Every business out there wants to outrank their competitors in the race to the highest ranks of the SERPs.
Yes, today in the digital age, online visibility is perhaps one of the most important aspects for any business. And, that is supposed to happen as being a digital marketer, you do know that online visibility can make or break your business and revenue.
HubSpot says, 75% searchers go past the first page of the search results.
So, it is quite evident that people want to get to the results immediately. And, if your website does not rank high enough, your website or marketing endeavours are never going to find prospects, easily.
Now, SEO or search engine optimisation is the most efficient way to increase your website traffic and attracting more potential buyers, when done properly.
But, today, as more and more businesses are trying their best to produce effective content, how can you differentiate yourself from others and stand out from the crowd?
As we said earlier, people are doing their best to get more and more traffic to their website, we consider the fact that you too are one of them.
And, as more website traffic is equivalent to a higher online visibility, focusing on the right kind of traffic is also important.
In order to do the same, you do need some best practices which can guide you to ultimate success in your niche. And, so, to help you with the same, here we are with the top 9 SEO tips that can help you achieve your business goals.
Top 9 Search Engine Optimisation Tips For 2022
Google has been upgrading their algorithms. And these updates have always set up bigger challenges for SEO experts.
However, there is always a way to success, if you follow the right path.
All you need are these 9 tips to make the most out of your SEO endeavours in 2022.
So, let’s get started.
1. Create Content Around Target Keywords
Keyword planning is an integral part of any SEO strategy.
So, while you go ahead in creating a robust content SEO strategy, make sure to focus on keyword research.
You can make good use of tools like Ahrefs, SEMrush, etc., to find out your target keywords. These tools are made to help you align your content along with certain keywords that most of your searchers use on Google.
And, while creating content, make sure that the write-ups do match the search intent of your searchers, as that’s what Google’s BERT and MUM prioritise, and that’s how it should be.
The above-mentioned tools will help you by segmenting keywords into,
- Primary Keywords, these should be incorporated in the headline as the main topic of your content.
- Secondary Keywords, these should be included in the subheadings and body content.
- Supporting Keywords, these should be included just in the body content.
While performing your keyword research, you will come across keywords that are considered secondary, but are subject to a lot of search traffic.
In such cases, you can opt for creating content having those keywords as your main topic.
All you have to do is, creating pillar content with your primary keywords and then linking them to the formerly mentioned articles are subtopics.
This approach will help search engines understand that you have a lot of insights and depth about these topics and that will boost up your chances to get a high rank in the relevant searches.
Long-tail keywords are also quite essential when it comes to crafting content.
This is because, these keywords are more intent-focused. And that can be very helpful in attracting potential buyers down the conversion funnel.
2. Titles Are Important
There are a lot of people who often get confused between titles and headings. Often, they consider both of these elements to be the same, however, they are quite different and are necessary in a web page.
To enlighten you more about the same, the title of a web page is the <head> element of every HTML document. It is also responsible for containing the metadata of the concerned web page.
Important information such as the document title, the language used, and codes required by analytics tool, each of them come under the section of metadata contained in the title tag.
The <title> or </title> tag is responsible for informing search engines about what is a particular web page contains and is also shown in the SERPs of relevant searches.
To create a good enough title, you need to make sure that it constitutes of these two things:
- The primary keyword that you intend to rank for, and
- Adequate information to make people click on the link
So, undoubtedly, titles are an extremely important part of any SEO endeavour and are the first things to consider while creating a content piece.
Now, if you are wondering about why the second part is so important, then let us tell you that, even if your web page with a good title tag gets a high enough rank but fails to get clicks, Google will replace them with articles that get clicked.
On the other hand, headings and subheadings are also important.
The heading of a web page is wrapped in the <h1> tag, and the rest tags such as <h2>, <h3>, <h4>, <h5>, <h6> etc., are subheadings.
So, while creating content, make sure that the <h1> tag incorporates the primary keyword, and the subheadings have secondary keywords placed in them.
3. Focus on Creating Effective Meta-Descriptions
The block of texts that appears in the search engine results pages below the title is the meta description of a concerned page.
As we mentioned earlier, the HTML <head> tag contains the meta description of a page alongside the title.
Meta description is responsible for informing search engines about what information a certain page contains.
To create the best meta description for a web page, what you need to do is stepping into the shoes of a searcher and think about what they would be looking for that is relevant to the content that you have created.
Think about how more convincing you can be to make your audience click on your content, without making it clickbait.
Also, do remind yourself of the fact that Google keeps on rewriting meta descriptions.
Yes, when Google gets a better hold of the user intent, it tries its best to make sure that your content’s meta description displays what a searcher is looking for.
Search ranking algorithms do not get affected by meta descriptions. But the click-through rate is somewhat dependent on how well you have crafted your meta description.
So, no matter if Google rewrites the meta description of your page for you, make sure that you do your best to make it look as alluring as possible.
It’s a free opportunity, so make the most out of it.
4. Optimize Images
It is important to keep your file sizes the smallest as possible. So, make sure you do the same as it helps your page to load quickly.
Now, we do understand that it would take eternities to go through every image and check its file size to find out if it can slow own your website. So, here is a hack for you.
Just use Google Lighthouse, and it will help you find all the images that should be optimised in order to make your website load faster.
You can also use image optimisers such as Bulk Resize Photos in order to resize media files. Although, you will find such options in your CMS too.
So, to make sure that you do not end up resizing all your images later on, make sure that you resize your images to smallest size, beforehand, keeping them clear enough.
