One of the most common mistakes we see from fellow SEOs is trying to optimize a website’s homepage for every keyword they want to rank for.

This is NOT a good idea. 

In fact, it can dramatically reduce other web page’s ability to rank for important keywords, such as your product and service pages (which are where the money is at!). 

That’s not to say that you shouldn’t optimize your homepage to rank for some keywords, just not every single one. 

A successful SEO strategy spreads the keyword love across all your important pages, not just the homepage. 

You should also try to get these types of pages ranking for relevant keywords:

• Content (blogs, videos, etc.) 
• Landing pages and lead magnets 
• Product pages 
• Service pages 

In this article, we’ll teach you why going nuts with homepage SEO is a critical error, and we’ll show you what to do instead – so stick around!  

1. Why You Shouldn’t Optimize Your Homepage Too Much

Most businesses start out only offering a handful of products, and then gradually expand their lineup as they scale their operations. 

What does this have to do with optimizing your homepage?

It’s relevant because most new websites will try to rank their homepages for keywords closely related to their flagship products and services. 

This means that when they eventually expand, they try to cram a ton of new keywords into their homepage, which causes a huge mess. 

Here’s an example of what we’re talking about.

Let’s say that you start a new business that sells blue widgets in New York. Since you only sell one product, you optimize your homepage for it:

This works great until you start to expand. Once that happens, you start selling red widgets, big widgets, and small widgets. You also start offering widget repair services, management, and insurance. 

Complicating the issue even further, you decide to open new locations in Chicago, Los Angeles, and London. 

The problem?

Your homepage is optimized to rank for the keyword ‘blue widgets,’ and that’s it. 

There’s no way that Google will rank your homepage for:

• Blue widgets
• Red widgets
• Big widgets
• Widget Insurance
• Widget Repair
• Widget Management
• Los Angeles widgets
• Chicago widgets
• London widgets

Your title tag would have to look like this:

Yeah, that’s not going to work. 

Plus, Google usually only displays 50-60 characters of your title tag in the search engine results (this is a faked screenshot for demonstrative purposes only!).

In this scenario, you can’t have your cake and eat it, too. 

Instead, you have to pick a handful of relevant keywords to rank for your homepage and then create other pages (product pages, landing pages, blogs) to rank for other important keywords as your business expands into new arenas. 

2. Wrecked Rankings Because Of Keyword Cannibalization

Another reason why you shouldn’t rank your homepage for all your keywords is cannibalization. 

Keyword cannibalization occurs whenever you try to rank two web pages for the same keywords. 

For example, trying to rank your homepage and a blog post for the same keyword will cause cannibalization. 

Why is it called cannibalization?

Since Google’s algorithm will see that you have 2 pages trying to rank for the same keywords, it will become confused over which page it should rank – causing it to rank neither. 

For this reason, you can think of two identical keywords as ‘eating themselves.’ 

Another scenario is that Google chooses to rank a less important page ahead of a product or service page. For instance, if one of your product pages ranks for ‘buy glasses now,’ but your homepage does too, your homepage may outrank it. 

As a result, you’ll miss out on valuable opportunities to convert users with your product and service pages – since they’ll get directed to your homepage instead (or, more likely, will choose another result on Google that better meets their needs). 

Not only that, but keyword cannibalization will eventually drag down the rankings for both pages in the long term.

Here’s an example of what that looks like:

This is a screenshot from Ahrefs (an SEO tracking tool). Each colored graph represents a different page on the site.

You can see in this example that one page will start to rank, and then Google will drop it and try to rank another one.

This cycle continues, and none of the pages rank to their full potential because Google can’t figure out which page belongs on the SERPs (search engine results pages). 

3. Usability: Get The User To The Right Page From The Beginning

Picture this scenario. 

You have a homepage that you’ve attempted to rank for all your most important keywords. This means that every user who visits your website through a search engine will get directed to your homepage. 

Well, this isn’t good news for your user experience, and it’s highly likely that any clicks you do generate will click away from your site after a few seconds. 

Why is that?

It’s because users want to land on web pages that deal with what they searched for, not a mammoth homepage that lists everything. 

Let’s say a user searches for ‘affordable rakes’ online, which is one of the products you sell. However, instead of ranking a product page or blog post for the keyword, you’ve got your homepage ranking for it. 

Imagine the users’ confusion and frustration when they click on your result on Google only to get directed to your homepage. Rather than try to parse through all your inner pages to find what they’re looking for, they choose to click back to the search results and choose another site instead. 

This is why it’s imperative to only rank your homepage for broad keywords specifically related to your brand and industry. 

Keywords related to specific products and topics should go to your landing pages and content, NOT your homepage. 

Research shows that 60% of consumers will abandon purchases due to poor website user experience, so it’s crucial to provide a seamless experience going from search engines to your web pages.   

4. Conversions On The Homepage

It’s time to rethink your SEO goals for your homepage. 

Rather than trying to get your homepage ranking for tons of keywords, you should focus on making it a conversion-generating machine. 

In other words, your homepage should encourage users to sign up for your service or try out your products above all else. 

After all, as your brand grows and search rankings rise for other pages (like your content and landing pages), more users will naturally flock to your homepage. 

Knowing this, it’s a lot more powerful to optimize your homepage for conversions instead of keyword rankings. 

It will also grant you the freedom to do whatever you want with your homepage instead of filling it with thousands of words and keyword spam in an attempt to rank. 

Our homepage is a great example of this philosophy in action:

As you can see, we went with a sleek, super simple design. We let users know that we will simplify the ranking process for them, and we included two CTA (call-to-action) buttons to encourage them to book a call or create an account. 

Because of this, our homepage lands valuable conversions for us all the time. Yet, all those sign-ups and call bookings wouldn’t happen if our homepage was attempting to rank for every keyword relevant to our business.  

So, with all that said, how can you fix your website if you’ve tried to rank your website for umpteen keywords?

What To Do Instead

The fix is pretty simple – just build out separate pages for each specific topic (product, service, content, category, location) that you want to rank for.

For instance, you would build out a page for each product:

Products

/blue-widgets/

/red-widgets/

/green-widgets/

Service

/widget-insurance/

/widget-repair/

Locations

/widgets-los-angeles/

/widgets-chicago/

..and rank each of these pages for what they are actually about.

Essentially, you need a page on your site for every keyword topic you have in mind. If you don’t already have a page for a certain topic – you need to build it!

Now, this doesn’t mean you have to build out a page for every single variation of a keyword you have since Google often will rank one page for variations of similar keywords.

If you need help building out new service pages, check out our copywriting product, HOTH Web Copy. It’s where we craft original web pages that attract your target customer, explain the features, and encourage prospects to become paying customers.

SEO Strategies To Optimize Your Homepage Properly 

All this isn’t to say that you shouldn’t optimize your homepage for ANY keywords, just not every keyword under the sun. 

There are some keywords that you definitely should optimize your homepage for, such as broad industry terms and branded keywords. 

The idea is to optimize your homepage for these keywords without stepping on the toes of your other web pages via keyword cannibalization. 

Yet, if you followed the previous step above, your website should now feature specific web pages for individual topics, products, and locations. 

Doing so will make avoiding cannibalization a breeze since you’ll have different sets of keywords for each web page. This will keep all your SEO ducks in a row, so to speak, and it’ll prevent you from trying to rank two pages for the same keyword. 

Without further ado, here’s how to properly optimize your homepage for search engines. 

Conduct an audit on your homepage

Your first step should be to perform an SEO audit on your homepage. 

What’s that?

An SEO audit is an in-depth analysis of your homepage’s current performance on search engines. It will uncover your primary strengths and weaknesses, which will provide valuable insights for putting together a long-term SEO strategy. 

In a nutshell, an SEO audit is a health check-up for your website. It’s how you diagnose any potential issues that need repairing, such as indexing errors. 

Here are the steps you should take when auditing your homepage:

1. Check the homepage’s current keyword position rankings using Google Search Console (GSC). If you’re new to GSC, check out our guide on how to set it up. Take note of any keywords your homepage is ranking for that you weren’t aware of (especially if they’re relevant). 
2. Analyze the content on your homepage. Are you using your target keyword too many times? As a rule of thumb, your keyword should go in the title tag, H1 header, and the first 100 words of the content. Remove any excessive keyword usage to avoid getting flagged as spam. 
3. Does your homepage load quickly? You can use Google’s PageSpeed Insights to learn if you have any issues with loading speed, visual stability, or interactivity. 
4. Navigate to GSC’s Page Indexing Report to see if your homepage has any crawling/indexing errors. If there are any, follow the steps to resolve them immediately. 
5. Is your homepage designed well, or are there lots of clashing colors and visual themes? When in doubt, a simpler design is always better. Research has found that a website’s first impression is 95% influenced by design. 75% of users trust visually appealing websites over unappealing designs, which is something to bear in mind. 

Optimize your homepage content for SEO

Your homepage is your digital storefront. 

It’s the first impression many visitors will have of your brand. 

Therefore, the primary goal of your homepage content is to clearly communicate what you do to both users and search engines.

Let’s start at the top with your homepage title tag.

Your homepage title is the first element that search engines encounter. Keep it concise (60 characters or less) and descriptive. 

Include keywords that accurately represent your website and incorporate your brand name. Ideally, place your target keywords at the beginning of the title.

It could look something like this:

Why optimize your homepage title?

Optimizing your homepage title helps establish your brand name in search results. While your homepage may not directly rank for specific search terms, a strong title reinforces your brand identity and makes it easier for users to find you.

Content length and quality

Google views web pages that have less than approximately 700 words as ‘thin content,’ and it doesn’t provide them any favors in the search rankings. 

For this reason, SEOs have adopted the practice of including at least 700 – 1,000 words on every web page, including the homepage. 

Not only does this help you avoid the thin content label, but it also provides search engines with more context about your business and expertise. Provide valuable information that addresses your target audience’s needs, desires, and pain points. 

Here are some tips to keep in mind when drafting the copy for your homepage:

• Avoid keyword stuffing: Stick with natural language and readable formatting (short paragraphs and subheadings) over cramming keywords.
• Focus on user intent: Understand what your target audience is searching for and tailor your content to match it. This ensures that your content always scratches the right itch for your users. 
• Highlight your value proposition: Without being too wordy, convey what makes your brand unique and how you will benefit potential customers.

Optimize your headers

Headers and subheadings are crucial for online content, and your homepage is no exception. 

