note of the top 10 websites that show up on the search results page. And most importantly, keep track of those who use the same specific niche keywords—these are your main competitors.

Analyze the Competition

Once you’ve determined who your main competition is, you can begin your SEO analysis using software, or contact a reliable digital marketing agency to make your job a lot easier. This analysis will include:

Obtaining the general metrics for your competitors;
Downloading their backlink profiles and sorting the backlinks from most to least authoritative—this will help you determine the number of high-quality links you’ll need to target;
Analyzing their topical authority—whether or not they an expert in their topic area; and Using metrics to determine industry averages.

Research Content Marketing & Social Media Strategies You can do a social media audit to research your competitors’ social media strategies. Visit all of their social media pages—Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, LinkedIn, Pinterest, etc.—and look for the following:

Number of followers;
Frequency of posts/updates; and
Engagement ratio.

Create Your Own SEO Strategy

Digital SEO analysis plan — *No matter what the situation, having a detailed plan makes everything easier.*

With all of the data from your research and SEO analysis, you can now create your own SEO strategy. For your website to show up on search results, you’ll have to determine how many links you’ll need and the quality of these links. This will depend on the site ranking averages for your chosen keywords. Out of the total number of links you’ll need, determine how many links should be based on topical categories. Using the industry averages, create a plan for your backlinks and determine how many should:

Be in your direct niche;
Be in a more generic niche;
Have a Domain Rank of 80 or more, 70 or more, and between 60 and 40.
Blogs & Social Media

Determine how many blog articles to post on your website each week. Of these articles, figure out the number of articles that should be keyword focused and topic focused. Also make a plan for a regular social media schedule. That means planning out how often you will post on your social media pages—and set a target for how many followers you want your pages to get.

Maintain Visibility

Maintain digital SEO visibility — *There is no point putting so much work into a website if nobody can find it!*

You’ve done your research, found your keywords, and now have a published website that is ranked, along with social media pages to target potential clients. If you stay on top of your SEO analysis and continue publishing quality content that is useful for your visitors, you should maintain visibility with search results. Google frequently uses algorithm updates to ensure the quality of the websites that appear on Google’s search engine (part of Google’s Index). If your website is lacking quality content, these Google algorithm updates can penalize you by affecting your website ranking and reducing your visibility. A recent Google Update named Fred penalized hundreds of websites around the world by taking away their Google search results visibility. Here are a few things to avoid to ensure your website won’t lose visibility on search engine results pages when Google launches its Algorithm Updates:

Poor-quality content—poorly written, outdated content, that lacks useful or relevant information;
Stuffing keywords into content—websites that stuff keywords in every nook and cranny of their pages are often penalized by Google; and
Ads—not only are ads annoying, the more you have, the more harm they will do for your website’s ranking and visibility. Most of the websites penalized by Fred had a combination of several advertisements, including banner ads, and poor-quality content.

It is important to stay on top of search engine guidelines and keep your website up-to-date. This way you avoid any unwanted penalties from algorithms updates like Fred. Quality content that uses SEO analysis and research will help you maintain a visible well-ranked website. As a result, you won’t have to scroll through page after page of Google search results looking for your website.

Tags - Digital Marketing, SEO Tips, analysis for SEO, basics of SEO, seo analysis, website analysis