We heard about SEO, website optimization, technical and on-page SEO and yet, the concept is blurry for you? That’s fine. Let’s get down to it.
How does SEO work, anyways?
Basically, search engines enable the users to find the right solution in the number of sources that are available on the World Wide Web. As there are a lot of sources, search engines help and prevent the irrelevant sources to appear in the first pages. Usually, the search engines study different elements of a web page: the title, the content, the meta description. First of all, they crawl the web to find new pages ready to be indexed. Then, they index the new pages and store the information in the database, so that they can easily retrieve it later when a query term corresponds to the page. And finally, of course, they provide the information and present it in their SERP, this is the line of results, the Search Engine Results Pages. Whenever a user enters a query (list of words or phrases in the “Search” box of Google for instance), the Search Engine replies with a list of websites, of sources whose keywords and content are linked to the query terms.
Today, Google is the first Search Engine used, before Bing and Yahoo.
Relevancy and popularity are based on a lot of parameters, called the ranking factors (on-page factors and off-page factors). This explains why content should be created according to SEO parameters: so that they can be crawled, indexed and then easily provided by the search engines whenever the query terms match their content.
What does SEO mean, by the way?
SEO stands for “Search Engine Optimization”.
It implies making changes and adaptations to the content to make the website and its pages, images, etc. more relevant for search engines to index them and offer the content to users directly. Creating an SEO-friendly website and content has an impact on the ranking of the website and thus, a role in the visibility of the brand: the more the users see the website on the first page of a search engine, the more likely they’ll be to trust the brand, click on the link, visit the website and engage with the company and its product(s)
Why does SEO matter?
- SEO gives data on what the visitor does. Writing content is good. Having a website is great. But not knowing how it is used, consumed, or read by the target audience — or even if the target audience is reached and gets to this content — is way more important.
- SEO helps increase traffic and conversions. Advertising can be a good way to make the brand visible on the Internet. But SEO helps you rank in a particular niche via keywords, and backlinking, and can drive organic traffic to your website.
- It costs effort. And that’s it. When the SEO strategy and content strategy are linked, we just have to…start working. It requires some effort, good writing skills, and inspiration, but it doesn’t require a complicated tool and a large amount of money.
- Ranking = Trust Being on the first page of Google is clearly a sign of trust. It shows we have something to say, we know what we do, and we master our field.
- Audience Loyalty: The more popular the content, the stronger the SEO, and the better the ranking. Plus, if you provide good, valuable, relevant content to your audience — whether educational or product-oriented for customers — they’ll obviously come back to you for more inspiration, tips, best practices, opinions, etc.
Where to start?
Ready to get started? Well, before anything, keep in mind that your blog article or web page should have:
— A title that makes sense The title should match the body of the article. It should contain at least one keyword and the content of the article should be relevant and answer the question the title underlined.
— A introduction that makes the reader curious A kind of introductory part that explains to the reader why he should keep reading, something appealing.
— A body that is structured The content with examples, explanations, opinions, etc. depends on the type of content. Internal links can be there
— A conclusion that leaves the door open for more info A paragraph that summarizes everything that has been said and that provides all the sources for more info (mailto, CTA, etc.)
— Illustration / Images
— A structure that is clear and efficient
— Several (1 to 3) CTAs