Headings are so powerful because they organize your content and make it scannable for readers. 79% of users will scan a page before deciding to read the entire thing, and subheadings are what make scanning possible. 

The last thing you want is for your blogs to feature massive walls of unbroken text. 

As a bonus, Google’s crawler bots also love subheadings, as it makes it easier for them to understand your content, too. 

Here are some tips to maximize the SEO potential of your headers:

Incorporate relevant keywords: Weave target keywords into your headers. This helps search engines understand the topic of each section.

Maintain a clear hierarchy: Use a single H1 tag for your main page title, followed by H2 tags for major sections, and H3 tags for subsections. This creates a logical structure that’s easy to follow.

Here’s a breakdown of header usage:

• • H1: Use only one H1 tag per page, typically reserved for your main page title. It should accurately reflect your brand and the page’s content.
  • H2: Employ H2 tags to introduce major sections within your content. Each H2 should represent a distinct topic or idea.
  • H3: Use H3 tags to break down H2 sections into smaller, more specific subtopics. This adds further clarity and depth to your content.

• H4: If you need to further elaborate on an H3 heading, use H4 tags, and so on (it goes to H6). 

Optimizing your headers enhances readability, improves user experience, and provides valuable signals to search engines about your content’s structure and relevance.

Optimize your meta description

Think of your meta description as an elevator pitch for your homepage. 

It’s a snippet of text that appears below your page title in search results that entices users to click through to your website.

Here are the key elements of a good meta description:

Concise: Keep it within 155-160 characters to ensure it’s fully displayed in search results.

Accurate: Clearly and accurately describe the page’s content.

Include a call to action: Encourage users to click by using action-oriented language (e.g., “Learn more,” “Discover,” “Find out how”).

Unique for each page: Don’t use the same meta description for more than one page.

Matches the content: Ensure the description accurately reflects the content on the page.

Here’s an example of a meta description for our fictional widget business:

“Widget World: Your one-stop shop for blue, red, & green widgets. We also offer repair, management, & insurance. Shop now!”

Optimize Image SEO

Humans are visual beings. While blank space on your homepage can make content easier to skim, incorporating visual content keeps viewers engaged and reinforces your branding.

Research shows that posts with images receive 94% more views than those with none. 

On top of that, images can be used as an alert for search engine crawlers to take note of your content. 

Choose the right file type 

File type impacts how quickly images load on your webpage.  Here’s a look at the most common file types:

• JPEG: Ideal for large photos and illustrations. Offers a good balance between file size and image quality.
• PNG: Best for logos, icons, and images with transparent backgrounds. Excellent for maintaining crisp details.
• SVG: Perfect for logos and scalable graphics. Retains quality at any size without increasing file size.
• GIF: Primarily used for simple animations and short video clips.

Image size also affects SEO

Image size is crucial for page speed. Large images can slow down your website, which is bad news for your user experience. 

Modern internet users have grown accustomed to instant gratification from just about everything, so they won’t stick around to wait for your web page to load. 

The solution?

Use image compression tools (like Adobe Photoshop, TinyPNG, or ImageOptim) to reduce file sizes without compromising quality.

Include your keyword in the file name 

Your image file name provides context to search engines about the image’s content. 

Use your focus keyword at the beginning of the file name, separating words with hyphens (e.g., “luxury-leather-handbag.jpg”). 

Avoid underscores, as search engines may not recognize them as word separators.

Optimize image alt tags

Image alt text (short for “alternative text”) is a brief written description embedded within the HTML code of an image on a webpage. It serves two primary functions:

1. Accessibility: It provides descriptions for visually impaired users using screen readers.
2. SEO: It helps search engines understand the image content and its relevance to your page.

Write concise, descriptive alt text while including relevant keywords. Imagine you’re describing the image to someone who can’t see it.

Example:

Instead of: alt=”image1″

 Use: alt=”Woman wearing a red dress standing in front of the Eiffel Tower.”

Add videos to your homepage 

Video is another content format that’s extremely effective at boosting traffic. 

The proof?

86% of marketers claim video content has driven more traffic to their websites. 

The great thing about video is that you don’t need Hollywood-tier production values to make it work. Instead, shooting some simple videos with a tasteful background on an iPhone will more than suffice. 

Popular video ideas for homepages include:

• Product and service demos 
• An introduction to your business 
• A fun illustration breaking down your value proposition 

It’s up to you what you choose to include on your homepage; just make sure that the file size isn’t too large. 

Add testimonials

Including testimonials on your homepage is a fantastic way to convey your expertise and competence. 

Social proof is an absolute must for any business in today’s age. 

According to research, a whopping 92% of buyers won’t trust a brand if they can’t find any reviews for it. 

Here are a few more reasons why testimonials are so powerful:

• Testimonials build trust: 92% of consumers read online reviews before purchasing. Testimonials demonstrate your product or service’s value from a customer’s perspective.
• Boost credibility: Genuine testimonials will validate your claims and build confidence in your brand.
• Increase relevance: Testimonials show potential customers that others like them have benefited from your offerings (and that they can, too). 
• Answer questions: Reviews often address common concerns and hesitations, which may serve as the impetus to visit your business.

Effective ways to incorporate testimonials:

Customer reviews: Display positive feedback from review sites as text snippets or embedded widgets. We actually do this on our website by embedding Google reviews:

Client logos: Showcase logos of reputable companies you’ve worked with.

Case studies: Briefly summarize successful projects or client stories.

Social media mentions: Embed positive social media posts about your brand.

Here’s an example of a testimonial on the HOTH home page: 

Source

We used a customer photo alongside a short, impactful quote. 

This enhances visual appeal and allows for strategic keyword placement for SEO.

Prioritize mobile optimization

With 70% of web traffic coming from mobile devices, optimizing your homepage for mobile is crucial for both user experience and SEO. 

The reason for this is that Google uses a mobile-first index, meaning it primarily uses the mobile version of your site for ranking and indexing. If your site isn’t optimized for mobile, it will likely rank lower in search results.

Here is what you need to consider when optimizing your site for mobile:

• Responsive design: Ensure your website adapts seamlessly to different screen sizes and devices.
• Content parity: Keep your content consistent between your desktop and mobile sites to avoid confusing search engines.
• Page speed: Optimize images and code to ensure fast loading times, as mobile users are less patient with slow-loading sites. Users are likely to abandon pages that take longer than three seconds to load. To learn more about optimizing homepage for page speed, check out our Free Page Speed Checker.

Get a feel for mobile-first design by exploring websites you’re familiar with. 

Start by analyzing their homepage layouts or other pages they’ve optimized. Take notes on how the content is presented and where key information is placed.

For example, check out one of our blog posts: How To Optimize For Featured Snippets And Rank In Position Zero. 

You’ll see that we have put the key takeaways and visuals further down the page, which caters to the scrolling behavior of mobile users.

Craft Compelling Calls to Action (CTAs)

You can have the highest quality homepage in the world, but if users don’t sign up for your service or leave their contact information, what’s the point?

This is why every web page needs a call to action (CTA). 

A CTA lets your visitors know in very clear language what it is you want them to do next, and they’re quite powerful tools. In fact, research has shown that including a CTA on your home page increases conversions by 121%.

Effective CTAs are clear, action-oriented, and tailored to your specific goals.

When creating CTAs, consider these key aspects:

• Clarity: Use simple, direct language that clearly states the desired action (e.g., “Get Started,” “Learn More,” “Sign Up”).
• Relevance: Align your CTAs with your company’s offerings and the page’s content.
• Urgency: Encourage immediate action by creating a sense of urgency or exclusivity (e.g., “Limited Time Offer,” “Book Now,” “Join the Waitlist”).
• Design: Make your CTAs visually stand out using contrasting colors, larger font sizes, or visually appealing buttons.
• Placement: Strategically position your CTAs in prominent locations where visitors are likely to see them.

Also, here are a few examples of effective CTAs for different goals:

Lead generation: “Get a Free Consultation,” “Download Your Guide,” “Request a Demo”

Product/Service promotion: “Shop Now,” “View Pricing,” “Start Your Free Trial”

Content engagement: “Read More,” “Watch the Video,” “Explore Our Blog”

Remember, the goal of a CTA is to guide users toward taking the next step in their journey with your brand. By crafting compelling CTAs, you can significantly increase conversions and drive meaningful engagement on your homepage. 

Pass Link Equity From Your Homepage 

Your homepage often holds the most authority on your website. 

As such, you can maximize its potential by strategically linking to other important pages. 

This will distribute its “link juice” (a fancy term for ranking power) and guide visitors deeper into your site.

Internal linking is an essential part of SEO and shouldn’t be dismissed when doing homepage SEO. Here’s why: 

• Improved user experience: Clear navigation paths make it easier for users to find what they’re looking for, leading to increased engagement.
• Distributed link equity: Internal links spread the authority of your home page and can drive more traffic to your service pages, product pages, or other valuable content. This can boost their rankings due to the link equity passed on by the homepage.
• Enhanced SEO: Search engines use internal links to understand your site’s structure and page relationships.

Here are some tips for passing link equity: 

Prioritize: Link to core service pages, top-performing blog posts, or other high-priority content.

Footer navigation: Utilize the footer as a secondary menu, including links to essential pages like “About Us” and “Contact.”

Contextual links: Incorporate relevant internal links within your homepage content to provide additional context and encourage exploration.

Calls to Action (CTAs): Use action-oriented CTAs within content or banners to direct users to specific pages.

Visual cues: Make internal links more engaging with buttons, images, or icons.

Build High-Quality Backlinks

Lastly, backlinks are a HUGE ranking factor for search engines, especially Google. 

What’s a backlink?

It’s an external link on another site that ‘links back’ to your content, which is where the name comes from. 

Search engines view backlinks as credibility votes toward the quality, accuracy, and trustworthiness of your content. 

As a quick example, if a trusted website like The New York Times links to your content, it’s a signal that your content is also trustworthy. 

Why is that?

The NYT is a major news publication that has rigorous publishing standards and quality checks, so they wouldn’t link out to just any old website. If The NYT does link to your content, it must be accurate and high-quality. 

That’s why Google uses backlinks as a crucial ranking factor. 

In particular, you need to build backlinks from relevant, authoritative websites in your field. 

To learn more about backlinks, check out our learning hub article on why link-building is so important for SEO. 

Summing Things Up 

To wrap things up, there are lots of reasons why you shouldn’t rank your homepage for every keyword you want to target. 

