If you are familiar with SEO (search engine optimization), and you should be if you are a website owner, then you know that there are a lot of people and companies offering services and guarantees, and you most likely get these offers through email, and your contact forms on a daily basis. But not everyone can afford SEO services (even the run-of-the-mill low quality work being offered through email), but there are things that every website owner can do to help improve the possibility of ranking higher in search engines. So, let’s go over the 5 projects every website owner should tackle:
Improve & Expand Content
Most websites, especially small and local business websites do not realize the importance of having good quality and sufficient content on their site. Of course, it is not necessary to have large volumes of content, a blog, and article archives for a local drycleaner, but it is still important to have relevant and adequate content to provide enough information for search engines to digest, and determine what the website is about. By reviewing your site, and improving and expanding its content website owners will be able to improve their chances of ranking higher in search engines.
Create Descriptive Page Titles
The simplest change which has the largest impact on rankings is the optimization of the page title. Nowadays, most website platforms provide the option of customizing page titles, and this is a feature of which every site owner should take advantage. The title of each page (especially the home page) should be based on the most appropriate keywords covering the topics discussed on that page. It is also important to keep the title brief yet descriptive (the ideal length for a title is to have it be no more than 70 characters, including spaces).
Create or Improve Internal Linking
Internal linking is another important component of website content optimization. A great example of this is what Wikipedia does with their interlinking of articles; however, that is not what website owners should aim for, as their interlinking is a bit excessive for a site that is not an encyclopedia or a similar content site. The best way to establish a good internal link structure is to develop good content, and then go through the entire site, and link keywords to their relevant pages.
Create or Improve Heading Tags
Page headings seem like a no-brainer, as they are not only helpful for SEO, but also a usability feature which help website visitors determine the topic of pages and the website in general; however, often this easy change gets overlooked. To optimize page headings, like titles, make sure that the headings are keyword rich and descriptive. It is also important to not only use a main H1 tag, but also smaller H2, H3, and so on to further break down page content where it makes logical sense.
Create or Improve Meta Descriptions
Meta descriptions have not been a website element with direct impact on rankings, but they do provide a great opportunity for website owners to utilize meta descriptions to improve click-through rates which in turn will help improve rankings (higher CTR has direct impact on rankings). The meta description should elaborate on the title of the page, and to also give a reason for users to click on the listing to find out more. For example, if you have an ecommerce site, you may want to tout your free shipping offer within your meta description.
By doing these few simple steps, you can dramatically improve the chances of your site ranking higher in the search engine result pages.
