We have covered the basics of SEO, looking at what it is as well as a few tips on how to improve it. One of the main concepts we have covered is keywords, which help and make it easier for your website to be ranked as well as for people to be able to find you. Other concepts of SEO, which we have not yet touched on are onsite and offsite SEO.
Just a quick recap: SEO is the process of improving a website to increase its visibility for relevant searches. It works hand in hand with ranking.
Onsite SEO
Onsite SEO is also known as on-page SEO is everything you do ON your website to make it easier for search engines to find you. This involves optimising elements on your website such as the content of the pages. Good onsite SEO makes it easy and possible for both search engines and page visitors to:
- Understand the website and what it is about
- Address a search query or queries in terms of relevance
- Find value in that website and find it worthy of ranking on SERPS
The following elements on a website or webpage can be optimized for onsite SEO:
Images
Use alt text with at least 1 keyword for all graphics on your website and make sure you keep it short.
Ensure your site is indexable
One of the best ways to do this is to ensure your website is registered with Google. When this is done, the search engine will be able to crawl your website and include any relevant information in SERPs.
Title and description
Use your main keyword(s) in both the title and description and ensure they are optimised for length. Google’s indexing prefers titles that are approximately 60 characters and descriptions that are 150 words.
Internal links
Include between 1 – 3 links on each of the pages to redirect visitors to other webpages in your website. This works very well with blogs as you can redirect visitors to older blogs.
Update content regularly
This is very important as search engines love new content. This can be done on a website with proper planning but is easier to do with blogs.
Offsite SEO
Offsite SEO is also known as off-page SEO, relates to everything you do OUTSIDE/OFF your website. Actions you take to promote your website on the internet other than advertising. This process usually involves creating links (link building) on other platforms.
Link building
This is when one website links to another, for example by guest blogging. Link building acts as a vote of confidence in terms of the credibility of your website, especially when the link is related to a trustworthy and popular website that is relevant to your industry.
Guest blogging
This is a great way to build links and can be done in two ways. Either write a blog with a topic relevant to your business and ask another website to share it or secondly, allow someone else to post their blog on your website. In both instances be sure to mention your website as well as your social media handles – remember this is a link building process and so exposure is one of the main goals.
Social Media Marketing
One of the most popular methods of offsite SEO and involves creating and publishing content on social media platforms as well as sharing links related to your website. Make sure your content is relevant and informative, so you encourage people to share it.
Whether it is onsite or offsite SEO, we will be able to assist you to start the process of optimising your website and ranking higher on search engines. Pop us an email for assistance with any element of your SEO.