It leads to tricky issues like keyword cannibalization and frustrates users, which is why you should spread the keyword love to other pages on your website. 

That doesn’t mean that you can’t rank your homepage for important industry terms and branded keywords, just that you shouldn’t overstep your bounds. 

Do you need help creating new web pages for important keywords you’ve targeted?

Then you’re going to love HOTH Web Copy, our copywriting service featuring top-tier professionals, so don’t wait to check it out!

Also, feel free to schedule a call with one of our consultants to learn more about our SEO services and how to use them to reach #1 on Google.   

The post Why You Shouldn’t Rank Your Homepage (And What To Do Instead) appeared first on The HOTH.

This reinforces the need for search engine optimization (SEO) campaigns so that your content can reach the top of the SERPs (search engine results pages). 

Yet, one of the biggest challenges with SEO is how often it changes. 

Thanks to constant Google algorithm updates and newly emerging search trends, SEO tactics fall in and out of favor all the time. 

If you don’t routinely optimize web content, holding onto top SERP rankings will be next to impossible.

In the current era, recent developments like the prevalence of AI chatbots, E-E-A-T, and slower indexing times are drastically changing the way SEO works – and you need to keep up with them if you want your content to continue to rank. 

However, some tried-and-true optimization tactics have yet to go out of style, like conducting targeted keyword research and creating excellent content that provides value to your audience. 

There’s a lot to know about optimizing web content, which is why we put together this comprehensive guide containing 5 steps to optimize any piece of content to perfection. 

Along the way, you’ll learn how SEO and content optimization has changed in recent years, so stay tuned to get the scoop on the latest developments. 

Why is Optimizing Web Content Necessary?

What does it mean to ‘optimize’ a blog post, video, or web page?

Optimization involves making enhancements to a piece of content with a specific goal in mind, which is usually to improve its performance on search engines like Google. 

Higher SERP rankings aren’t the only reason you may want to optimize your content, as you can also optimize for higher conversions, click-through rates, and a better overall user experience. 

It all depends on what your primary business objectives are, such as increasing revenue or improving brand awareness. 

Also, routine optimization is a necessity due to the ever-changing nature of SEO. 

Unless a piece of content is evergreen (meaning that it continues to stay fresh & relevant for readers), you’ll need to update it with new information periodically. 

Not only does this ensure that your readers always receive the most accurate, up-to-date information, it makes your content eligible to remain on Google’s SERPs. 

Since Google only wants to provide its users with the highest quality, most accurate information, its crawlers only rank content that’s relevant and recent. 

Give underperforming content a second chance

Another reason to optimize your web content is to tweak and improve an existing piece of content that isn’t as performing as well in the search results as you’d hoped. 

It takes a lot of time and money to produce high-quality content, so it’s worth doing what you can to optimize a post that doesn’t meet your expectations. 

After all, it could be something simple like an indexing error that caused your content to disappear from the SERPs. 

Once you rule out technical issues like noindex tags, indexing errors, and duplicate content – it’s time to take a cold, hard look at the content you produced. 

Ask yourself the following questions to help determine the root cause of the issue:

• Are you targeting keywords that have decent search volume and relatively low keyword difficulty scores?
• Does the piece feature a readable format with keyword-rich headings (H1, H2, H3, H4, etc.)?
• Were you able to provide unique insights about the topic derived from your own personal experience and expertise?
• Do your title tag and meta description accurately reflect the topic you explore in the content?
• Is the piece of content more than 700 words? 

If you answered no to any of these questions, then you’ve definitely got some optimization to do. 

The good news is that if you’re able to fix whatever’s holding your content back, you’ll enjoy higher SERP rankings and increased online visibility. 

How Has Content Optimization Changed in Recent Years?

In a field that’s known for constant changes, the last few years have been especially ripe with new developments affecting SEO.

AI chatbots took over the world while Google released back-to-back updates to their algorithm and Quality Rater Guidelines – just to name a few changes. 

Here’s a look at the latest SEO developments you should keep in mind when optimizing web content.

Link Spam Update 

In December 2022, Google released their latest Link Spam Update, which used a souped-up SpamBrain (their AI-based spam prevention system) to negate the effect of paid backlinks on SERP rankings. 

While paying for backlinks was always against Google’s guidelines, it was standard practice for many SEO experts – even those who favored white-hat techniques. 

The update’s effects were drastic on websites that used paid or unnatural backlinks, as many site owners reported significant ranking drops.

Going forward, website owners must focus on strictly organic link-building techniques, such as guest posting, link insertions, and relationship-building. 

E-E-A-T (Quality Rater Guidelines update)

Around the same time the Link Spam Update rolled out, Google updated its Quality Rater Guidelines. 

Most notably, they added an extra E to their famous acronym, E-A-T (expertise, authoritativeness, and trustworthiness).

The additional E stands for experience, which means websites and reviews that display first-hand experience and knowledge of topics are favored by Google’s quality raters. 

To ensure your content remains at the top of the SERPs, optimize your content by including anecdotes, real stories, and first-hand accounts that reflect your knowledge on a topic. 

The AI revolution 

AI chatbots were already taking over the world at the beginning of 2023, and it’s only been gaining momentum since. 

The entire internet has long been buzzing about ChatGPT, AI image generators, and AI content creation software.

Bing famously integrated ChatGPT into its search engine, which is already changing the way users approach search engines. 

While traditional SEO still works for now, it’s bound to change quite a bit in the near future. 

In the meantime, you can use powerful AI tools to make optimizing web content a lot easier. Tools like Copymatic will enable you to automatically generate blog posts, landing pages, and even entire websites. 

Chatbots can provide quick answers to any questions you may have while creating content – saving you the need to browse multiple web pages. 

Reduced crawling and indexing 

In order to reduce their impact on the environment, Google significantly reduced the amount of crawling and indexing it does to discover new websites. 

Their thinking is that excessive crawling and indexing powered by non-renewable sources is contributing to greenhouse gas emissions. 

Not only that, but Google plans to neutralize its carbon footprint entirely by 2030, and reduced crawling/indexing is a part of that plan. 

What does this mean for SEO?

It means that crawling and indexing your new web pages will take even longer than before (it was already a lengthy process). 

While search engines like Bing and Yandex have incorporated IndexNow (an open-source protocol that enables instant indexing for participating search engines), Google has yet to implement such a solution. 

That means it’s more important than ever for site owners to publish high-quality content, seek out high-authority backlinks, and grow their social media presence to speed up the indexing process. 

Pro tip: The indexing process can be especially slow for link-building tactics like guest posting, so incorporate some link insertions into the mix. That’s because a link insertion involves adding one of your backlinks to an existing piece of content that’s already in Google’s index. 

5 Steps to Optimize Web Content 

Now that you’re up to speed on what’s new with SEO, it’s time to look at the most effective content optimization techniques to help you reach the top of the SERPs. 

Bear in mind that we’re only going to cover on-page optimizations, so if you’re interested in diagnosing and repairing technical issues, check out our in-depth technical SEO checklist instead. 

If you have a piece of content that’s underperforming due to on-page reasons (or if you’re creating a new piece from scratch), follow these 5 steps to optimize it for SEO fully. 

Step #1: Targeted keyword research 

The keywords that you target will make or break your SERP rankings, so you need to be smart about the ones you choose. 

Researching keywords is how you uncover topics relevant to your target audience, which will guide your entire content strategy. 

It’s more important than ever to find topics that are not only relevant to your audience but also cater to your expertise and first-hand experiences. 

Google’s algorithm is extremely adept at finding content that’s irrelevant or out of place, so you shouldn’t pursue a keyword simply because it has a lot of search volume. 

For example, if a website that sells car parts starts publishing trendy food recipes, it’ll stand out as irrelevant to Google. 

To find keywords to target, you can use our free keyword planner tool. 

It’ll provide essential keyword metrics like search volume, CPC, keyword difficulty, and current search trends.

Look for keywords that reflect your expertise, have high search volume, low keyword difficulty, and an upward search trend. 

Step #2: Proper keyword placement 

A mistake beginner SEOs make is to overuse their keywords, which stands out to Google as keyword spam. 

You want to use your keywords organically and in a few key locations, including:

• The title tag and meta description 
• Headings (especially H1 tag) 
• In the alt text for any images 
• Organically several times throughout the piece (including common variations) 
• In the first 100 words of the content 

If one of your blogs is underperforming on search engines, confirm that your target keyword appears in these areas. 

If they do and you still aren’t making any progress, it could be that you’re targeting the wrong keywords (in which case you’d need to refer back to step #1). 

Step #3: Use relevant and engaging visuals 

It’s been common knowledge for a while now that blogs featuring visuals perform better in the search, improve dwell time, generate more backlinks, and make posts easier to digest. 

That’s especially true if the visuals you use serve as supplementary aids to your content. 

Infographics, videos, and relevant images/illustrations are all great examples of visuals that make blogs more SEO-friendly. 

However, you should stray away from irrelevant images, even if they are visually stunning. 

Unless an image is able to add something or relate to the post’s subject matter, you shouldn’t use it. 

Also, every image that you use needs alt text (containing your target keyword) that describes what the image displays. This is helpful for users that are visually impaired, and alt text enables search engine crawler bots to know what the image shows (and how it relates to your content). 

Step #4: Use inbound and outbound links 

Your goal is to keep users engaged in your content loop for as long as possible, and the best way to do that is to interlink to related posts on your website. 

Using internal links is a great way to improve your dwell time and user experience, as you can direct readers from one post to another (or to a product/landing page) by using inbound links. 

As an added bonus, internal links help search engine crawler bots understand the structure of your website, which leads to better indexing. 

Whenever you’re creating a new post or optimizing an existing one, create a list of related content that you want to link to within it. 

Also, outbound links to authoritative sources (like research papers, government agencies, and educational institutions) will improve your SEO – so use them whenever possible. 

Step #5: Provide real value to your audience 

This last step is the most important, and it’s the least likely to go out of style. 

Above all else, you should do your very best to provide value to your target audience. 

That means publishing how-to’s and ultimate guides covering skills they want to acquire, keeping them up-to-date with the latest developments in your industry, and providing some good old-fashioned entertainment. 

As long as you do that (and ensure no technical SEO issues are holding you back), nothing can stand in your way of becoming a valued thought leader in your field. 

Concluding Thoughts: How to Optimize Web Content 

SEO has changed a lot in recent years, and it will only continue to change going forward – especially with the advent of intelligent AI chatbots. 

