George Orwell famously said, “We have reached the point where the first duty of intelligent men is to restate the obvious.” Whether digital marketing and organic SEO have reached that point remains to be seen.
But in a world where a lot of messages about how to market your website are flying around, it’s a good idea to take Orwell’s advice to heart and begin with the basics. That means a review of your on-page optimization techniques.
Here are 3 basic techniques to try:
#1: Do keyword research.
A prerequisite of on-page optimization is that you’ve already got some great content posted that people in your market will want to read. Review the content and determine what 2-3 keywords best describe it and then find out what kind of search volume they get on Google.
The Keywords Everywhere Tool is great for this. You’ll not only find out the search volume for your keyword ideas, but you’ll also see the online market size for all related keywords that users type into the search engines.
Once you’ve settled on your keywords, edit the content to make sure all are used and the primary keyword is used within the first 100 words.
#2: Write meta-titles and descriptions.
Have you written the title and description as you want it to appear on a Google search? If not, Google will just pull something from the top of the page, and the introduction to a page rarely makes the best sales copy for a search engine.
So make sure these fields are filled out. If you can’t find the fields, talk to your developer and get them added.
#3: Use internal linking.
When you make references to a topic that’s covered elsewhere on your website, include the link. This adds value to the page in the eyes of Google’s spiders. Don’t overdo it—forcing a link where it’s unnatural won’t help and may even hurt your linking credibility with the spiders. But when it’s a smooth organic fit, include the link.
On-page optimization techniques aren’t flashy and they aren’t even cutting edge anymore. But they’re still the foundation of how to present content to a search engine.