Now, if you are wondering why we are emphasising on this, then you need to understand that Google prioritises providing the best user experience to its searchers, and that is why if your page gets loaded slower than your competitors, then your website will also get a rank lower than your competitors.
Accessibility is also important.
There are also users, who will make use of screen radar tech which helps them navigate through websites.
Make sure you tell search engines that your website supports this accessibility feature.
5. Link Internally
Interlinking is a very important aspect of SEO.
So, make sure you link to other websites wherever you find it to be appropriate, but also with the pages of your own website’s relevant content pieces.
Keep in mind that Google crawls through every link that they find in your page to make sure that the links are made to pages that are relevant to the content that you have written.
So, link with intention as if Google finds them pretty appropriate, they will consider your website as trustworthy.
Also, instead of adding links to texts like “read this article” make sure that the content is linked to the primary keyword that it is based upon.
It emphasises on the way your link is headed to and informs the search engines effectively.
Moreover, there is not hard and fast rules when it is about the number of links that you can add to your content, but make sure you do not over crowd your content with links. So, add links that are the most relevant.
Yes, linking to non-relevant content confuses and distracts your users as well as the search engines.
Add links in enhance clarity of the provided information.
6. Prioritise UX
When talking about SEO and rankings, people often overlook the website design. They often focus more on bettering their meta descriptions and on the quality of content that they create.
However, it is quite important focus on the same, in order to get a high enough rank in the relevant searches.
Google prioritises UX and so should you.
Yes, Google wants to make sure that whenever a searcher lands on a particular web page, they can easily get their hands on the piece of information that they are looking for.
So, make sure you focus on making the process easy, no matter the device your searcher is using, be it a desktop or a smartphone.
Ask yourself a few questions.
- Is it easy enough to navigate through your website?
- Can a user click through the links easily?
- Does your long-form content come up with a table of contents which the user can make use of to jump through the content?
When developers create a website focusing on the desktop version of the same, often they miss out on the chance to see how it would appear on a mobile device.
So, it is quite imperative to keep in mind to have a mobile responsive design ready for your content.
No matter which device your audience uses to go through your content, it is always recommended to have a mobile version of your website so that you can convince Google to give you a high enough rank because of the same.
7. Boost Up Website Loading Speed
In every web page, the code present in the <head> section of the content should be quite lean as it loads before the rest of the page.
Although, website owners tend to neglect this section as they do not find it important enough.
And that is why they often keep the codes required for Google Analytics or Hotjar in the header section, making the website load slowly increasing the bounce rate.
Now, what can you do to better the loading speed of your website?
Well, as we mentioned in Point No. 4, Google Lighthouse is an effective tool that can really help you in this situation.
It scans your entire website finding the items that slow down your website and increases the loading time of the same.
Here all you need to do is making good use of this information to figure out what is important for your content, and what can be otherwise omitted.
Next, what you should do is making sure that when your website is in the development stage, your CSS and JavaScript files are bundled.
Also, make sure that these files are up-to-date and are developed with the highest efficiency.
So, apply your minification skills here and cut down every strand of excess code to make your website as fast as possible.
Another thing that you can try is making sure that your content gets loaded before the rest of your webpage. This is because, if you want to keep your audience and Google stuck to your content, making your content get loaded as fast as possible can get the job done for you.
Lazy loading is also a great way to make sure that the images and videos of your web page get loaded after the textual content.
8. Incorporate Sitemaps
The top navigation bar of your webpage will help you the most in understanding which piece of content is the most important in your entire website.
So, to make your website SEO friendly and to make your website visitors get to the important pieces of content easily,
- Link your best pillar pages in the navigation bar.
There is no necessity of linking every pillar page of your website, but the ones that are the most important should be linked here.
- Use certain language that your website visitor understands.
Avoid terms like “solution”, “services”, etc. They might end up confusing your website visitors.
Now, speaking of sitemaps, they are nothing but XML files that are there to inform Google about the pages that are present in your website.
So, prepare it efficiently and submit it to Google via Google Search Console.
For ease, you can also opt for using HubSpot or WordPress which come with internally built sitemaps, breaking down your website in an easy and understandable way.
It is among the best practices of SEO, that sitemaps for a given website are clearly mentioned and informing Google about the same.
Yes, it is true that Google bots can easily crawl through your website and find the pages that are linked to your main content. However, it is recommended to have a sitemap in place in the Google Search Console.
9. Semantic HTML
Semantic HTMLs are a great way to inform Google about what it is crawling through and the page its bots are on.
This is because, semantic HTMLs are meant to reveal the structure of a page, which include the placement of content as well as the primary and the secondary topics that are mentioned.
Moreover, it also tells Google about the concept of the page, along with its relation to the rest of the text of your content.
You can easily do this. And, if you ask how, then let us tell you more about it.
For this, you need to use heading tags, rather than using smaller or larger fonts to format the text of your content.
Also, when indicating bold text, developers often use <b>, but, if you use <strong> for the same purpose, it will get emphasized strongly.
The difference between regular HTML and semantic HTML is quite distinct. Semantic HTML focuses on linguistic and specific differentiation to help Google understand about several aspects of your text as well as their function.
This is because, Google knows how a well-written title and well-structured page appear to be.
Conclusion
Improvement is a continuous process and there is no end to it.
Hence, you need to keep on striving to make your website better in order to achieve or retain the highest ranks on the SERPs of Google or any other search engine.
But, these 9 points are enough to push you through 2022. So, start working on it today!
What are you waiting for?