For now, creating as much value for your audience as you can through your content is still the way to go. 

Do you need expert help developing an airtight SEO strategy for your business?

Then don’t wait to check out HOTH X, our managed SEO services, and HOTH Web Copy, our enormously effective content creation service.

The post 5 Steps to Optimize Web Content Like an SEO Expert appeared first on The HOTH.

For one, 67.6% of all clicks go to the first five organic results on search engines. 

So if your content isn’t optimized to penetrate the top 5 for keywords related to your niche, you’ll have a hard time generating more organic traffic. 

Beyond that, 61% of marketers prioritize their SEO efforts above all other inbound marketing strategies because they see the most results. 

So if you aren’t using any on-page SEO strategies for your website, now is the time to start. 

What’s on-page SEO?

SEO breaks down into three core components; on-page SEO, off-page SEO, and technical SEO. 

On-page SEO refers to all your efforts to optimize the content & ranking factors that exist on your website (like your blogs, infographics, title tags, internal links, and URL structure). 

Videos, blogs, and other types of your content that are on other sites (i.e., YouTube, Twitter, guest blogs, etc.) fall under the umbrella of off-page SEO. 

In some cases, there’s a bit of overlap between the three components – especially with on-page and technical SEO (more on this in a bit). 

We want to help you boost your SEO profile, which is why we put together 10 effective on-page SEO strategies, so read on to learn more. 

Understanding the Three Components of SEO 

Search engine optimization is a thorough process that involves a lot, so it’s helpful to break it into three parts. 

On-page SEO refers to all your SEO efforts that occur directly on your website, including both the front-end and back-end. 

Off-page SEO involves external SEO efforts, like publishing guest blogs to acquire backlinks, creating social media posts, and uploading videos to third-party video-sharing sites like YouTube. In other words, it refers to all the promotional efforts that occur outside your website. 

Technical SEO refers to tweaking the technical factors of your site (page speed, mobile responsiveness, fixing indexing errors) to make it easier for search engine bots to crawl and index. 

While on-page, off-page, and technical SEO comprise nearly all the ways you can optimize a website for search engines, there are some overlaps. 

That’s why you commonly see the three components of SEO represented in a Venn diagram where some factors overlap. 

For example, improving page speed qualifies as technical SEO, but it also takes place directly on your website, so it’s also a form of on-page SEO. The same is true for optimizing your metadata (meta description, title tag, etc.) – as it could be considered both a technical and on-page SEO tactic. 

In this article, we’re only going to explore on-page strategies but feel free to check out our guide to handling technical SEO as well.

Why is On-Page SEO Important?

On-page SEO is crucial because it informs both search engines and users about your business and how you provide value to customers. 

In particular, on-page SEO strategies contain vital ranking signals that help search engines determine how to rank your website. 

These signals include target keywords (search queries), internal links, external links, properly structured URLs, H1 tags, image alt text, and more. 

When crawler bots find things like relevant keywords and a logical internal link structure, it not only helps them understand your website’s content but also helps rank you higher on the SERPs (search engine results pages). 

Whenever you create website content like a blog page, you need to include on-page SEO best practices like:

• Strategic keyword use (first 100 words of content, meta tag, alt text, meta description)
• Relevant, attention-grabbing headings (H1, H2, H3, etc.)
• Internal links to other related web pages on your site (with informative anchor text) 
• External links to trustworthy websites with high domain authority 
• High-resolution images that relate to your topic and break up long lines of text 

What’s great about these tweaks is that they provide two benefits. First, they boost your online visibility and increase your chances of ranking higher on search engines like Google. 

Second, they enhance your user experience by providing high-quality content that’s easy to read and caters to your target audience (assuming you conducted proper keyword research). 

That’s because almost every on-page SEO technique is visible to anyone visiting your website, which is why they provide value to users and search engines. 

That differs from technical and off-page SEO, as they both primarily involve tweaks that aren’t visible to your users – but are only there to cater to search engine algorithms. 

The Elements of On-Page SEO 

The world of search engine optimization is filled with enough umbrella terms to block out a monsoon, and on-page SEO is no different. 

While it’s already an offshoot of the term SEO, on-page SEO encompasses several elements:

• Content 
• Site architecture 
• HTML elements 

These three categories cover 99% of on-page SEO strategies, so let’s take a more in-depth look at each one. 

High-quality content 

Releasing stellar page content is the backbone of on-page SEO. 

Why is that?

It’s because your content is how you:

• Use the keywords you uncovered during your research 
• Inform, educate, and attract potential customers 
• Let search engines and users know what your business is about 
• Provide value to your target audience to build loyalty and generate leads 
• Directly promote your products and services for more revenue 

As you can see, website content serves many purposes for your SEO & digital marketing strategy as a whole. 

Ideally, you should create content for every stage of the sales funnel (your buyer’s journey). 

To do so, look up keywords that represent different types of search intent. 

In particular, you need keywords with informational, educational, transactional, and purchase intent. 

That’ll help you check all the boxes with your website content – ensuring that you’re attracting prospects & leads at the top and then converting them at the bottom. 

What type of content should you create?

It depends on your industry and target audience, but in general, blogs are the quickest and easiest type of content to produce – and they can yield impressive results. 

In terms of popularity, short videos are all the rage, with the average online user watching 17 hours of videos per week. 

Then there are eBooks for lead magnets, infographics to acquire backlinks (and generate traffic), and podcasts – which are also immensely popular.  

Site architecture 

Next, your site architecture plays a big role in your on-page SEO strategy. 

Primarily, your website needs a flat architecture with a logical internal linking structure. 

As a rule of thumb, every web page on your website needs an internal link pointing to it – otherwise, you’ll have orphan pages. 

An orphan page is one that doesn’t have an internal link from the rest of your website, isolating it as a result and making it near impossible to find through your internal navigation. 

Not only that, but search engine crawlers also have a difficult time finding orphan pages, meaning that they likely won’t get ranked at all. 

While that isn’t a big deal for admin or login pages, you definitely don’t want an expensive blog post, infographic, or video to become orphaned. 

That’s where a flat site architecture comes into the picture. 

What makes the architecture flat?

The word ‘flat’ refers to the fact that every web page is only two or three links away from the homepage. 

That makes it effortless to keep track of all your web pages, as they’ll all link back to your homepage in just a few clicks. 

The opposite of flat architecture is deep architecture, where there are long, complex link chains that lead to inner pages. 

The downside of this style is that it becomes extremely complicated, confusing both users and search engine crawlers. It’s also far easier to orphan pages by mistake due to how deep they’re buried inside your website. 

HTML elements 

These are the HTML elements in your source code that search engine crawlers look to when attempting to make sense of your website’s content. 

The main HTML elements you’ll have to worry about for on-page SEO include the following:

• Meta descriptions. These are the brief page descriptions that appear under the blue hyperlinks in search results. While they’re not direct ranking factors for search engines, they are immensely helpful for promoting your content to users. As such, you should use your target keyword and a CTA to entice readers to click on your link. Your meta descriptions SHOULD NOT exceed 160 characters. 
• Headers. These refer to your page title and subtopics, which you should format as headings (H1, H2, H3, H4). Search engines scan your headings to infer what your article covers, so they need to relate directly to your content and contain target keywords. 
• Image alt text. Website crawlers don’t have computer vision, meaning they can’t see the images you include in your content. Instead, you need to provide detailed alt text describing what each image shows. Including your target keywords in the alt text will also improve your chances of ranking higher, so don’t forget to include them. 
• Structured data markup. Structured data is how Google uses your content to present rich snippets, and it’s also how they share content through social media. If your structured data isn’t in compliance with Google, you won’t be able to appear in SERP features like featured snippets, knowledge bars, or image carousels. 

HTML elements are equally as important as site architecture, so don’t forget about them when developing on-page SEO strategies. 

10 On-Page SEO Strategies You Need to Start Using Now 

Now that you’re familiar with the top on-page SEO factors, it’s time to learn how to put it all into practice. 

Master these on-site SEO techniques, and you’ll see more conversions, a better click-through rate (CTR), and higher SERP rankings in general. 

Here are 10 of the most effective on-page optimization techniques that you can start using today. 

#1: Conduct keyword research & publish high-quality content 

Since content matters so much for on-page SEO, it should be no surprise that it secures our #1 spot. 

Yet, you can’t create valuable, relevant content for your audience if you don’t start with smart keyword research. 

In particular, you need to uncover the top queries and long-tail keywords your audience actively searches for – as they’ll inform your content strategy. 

For instance, if your niche is gardening and you discover that lots of people are searching for the keyword ‘landscape design,’ writing a blog post on the best practices of landscape design will provide value to your audience. 

There are lots of ways that you can uncover keywords related to your niche – including the following:

• Using Google autocomplete to find relevant phrases 
• Asking ChatGPT to generate a list of keywords for you
• Using our free Google keyword planner from The HOTH 
• Checking related user forums and social media groups to get inside the head of your audience 

There are also a few metrics to pay attention to when searching for keywords – namely, search volume and keyword difficulty. 

You want the search volume to be relatively high. Otherwise, you’re creating content that not a lot of people will see. Beyond that, it’s best to choose keywords that don’t have keyword difficulty scores that are too high (over 70 is usually too steep) to avoid heavy competition. 

Once you have a list of relevant, high-quality keywords – you can use them to create blog posts, videos, infographics, podcast episodes, eBooks, and more. 

#2: Demonstrate first-hand experience in your content 

Google recently updated their Quality Rater Guidelines to become E-E-A-T instead of the traditional E-A-T (expertise, authoritativeness, trustworthiness). 

What’s the extra E for?

It stands for experience, which is now one of Google’s most important standards for judging the quality of a piece of content. 

In other words, Google wants to see that you have first-hand experience with your content topics, especially when it comes to things like product reviews. 

To quote Google directly, “Does the content demonstrate that it was produced with some degree of experience, like the actual use of a product, visiting a place, or communicating with someone?”

So if you want to optimize your content for E-E-A-T (which you definitely should), you need to include evidence of your first-hand experience with a topic. 

For example, if you’re talking about a place that you’ve actually been to, describe what it was like being there, share stories, and upload original pictures. 

Even if you’re just writing a basic blog post about what you do as a business (like gardening), you should still try to demonstrate your first-hand experience with the subject. That could be sharing case studies where you helped clients or sharing personal anecdotes that taught you valuable lessons. 

These are all ways to show Google that you’ve got first-hand experience with your content topics, which will increase the perceived quality of your website. 

