As fast as the days and season might change, the trends in SEO change faster. But unlike the changing daylight and rise and fall in temperatures, the shift in SEO trends can be extremely hard to track.
Unfortunately, for most businesses, there’s usually no way of knowing whether your SEO marketing campaign is working or not.
How can you be absolutely sure that your SEO marketing plan is going to yield fruitful results and that you are not just waiting in vain for your web traffic to increase?
The obvious answer is to implement strategies that are known to work.
But the real deal is to separate the techniques that actually work from the techniques that are just being promoted by marketing agencies or software companies. Usually, these companies are just trying to get you to subscribe to their services or use their ‘amazing’ tool that will help you reach to the top.
Following are the foolproof SEO techniques that you can implement on your own and thus, increase your web traffic without falling trap to fake marketers claiming to help you in your endeavors.
Do an SEO Audit for Your Website
Completing an SEO audit for your website is a surefire way of boosting your rank on search engine results page. It helps you identify the loopholes in your current strategies and rectify any mistakes you might have made.
Here’s what you should check when auditing your website for SEO.
- Meta titles, meta tags, and meta descriptions are written for each page
- Each page is optimized for relevant keywords (note that optimizing a page for a keyword does not translate to stuffing the page with a keyword)
- The pictures on your website include the keyword in the image-alt text
- The URL for each web page is optimized accordingly (it should be short and simple – you can do this by creating the right slug for each page)
- The content contains a sufficient amount of both, internal and external links – because links to other sources on the web are amongst Google’s top-three ranking factors!
When it comes to the URL, it should look something like this:
You can tell at a glance that the page talks about content marketing strategies.
This is important from an SEO point of view because complex and lengthy URLs that contain undecipherable symbols, numbers and whatnot can be hard for a search engine to pick up when it is looking for sites that match a user’s query.
Rethink Your Content Strategy
People who don’t believe in ‘content comes first’ approach might as well believe that the sun rises in the west.
Content is king.
You must have heard it a thousand times already. But as cliché as it may sound, it’s still true because it’s still very much applicable.
No matter how much the field of SEO might evolve and what latest algorithms Google might be using to determine the rank of websites, the content that your website features will always hold its importance.
Let’s consider the ideal scenario that your website made it to the top three results or the first search engine results page for that matter. Does that guarantee that the user will click on the link that will lead them to your website?
No.
Because they will quickly scan the headline first along with the brief meta description featured beneath it. And this should contain unique yet relevant information that makes them want to explore more.
But it’s not just about writing catchy headlines and meta descriptions. You need to hold the reader’s attention until the very end.
The ‘back button’ is your nemesis because even if you have attracted sufficiently large traffic, it can result in decreasing your site’s ranking.
If the visitors to your site don’t read past the first few lines and decide to go back, the search engine will be quick to notice and take action. It will lower the rank of your website as your site doesn’t seem to provide the visitors with what they need.
Interesting and engaging content not just reels the user in but also keeps them hooked for long. However, producing such content is not everyone’s cup of tea. So, you might be better off by hiring a content writing service in this case.
If implemented correctly, an SEO plan can not only increase the traffic to your website but also generate leads, boost sales and therefore, maximize profit.
So, follow these tips and rest assured, your total web traffic is bound to skyrocket faster than you might have imagined.
Author’s Bio
Dave is a passionate content marketer who’s dedicated to helping others benefit from the insight that he has gained over the years in his line of work. He alternates his days between writing compelling value-adding blogs, running household errands, and lounging at the beach.