In addition to demonstrating first-hand experience, your content also needs to display expertise, authoritativeness, and trustworthiness to round out the E-E-A-T acronym. 

#3: Optimizing images (alt text, mobile friendliness, page speed) 

High-resolution images are a must for blog posts. 

Why’s that?

First, they’re visually appealing, which is reason enough for most users to stay on your blog post long enough to at least look at them all. 

Research even found that blog posts with images receive 94% more views, so they play a big part in generating organic traffic for your articles. 

Images also break up the monotony of walls of text, which are cumbersome for readers. 

With a relevant and eye-grabbing image every couple of subheadings, it’ll be far easier for your readers to stay engaged until the end. 

Yet, simply copying and pasting images into your content isn’t enough. 

That’s because search engine crawlers also value images, but they aren’t able to see them since they lack computer vision. 

As a result, you must add alt text to your images, which are brief descriptions of what your images portray. 

To properly optimize your alt text, you need to include your target keyword for the content the image is featured in – as that’ll help your SEO.

Also, you need to create custom titles for each image instead of using default titles like IMG_0219. That’ll make your images easier to crawl, and it’ll help you keep your images organized. 

Lastly, you need to ensure that your images will properly display on mobile devices, and you should compress them as much as possible so they don’t affect your page speed. 

#4: Optimize your URL structure 

Many SEOs forget that their URLs count as on-page SEO factors they should optimize. Instead, they leave their URL settings on default, which is a missed ranking factor that many search engines use. 

So if you want to optimize your URLs, include your target keyword in each one. 

Whether you’re writing a blog post or setting up a product page, you can and should add your primary keyword to the URL. 

CMS platforms like WordPress will automatically generate dynamic URLs for every page you create, but you should forgo these in favor of creating custom, SEO-friendly URLs. 

You may also need to update your existing URLs, especially if they don’t contain your target keywords. 

That’s something to do during a site audit or content audit, but it’s worth taking the time to do. 

While URL structure used to play a bigger role in SEO than it does today, it’s still a ranking factor that will affect your website. 

Google’s algorithm updates made the impact of URLs less grand, but they still matter to a degree. 

In particular, URLs carry more clout during the initial ranking process, especially when Google doesn’t have access to any site content. 

Google’s John Mueller confirmed this, as he’s been quoted as saying, “This is primarily something we would take into account when we haven’t had access to the content yet.” 

While Google nerfed the impact of URL keywords, other search engines like Bing did not. So if your SEO strategy includes more Bing than Google, URL keywords will matter even more. 

#5: Use clever internal linking tactics 

As stated previously, a logical internal linking structure makes it easier for search engines to crawl and index your website. 

Also, including an internal link to every page on your website will help avoid orphan pages, and it’ll make it easier for your customers to navigate your site. 

However, that’s not the only reason you should strive to include internal links in your content. 

Besides contributing to an organized site structure, internal links can yield other benefits like generating leads and improving dwell time. 

Basically, you should always include at least a few internal links in every piece of content you create. 

Don’t randomly link to unrelated pages, either. 

Instead, determine which pages on your website best relate to the topic at hand. That way, interested readers on your site will stay engaged in your content loop – extending your average session time and improving the chances of them making a purchase. 

Do your best to link to related blog posts, product pages, videos, and other helpful forms of content that enhance the piece you’re creating. 

You also need to optimize the anchor text you use for each hyperlink, as that’s also a ranking factor. 

How do you optimize anchor text?

Here are a few general pointers:

• Include the primary keyword of the page you’re linking to 
• Provide helpful information that previews the page in question 
• Avoid generic phrases like ‘click here and ‘buy now.’ 
• Keep it between 6 – 8 words or 55 – 60 characters 

Follow these guidelines, and you’ll consistently write well-optimized anchor text. 

#6: Don’t forget to use external links, too 

A component of on-page SEO and link-building that goes overlooked is the use of external links. 

Outbound links do affect your SEO, so you should do your best to include external links to reputable, trustworthy websites. 

Search engines like Google will measure your outbound links for relevancy, quality, and volume in relation to the pages they appear on. 

The whole concept of Google (known as Backrub while Larry Page was still at Stanford) was to rank websites based on the quality of the inbound and outbound links they use. 

That means backlinks, internal links, AND external links all contribute to the perceived quality and value of your website. 

You can think of links as ‘credibility votes’ for your website, which can be positive or negative, and external links to trustworthy websites are positive credibility votes. 

However, linking to (or getting backlinks from) low-quality, untrustworthy websites will count as negative credibility votes. 

That’ll tank your SEO profile, and you’ll lose the rankings that you worked so hard to obtain. 

To avoid this, only link out to high-quality websites that provide credible, trustworthy information. Sites that end in .gov and .edu are always safe bets, as Google views these types of sites as extremely trustworthy. 

If you want to link to a low-quality website (or discover a backlink from one) but don’t want it to negatively affect your profile, you can use a nofollow tag. That way, you’ll be able to link to the site for illustrative purposes without fear of losing clout on the SERPs. 

#7: Audit & optimize existing content 

Another on-page SEO strategy you shouldn’t ignore is conducting a thorough audit of the existing content on your website. 

Regular content audits are a necessity, as you’ll need to update outdated content, retarget new keywords (some keywords lose popularity over time), fix broken links, and ensure every piece of content is up to Google’s standards. 

Since Google is always updating its algorithms, SEOs are constantly going back and tweaking their existing content to stay in compliance.

An example of this is the recent link spam update, where Google negated backlinks that were purchased through third parties. 

Almost overnight, tons of websites saw their search engine rankings crumble, and their SEOs had to scramble to recover. 

If you’ve recently developed an SEO strategy, you’ll definitely need to update your existing content. 

That’s because it won’t be optimized for keywords relevant to your target audience. 

Optimizing existing content means conducting keyword research and then placing those keywords in the following areas:

• The first 100 words of your content 
• Your H1 tag 
• The meta title and meta description 
• In the URL 
• In the alt text for all images 

Not only that, but you’ll need to ensure that your existing content is still relevant to your audience. 

Unless your content is evergreen, it won’t take long for it to become outdated. 

The good news is that you can always go back and update existing pieces with recent information, making them relevant and rankable again. 

After all, you spent precious resources to create your content, so it would be a shame for it to fade into obscurity. 

#8: Write attention-grabbing headlines 

This is another on-page SEO strategy that serves two purposes. 

First, readers are far more likely to click on posts that have relevant, stand-out titles. 

Next, search engines scan your headings and subheadings to determine what your content is about, which queries exist, and how they should rank your content for those queries. 

That’s why it’s imperative to include your target keywords within your headings, especially your H1 header. 

73% of online users admit they skim blog posts, which means they read the headings and subheadings first to see if the post is worth their time. 

If you can write engaging headings, these skimmers are more likely to sit down and engage with your entire post. 

Here are a few pointers to consider when writing your content headlines:

• Make heavy use of listicles and numbers – as list-style blogs are by far the most popular 
• Use your target keyword as close to the beginning of your headline as possible 
• Hint at the topic you’re covering without revealing too much 
• Add the current year to your titles (makes them appear up-to-date and more relevant) 
• Don’t be afraid to use parentheses, as they’re visually appealing and stand out on SERP pages 
• Pose an interesting question that you answer in the content

These are all reliable ways to come up with headlines that get attention from both readers and search engines. 

What should you do if you have writer’s block?

In today’s age, advanced chatbots like ChatGPT are more than capable of generating headline ideas, which will get rid of writer’s block for good. Even if you aren’t blocked, generating a few potential headlines via AI will help you think outside the box when writing your headlines. 

#9: Speed up your website if it’s running slow 

Modern internet users have a need for speed, and they won’t settle for anything less than lightning-quick loading speeds. 

Yet, there are many reasons why a website may experience slower loading times, including oversized images & videos, too much Javascript, poor domain hosting, and too many advertisements. 

Search engines also value super-fast loading times, as the last thing they want is to rank slow websites in the top 5 results – as that’ll hurt their reputation. 

That’s why Google created the Core Web Vitals Test, which you’ll need to pass if you want the honor of being included in the Google SERPs. 

The test measures several ‘vitals’ for page speed, including first input delay (FID) for interactivity, largest contentful paint (LCP) for loading times, and cumulative layout shift (CLS) for visual stability. 

How do you know if you can pass the Core Web Vitals test?

Luckily, Google provides the PageSpeed Insights tool for free, which will let you know if you’re able to pass the test – and it will provide suggestions for speeding up your website. 

#10: Ensure mobile-friendliness 

Lastly, your website needs to work flawlessly on desktops, smartphones, tablets, and other mobile devices. 

That’s because Google practices mobile-first indexing, meaning that they index the mobile version of your website first. 

In today’s age, the best and most common way to ensure mobile-friendliness is to use a responsive design, where the dimensions of your website automatically change depending on the user’s device. 

Besides your web design & navigation displaying properly, you also need to ensure that your images and videos work on mobile devices. 

Concluding Thoughts: On-Page SEO Strategies for Better Rankings 

Your on-page SEO tweaks matter equally to search engines and your online users, which is why on-page SEO strategies matter so much. 

Do it right, and you’ll generate a ton of organic traffic, leads, and sales. 

Flub it up, and you’ll find yourself back at square one – virtual anonymity. 

Do you need help developing an on-page SEO strategy for your business?

Then don’t wait to check out our immensely powerful managed content packages from The HOTH. Our SEO experts will create meaningful content for your target audience that ranks well on search engines, so don’t wait to get in touch now.      

The post 10 On-Page SEO Strategies for Better Search Engine Rankings appeared first on The HOTH.

In reality, old posts are arguably the best to optimize. 

It’s because you have the added benefit of 20/20 hindsight. Since the content is already there, you can now identify which posts have the strongest chances of ranking in the top 5 on search engines. 

Not only that, but you can check which keywords existing posts are already ranking for – creating an ideal 80/20 approach to post optimization.

In many cases, websites have hundreds of existing blog posts in limbo – some of which have the potential to really shine with a few tweaks. 

Since you’ve already made the investment to create a blog post, why not refine it so it starts generating a stronger return for you?

Of course, I won’t ask you to just take my word for it. So in this article, I’ll present my own case study about how I executed this methodology AND increased organic traffic by over 40%.

In this extensive guide, I’ll cover the following:

• The benefits of updating old content
• How often to update older posts
• How to discover which posts to optimize
• How to determine which keywords to target
• How to optimize the post for these keywords
• Tips for making old blog posts stand out

Afterwards, I’ll show you what effect this had overall on the website.

Let’s dive in.

What Can Updating Older Blog Posts Do For You?

Are you still on the fence about updating your old content? If so, perhaps these attractive benefits will help you see the light. Updated blogs can generate organic traffic and reignite interest in older topics, among many other things. 

Acquire Outdated Competitor Backlinks 

It’s crucial to regularly update content to obtain (and retain) quality backlinks. Let’s say that you have an article on your website entitled ‘FinTech Trends for 2021’ that you haven’t updated yet. 

From there, you notice a key competitor with attractive backlinks that hasn’t updated their FinTech trends article either. You jump at the opportunity and become the first to post ‘FinTech Trends for 2022.’

Next, you reach out to the backlink owners from the competitors’ article and convince them to link to your more current post instead. That’s a decision they’re likely to make since nobody wants to link to outdated content. To discover which backlinks your competitors have, you can use a backlink checker tool like the one from Ahrefs. 

That’s how you can use updated blog posts to acquire competitor backlinks. Also, updating your content will help you retain the backlinks you fought so hard to get. So remember – do your absolute best to keep your blog posts updated for the sake of your domain authority. 

Obtain Thought Leader Status Among Readers

It should be the goal of any content marketing strategy to build loyalty among readers. One of the most reliable ways is to keep your posts updated. It doesn’t bode well for your blog whenever users land on outdated content – and it’s also a guarantee that they’ll look for updated information elsewhere. 

If your blogs get updated regularly, the opposite will take place. Readers will know that they can always expect the most valuable, up-to-date information from your blogs. 

That’s a fantastic way to obtain ‘thought leader’ status – something that every blog attempts to do but few perfect. 

Updating your existing content is a must if you want readers to flock to your blog. It shows that you care about your content and want to provide the maximum amount of value to your readers. If you’re struggling to retain readers on your blog, try updating your posts and creating evergreen content (blogs that remain fresh over time and answer questions that don’t change.)

Stay Current with the Latest SEO Tactics 

SEO strategies are constantly changing and evolving, so updating your content is essential. What worked for SEO in 2018 will see drastically different results in 2022. 

Whenever you update a blog post, make sure to include the SEO best practices of the current era. 

An example would be incorporating keyword clustering into an old article that only focused on a single keyword. A keyword cluster is a group of related keywords with the same purchase intent. It’s a more recent strategy that can provide impressive results and is now preferred over only using a few keywords. 

Conversely, some older strategies can even land you in hot water with Google and other search engines. Back in the 2010s, keyword stuffing or spamming was a widespread practice – which is now frowned upon and penalized today. 

If you’ve got a ton of old blog posts from 2011 – it’s wise to dig them up and look at what they have going on. You never know; you may discover an older blog perfect for today’s age with just a few adjustments. 

Generate More Revenue From an Existing Investment 

Last but not least, updating existing content will help you capitalize on the money you’ve already spent.

It would be a shame to let content you spent money on disappear into obscurity forever. 

Instead, you can keep generating revenue from content you’ve already spent money on by simply updating it. I’ve found that tweaks like adding the current year, doing new keyword research, and adding more insights can drive lots of new traffic to a once-dead blog post. 

Much like SEO itself, blog posts can continue working for you well into the future. As long as you keep updating them and adding relevant new information, a single blog post can generate traffic for many years. 

So if you’re a fan of getting the most bang for your buck, updating your older blogs should be a no-brainer. 

Remember, you’ve already spent the money, so why not do everything you can to get that money back and then some? 

It’s a plus for you as you get to conjure new interest in an existing piece. It’s also a win for your readers as they enjoy new insights and up-to-date information by reading the post. In short, updating older blog posts provides a lot of perks with next to no downsides – and it’s a great way to generate new traffic and revenue.

How Often Should You Update Old Content?

There are several ways to go about this, but I like using free tools like Google Search Console.

So first, go to Google Search Console. Below it, click Search Traffic > Search Analytics.

Google Search Console

Make sure the boxes for Clicks, Impressions, CTR, and Position are all checked. These are the metrics that you’ll want to view for each blog post.

Search Console Filters

Search Console Filters

There are numerous ways to filter the search results on Google Search Console – so it’s imperative to know which one to use to find blog posts in need of updating. A quick and reliable way to use the Pages filter. It’s my preferred filter because it’s the simplest way to view the performance statistics of a particular page. 

That way, you can determine if the blog in question is worth updating or not by viewing its CTR, impressions, and position. Ideally, you want to update blogs that currently aren’t doing very well, but are within range of obtaining traffic. 

A potential drawback of the Pages filter is that you can only view one page at a time.

If you need to view the performance of an entire category of pages (such as all blog posts or a sub-category), you’ll need to use the URL containing filter. I sometimes use it to see if several older posts need updating. 

The filter contains other valuable information, such as how Google viewed your site when crawling it. Data points include when Google crawled your page and any navigational mistakes during indexing. 

That comes in handy for pinpointing technical issues holding your posts back in the search rankings. 

Once you’ve selected the appropriate filter, you’ll want to download the results and place them in a spreadsheet for analysis. 

Download Search Console

Download Search Console Results

At this point, you have two options.

• Option 1:  Optimize all the posts (skip the following section)
• Option 2:  Focus only on the posts that will give you the largest gains

If you have a smaller blog with only a handful of posts,  option 1 might be the best.

But, if you’re like most people and want to work at peak efficiency, I’m going to give you some highly adjustable criteria that you can use to identify the posts that will give you the most bang for your buck.

That criteria is:

• A CTR lower than 1%
• A ‘high’ impression rate (what you consider high depends on your blog / it’s traffic)
• A position between 1 to 30

I chose this criteria because it tells me that the post is ranking for something that has volume, is being seen, but for some reason isn’t getting clicked enough. 

In theory, if we can move it up in the rankings and optimize the title / description to be more relevant to what the user is searching for, we can generate more clicks.

Given that, create three columns used specifically for the criteria, and use IF statements to indicate whether or not the post is getting high impressions, how it’s ranking, and if the click through rate is lower than 1%.

OnPage SEO Stats

On-Page SEO Stats

You can then filter out the posts that don’t fit the criteria to avoid updating content that won’t lead to conversions or generate organic traffic. As stated before, I only recommend updating every post if you just have a handful. 

If your blog has been going strong for years now, optimizing every post will take a lot of time and effort – and won’t necessarily lead to any returns. 

That’s why I highly suggest only optimizing posts that meet your criteria. Bear in mind that you can adjust and tweak my provided criteria as much as necessary for your needs. That’s especially true for the impression rate, as it will vary greatly depending on your blog and the average amount of traffic you see. 

It’s best to have a clear reason to update content instead of just going through the motions. An example would be a revitalized interest in a topic you covered in the past. 

Let’s say, years ago, you did a piece on digital marketing trends that weren’t prevalent at the time but have since sparked in popularity. That’s a great reason to revisit the post and beef it up with fresh content and new insights. Since you know there’s interest in the topic; it stands a greater chance of attracting interest.

How To Determine Which Keywords You Should Be Targeting

You now have your target posts, so let’s find out what keywords you should target for maximum effectiveness.

Venture back to Google Search Console to the same screen with your chosen filter and find a post that you want to optimize. Note – you may have to go to the bottom and increase the number of results to show more if you don’t see the blog you want to update. 

Click the post, and then adjust the filter from Pages to Queries.

Search Console Queries

Search Console Queries

Now it’s time to learn about another filter you can use on Google Search Console, Queries. This query provides an invaluable report containing vital keyword information about your website. In particular, you’ll get to discover all the keywords you’re currently showing up for on Google’s search engine results pages. 

Beyond that, you also get to see which keywords are actively driving users to visit your website. That lets you know which keywords are the most valuable for each webpage, which is incredibly useful. 

It helps you avoid placing focus on keywords that you don’t stand a chance at ranking for and lets you know where you’re currently finding the most success. 

You can also view the information by date range, which is especially helpful for updating older posts. I like to set the range to cover the last three to four months, giving me full visibility of the entire business quarter. 

You can sort the results to show pages with low CTR yet high ranking and strong impressions. That’s a sure-fire way to locate pages with high-quality keywords that aren’t getting the clicks they deserve. From there, you can go about tweaking the pages to obtain a boost in traffic once the click-through-rate improves. 

Another favorite technique of mine is to sort by impressions, so the keyword queries receiving the most impressions are at the top.

Sort By Impressions

Sort By Impressions

Generally, the top one is what I choose to make the focus keyword unless I find that it’s totally irrelevant. The other ones can serve as great secondary keywords for even more of a boost. I create two more columns in the spreadsheet for my focus keywords and go through all the posts in the list.

You can also filter the results to only show posts with impressions of 1,000 or greater (or another number of your choosing.) 

That way, you’ll only view keywords generating the most interest. Remember, a post containing a valuable keyword isn’t enough. The post must have valuable, well-written content that outdoes the competition. 

Keywords are undoubtedly necessary to succeed with SEO, but they go hand-in-hand with creating stand-out content. You’ll want to create posts that inform, educate, entertain, and ultimately convert readers into customers. 

How To Optimize The Post For These Keywords

Once you’ve built your list of blog posts that are ripe for optimization, you’re all set to get started on the actual process of updating them.

I highly recommend Yoast’s WordPress plugin as it’s one of the most helpful SEO tools on the market. It also has a Focus Keyword feature where you can enter your target keyword, and it spits out recommendations.

Yoast SEO WordPress Plugin

Yoast SEO WordPress Plugin

Yoast works by providing you with an ‘SEO score’ for each one of your blog posts and web pages. Your score will be a series of color-coded circles grading each aspect of your content in regards to how optimized it is for search engines. Here’s a rundown of Yoast’s color-coding system:

• Gray: If you see a gray circle, that means there isn’t enough information on the page to calculate an SEO score. 
• Red: This represents the weakest SEO score and signifies that your post needs improvement. 
• Orange: This isn’t the worst but it is still a poor SEO score that needs work. 
• Yellow: If you see a yellow circle, the SEO score is average but still isn’t great yet. 
• Green: If you’ve got a green circle, you have a high SEO score, and your content is optimized well. 

If your Yoast SEO score is red or orange, the post needs some serious work. To make things easier, Yoast separates the tasks it scores you on into three categories:

• • Problems. Under this category, Yoast will list all your red circles. These are the most troublesome areas that you should focus on first. Examples of a red circle include missing a meta description or title, broken links, and having a keyword density of 0%. 

• Improvements. This category contains all your orange circles – which are weak areas that need improving. Examples include missing alt tags and not including your target keyword in a header. 

• Good Results. Here, you’ll find all your green circles or the areas where you’re doing the best. Ideally, you want to make as many circles go green as you can – or at least yellow.

You’re doing things right when you don’t see any orange or red circles. That means your content is highly optimized and stands a great chance of generating website traffic.  

The plugin updates in real-time, so it’s quite easy to follow your progress. It’s free, but the premium version allows you to add additional keywords and contains other robust features. Besides scoring your SEO overall, Yoast’s Focus Keyword feature makes it effortless to build an extensive list of keywords related to your niche. 

General Tips for Optimizing and Improving Blog Posts

Beyond using Yoast’s plugin, there are some sure-fire ways to improve a post, such as:

Add Images with Alt-Text 

Want to know a great way to strengthen any post and potentially outdo the competition? Include high-resolution images and visuals that are relevant to your post. Once again, the idea is to add images that are RELEVANT to your post. Stock images are totally fine, but you need to make sure that they relate to what you’re talking about and aren’t totally random. 

I always make a point to include images in my posts because they’re excellent for breaking up the monotony of continuous text. Also, relevant images can work to enhance readers’ understanding of the subject matter. Beyond stock images and original photos, infographics are amazing for SEO. That’s because they not only provide a visual but also entertain and embellish the topic. 

Also, every image you upload needs alt text or an alt description. 

What’s that?

Alt-text is a physical description of what an image contains. It has three primary uses, the first of which is for accessibility. Anyone that’s visually impaired will have a text-to-speech program read the alt description to them so they can understand the image. 

Next, and this is why it’s crucial for SEO, is it provides image context for search engine crawlers. In other words, it helps engines like Google to index your images properly. 

Lastly, the alt text is what will display if the image fails to load. 

To ensure search engines understand your images and what they represent, always include an alt description for the visuals on your posts. 

Fix Grammar and Formatting Issues

You aren’t doing yourself any favors if your content and headings contain spelling and grammatical errors. First and foremost, these errors affect readers the most. Nothing will hurt your trust and reader loyalty more than constant formatting and grammatical errors. It reflects poorly on your brand because you didn’t care enough to make sure your posts were readable. 

If you want readers to take you seriously, aim only to publish (or republish) flawless content containing no errors. 

There are plenty of tools that can help you do this, such as Grammarly, which has a totally free version you can use. The premium version takes things a step further by assisting with things like sentence structure and enhancing vocabulary. 

While it’s critical to have impeccable grammar and formatting for readers, it also matters to search engines too. In particular, Bing programmed their algorithm to only rank content that contains no errors whatsoever. That’s another reason why double and triple-checking grammar, spelling, and style is crucial for your blog posts. 

Add More Internal Links, Research-Backed Stats, and New Backlinks 

External links to reputable websites will boost your domain authority. Also, internal links are great for your SEO and also create a web of interrelated content on your site. Well-placed internal links can also influence readers to check out your other posts – driving more traffic to them in turn. 

Research-backed stats will also boost your authority in the eyes of search engines. If you make a claim, do your best to back it up with a study or report from a trusted source. Try to find links from .gov, .edu, and .org websites in particular. 

Also, you’ll want to add new backlinks to any articles that you update. More recent, high-authority backlinks will work wonders for your domain authority. As I stated before, updating old blogs is a reliable way to poach links from other outdated posts by competitors. 

Lastly, take a look at your cited sources. The chances are high that they’ll be just as outdated as your blog post. Replacing them with updated citations is another way to optimize an aging post. 

Use More Multimedia Content for the Post 

I already mentioned how effective infographics are at enhancing articles. Yet, they aren’t the only form of multimedia that will add value to your blogs. There are also videos, slide decks, GIFs, tables, podcast episodes, and more. These are all fantastic additions to a post so long as they’re relevant and provide additional insights. 

An example would be including a how-to YouTube video embedded in one of your posts. Ideally, the video should contain original content separate from the blog post. 

You never want media to replace your written content, only to enhance it and serve alongside it. 

Let’s say you have a post going over the health benefits of spinach. As a companion to the article, you include a YouTube video containing a tasty recipe for a spinach salad. The video doesn’t step on the article’s toes – but instead serves to enhance it by providing a recipe readers can make once they realize how healthy spinach is for them. 

The Results

Between August and December of 2016, I used exactly this method to optimize nearly 200 old posts on AvocadoPesto, my girlfriend’s food blog.

Mind you, we did very little in the ways of adding new content, rewriting, or adding images. The primary focus was simply keyword adjustment and following Yoast’s guidelines. On average, optimizing each post took about 10 minutes, so in total the project took around 30 hours.

Here are the results.

Onpage SEO Results

On-Page SEO Results

As you can see, for a long time the blog’s organic traffic was stagnant at around 40k organic visitors a month, even though new content was being produced weekly!

In September, after we started optimizing, there was a noticeable uptick to 55k visitors; an increase of almost 40%!

January, being only half over, is on track to surpass 60k visitors, which would be a 50% increase overall.

Not bad for less than a week’s worth of work.

Concluding Thoughts: How to Re-Optimize Your Old Blog Posts To Boost Traffic

Now that you know my step-by-step blog revitalization process, it’s time to take your old (or dead) content out for a makeover. That way, you can derive more value out of your existing content and start ranking higher in users’ organic search queries. 

What I’ve shown you is not something overly technical or complicated and honestly can be accomplished with the help of a dedicated assistant. It’s a paint-by-the-numbers process that’s pretty easy to do once you get the hang of it – and it’s well worth the payoff. 

If you have anything to add or share about your experience optimizing existing posts, let us know about it in the comments below. 

The post How to Re-Optimize Your Old Blog Posts To Boost Traffic appeared first on The HOTH.

According to a 2021 study, 69% of marketers invested in SEO, and 75% said their SEO tactics were effective at helping them fulfill marketing goals.

But every marketer isn’t an SEO expert or even proficient in the field. Companies need to hire an SEO specialist who knows exactly what to do so their website and content rank on the first page of search engine result pages (SERPs) and bring in traffic.

This article explains the role of an SEO specialist in detail and lists the essential characteristics they must have to help companies get results.

What is an SEO Specialist?

In a sentence, an SEO specialist analyzes websites and optimizes them so that they rank higher on major search engine result pages. 

This individual is an expert in “organic search” — search results that aren’t ads, but that Google thinks are the best and most relevant content — and can create an SEO strategy that improves user experience while simultaneously appealing to the latest search engine algorithms.

Apart from a higher search ranking, an SEO expert can ensure your web pages appear for relevant search terms instead of random ones.

For example, if you search for “running shoes,” you get companies like Nike, which sells running shoes, and articles that list the best running shoes. Both of these results are driven by good SEO.

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A good SEO strategy can help companies, regardless of size, attract more users and generate high-quality leads. Consequently, conversions grow, and so does revenue.

While this sounds great, business owners often have surface-level SEO knowledge. They know it’s a marketing term but don’t understand the different components, such as on-page, off-page, and technical SEO, or how they impact search engine rankings.

They can also struggle to differentiate between SEO and SEM (Search Engine Marketing), which have the same goal — driving traffic and revenue from search engines — but varying components and tactics. This lack of understanding often leads to them making incorrect decisions regarding hiring and goal-setting in these areas. 

This is when SEO professionals are required. They can take charge of all the processes needed to boost your search rankings.

What Are the Job Responsibilities of an SEO specialist?

Every SEO consultant has a different set of responsibilities depending on the industry and company they’re working with. However, most SEO experts are proficient in the following:

Keyword research

A keyword typically corresponds with the main topic of the content on your page. It is a word, phrase, or question users search for to find specific web pages and content on the topic. It can be a single word such as “shoes” or a longer phrase such as “running shoes for women.”

An SEO specialist performs keyword research to determine which keywords each page on your website should target. They will then focus on how each of these pages can rank for their specific keyword(s).

Without keyword research, your content is a jumble of topics that you think your users might like. Unfortunately, most websites make this mistake, which is why a 2020 study found that 90% of them don’t get organic traffic from Google.

It’s the job of the SEO specialist to use keyword research to identify exactly what users are looking for and why. They then tailor your website’s content to match search intent.

On-page optimization

On-page optimization is a general term used to describe how an SEO expert cleans up all the elements that are on or behind your website. 

This includes meta titles and descriptions, header tags, using the right images, proper HTML structure, internal linking, and fast page load speeds (like always compressing images that go on your web pages).

Here the SEO specialist ensures every web page aims to show up for the correct search terms, provides a good user experience, and leads users towards conversion.

Optimization also requires testing varying versions of elements on the web page to see which one improves lead generation. For example, having a detailed call-to-action button can perform better than a basic “Click Here” button.

Mobile optimization

Mobile phone users accounted for more than 92% of global internet users at the end of 2021. Your website must be mobile-friendly, there’s just no way around it, both for general usage and SEO purposes. Every page on your website needs to be 100% visible and perfectly usable on mobile devices.

Search engines value mobile-friendliness in 2022. Google has implemented mobile-first indexing for years now, which means websites that are not mobile-friendly automatically get lower rankings. They even offer a free tool to test how mobile-friendly a web page is.

An SEO specialist must analyze how they can improve your mobile user experience and make your web pages easy for users to navigate, regardless of their device.

Link building & off-page optimization

Link building is a way to let Google know that your content or web page is valuable. It’s the process of getting links to your website from external websites to improve your authority.

The links could be someone referencing your blog post in their article or a reviewer adding a product link as part of a glowing review.

Building a web of links from multiple sources increases your website’s chances of gaining a higher ranking. A recent study showed that top search results had significantly more backlinks than lower-rated results.

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An SEO specialist will have a link-building strategy that develops backlinks via guest posts, content-based assets (infographics, statistics, etc.), and other methods. Some might consider buying links, but this is risky as it violates Google’s Webmaster Guidelines, and you have to trust the seller to be honest and uphold their end of the bargain.

Link building has to be combined with every other SEO component to work. For example, you can have multiple backlinks to a page, but if the content on that page is poor, then your lead generation will take a hit.

Content marketing is an effective strategy for building your off-page online presence. If you invest time in building relationships with other bloggers in your niche, and creating stellar, valuable content, it’s only a matter of time before you earn several high-quality, relevant links.

Analytics

Every SEO expert has to know how to analyze the results driven by their campaigns, the different metrics to use, and what the numbers actually mean. Understanding this data is more complicated than it seems.

Sure, it’s easy to look at leads generated or web traffic and decide whether a campaign is successful or not. But, there are many smaller yet impactful metrics along the way. Each of which indicates how parts of your SEO campaign are working.

SEO specialists will analyze the correct metrics, gauge results, and make campaign decisions based on them. If a particular aspect fails, they will need to test new elements or implement process changes to get better results.

URL naming & titles

For accurate data collection and campaign tracking, SEO specialists need to use custom URLs. These URLs will let them know where the traffic is coming from, whether from a backlink, an ad, a social media post, or a marketing asset like a newsletter. 

Let’s say you hired an SEO expert to boost your traffic from search results. If there’s a sudden uptick in traffic, how do they know if it’s because they’re actually reaching the goal you set or if the increase in visitors is from other sources, like a social media contest?

Custom URLs are used to monitor data for different campaigns, assets, and sources.

The Characteristics of an Effective SEO Specialist

If you’re looking to become an SEO expert or hire one, here are six crucial characteristics you need:

#1. Understands the different levels of SEO 

There are three main SEO tiers — on-page, off-page, and technical — that every expert must deeply understand.

• On-page SEO is usually content-related but includes everything that goes into your web page. It’s the process of ensuring all the content on your website uses the right keywords, meta tags, title tags, and internal links. These elements let search engines know the topic you’re covering and why you’re a trusted resource on the subject.

SEO experts must know how to optimize content and form links between related web pages such that users are led from one page to the next, inching closer to completing the purchase.

• Technical SEO refers to optimizing components that are not content-based. It ensures that the foundation of the website is good.

Website speed, architecture, indexing, crawlability, and mobile-friendliness, are some technical factors that an SEO expert must analyze and improve.

Improving technical elements shows search engines that your website is well-built and provides a better user experience.

• Off-page SEO refers to activities outside your website that help improve search rankings. Backlinks are vital for off-page SEO as they act as social proof of your authority on a subject and let Google know that your web page is a trusted source.

Apart from backlinks, any external activity that can boost your search ranking is considered off-page SEO, including social media and traditional media marketing campaigns, brand mentions, and influencer marketing.

SEO specialists often work with marketing and PR teams to create external campaigns that will positively impact SERP rankings.

An SEO specialist is expected to be an expert in these core areas and know precisely how they affect your ranking. While they may not handle all of these factors personally, their knowledge will help them oversee other teams’ efforts.

#2. Stays current

Google constantly updates its search algorithm, and these changes can affect your rankings and domain authority. So how do SEOs stay up to speed? The SEO industry keeps evolving as experts discover new strategies or ideas to adjust to the latest developments.

An SEO expert must keep track of all these updates, trends, and methods to strategize effectively. Outdated tactics will often lead to poor results.

They must also be aware of the latest trends in the client’s industry so that they can create relevant content. For example, if everyone in the industry is focused on X, but all your blogs are about Y, the chances of gaining next-level traffic are minimal. So you want to capitalize on trends to capture user attention.

#3. Collaborates with other teams

Since so many factors go into SEO, a specialist rarely works alone. It’s more common that they work hand-in-hand with other teams, such as social media marketing, content marketing, and web development.

For successful campaigns, SEO experts must be excellent communicators and collaborators. They must communicate with clarity, so all team members understand why and how to accomplish campaign goals.

They also need to be persuasive. You often have to explain why changes are needed and how they benefit the website to people who don’t have any SEO knowledge, such as stakeholders or the web development team. You must be able to get these people on board.

#4. Has a marketing mindset 

Search engine optimization and marketing go hand-in-hand. Effective marketing campaigns lead to better search rankings.

SEO specialists need to have a marketing mindset, where they are focused on the target audience and know how content plays an overall role in achieving business goals.

Moreover, an SEO consultant will often work with a company’s internal marketing team. So, they need to be up-to-date on current marketing trends and strategies. The content you create must appeal to readers if it has a chance of rising up the rankings.

Additional knowledge in social media trends, consumer psychology, web development, and viral strategies enables SEO experts to create more compelling content and optimize websites to make the most impact on users.

#5. Able to define and track SEO goals 

SEO experts must be able to look at the bigger picture and set the right goals. Is the overall goal to build brand awareness, increase rankings, drive traffic, or boost conversions? These are interrelated, but understanding the main objective helps set smaller SEO-based milestones.

For example, if the goal is to drive traffic, you can set milestones based on the number of visits via organic search per month. A free website traffic checker can help with that.

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Knowing how to set goals, using the right metrics to measure them, and analyzing initial results to make changes or increase production are all expected of an SEO consultant.

#6. Adaptability 

You’ve created the perfect roadmap for getting the company website to the first page of SERPs, and then BAM! Google switches its search algorithm, or a new viral marketing trend takes over.

This is a common scenario for an SEO expert, and they must be able to adapt to it. 

SEO experts often work with multiple companies across industries. Adaptability is also essential here. You need to understand your client’s needs, their industry, and how you can take them to the top of search rankings for their specific keywords.

Where to Find SEO Specialists?

You can hire a freelance SEO specialist or consultant for one-time projects. These are experienced individuals that work with companies on a per-project, contract, or retainer basis. 

However, they may not be viable for many organizations as freelancers can be expensive, and there’s no guarantee of stability or results or productive, long-term relationships. Moreover, a single SEO specialist can help strategize, but they struggle with implementation, especially at a larger scale. 

The second option is to hire a full-time SEO specialist who works with your marketing teams to get results. But again, this can get expensive, and their skillset is often limited to one aspect of SEO.

This is why most companies opt for a digital marketing agency like The HOTH. Agencies have a group of experts at their disposal. They can also produce content faster, meaning you can scale your marketing efforts exponentially. 

To add to this, agencies can be cheaper and often have a subscription-based model where you only pay for what you need and can cancel at any time.

SEO Specialists Can Elevate Your Brand and Business

Every business that wants to succeed digitally needs SEO experts to guide them to the top of SERPs. SEO agencies can help you target the right users, create personalized content at scale, and boost traffic. 

Get industry-leading SEO specialists working on your website by using our HOTH X service. Our experts have spent years of their lives diving into the technical (and often tedious) world of SEO, so you don’t have to.

The post What is an SEO Specialist? Here’s What You Need to Know appeared first on The HOTH.

That’s where things get difficult.

There are many ways to capture the hearts and minds of your target audience. You could run stellar ads, produce thought-provoking blog posts, and create shareable video content that evokes both curiosity and excitement.

All of these marketing strategies have one thing in common: they involve producing and optimizing content.

Content is more than just a marketing buzzword. It’s the beating heart of your business — a sales pitch that carries your message to the masses, proving both the effectiveness of your product or service and your expertise in the industry.

But if you want your content to reach people, you must optimize it for both search engines and people.

In this article, you’ll learn all about content optimization, including what it is, how it’s done, and how you can optimize various forms of content.

What is Content Optimization?

Content optimization is exactly what it sounds like — it’s a way to take the content you produce and optimize it for maximum profitability. This is possible for many different kinds of content.

Text-based content can be defined as a series of tweaks that make content more appealing to search engines like Google and Bing (but mostly Google) without losing readability or flow for human readers.

This is a sub-discipline of search engine optimization (SEO) and is often called “on-page optimization.”

When someone says content, the first thing that springs to mind is often text-based content, like blog articles, e-books, and website copy. But there’s so much more to the world of content than just text.

There are many different forms of content, including:

• Text
• Visual content like images and infographics
• Video
• Podcasts

There is no “best” form of content because different companies have different goals and requirements. There’s also no one-size-fits-all content optimization approach because there are different ways to optimize each content type.

The content optimization process comprises technical steps along with some editorial and marketing steps to generate the best results.

Of course, optimization is not something that can be done quickly. While we’ve seen results in as little as four months, it often takes up to six months or longer before you notice a meaningful impact on rankings, traffic, and revenue. That makes content optimization a long-term investment that requires patience.

It also takes quite a bit of know-how if you’re going to try it on your own without the help of a skilled agency. You need to know what you’re doing when selecting keywords and planning the structure of your content plan. Trying to take on a project like this with little to no expertise will only be a waste of time.

Remember, the best content in the world is useless if no one can find it. That’s why optimization is so vital to content marketing success.

But even if you commit to learning everything there is to know about content optimization, it’s an education you have to stay on top of. Content marketing is constantly evolving, with changes to Google’s search algorithm coming frequently and without warning.

That’s why you need SEO experts in charge of your content optimizations who keep their collective ear to the Google ground. (If you don’t have any on your team, reach out to Hoth X today.)

How to Optimize Content for SEO

Now it’s time to dig into the heart of the matter. How can we optimize content for search engines so that you’ll start generating more traffic, more conversions, and more profits?

We’ve broken the process down into five distinct steps. Of course, these are broad explanations that can span different content types. In the next section, we’ll further drill down into the specifics of the three main content types.

Step 1: Perform keyword research

Before you can start optimizing your content, you first have to understand what you’re optimizing it for. That’s where keyword research comes into play.

First, you have to determine what your audience is looking for and how you can help them find it. Then, perform an audit of the search engine results page, also known as a SERP. Using SEO tools like Google’s Keyword Planner, you’ll be able to identify relevant keywords and create a list of topics to create content around.

It’s important to take search intent into account here as well. When determining what keywords you need to rank for, you want to make sure they receive traffic on the SERP, they’re relevant to your business, and they speak to the specific intent of your audience.

For example, if you’re selling cars, you’ll want to appeal directly to people searching for a new car to buy, not someone looking for information on fixing or selling a car.

It’s also important to be realistic and look for low-hanging fruit. These are relevant terms with good search volume and the right intent but less competition.

Don’t try to compete with Wiki pages and national brands. They dominate broad keywords, and you’re not going to be able to compete with them. But more niche terms and “long-tail keywords” often lead to the perfect content optimization opportunity.

This is also when you identify semantically related keywords. These terms are a lot like those you’re targeting and appeal to the same audience. Often, finding semantically related keywords to high competition terms can reveal some low-hanging fruit.

Step 2: Determine your format

Now that you know how you’re going to optimize your content, it’s time to start planning it out. You’ll first need to decide your content’s format (or formats). Are you going to focus on revamping your text-based blog articles? Will you create infographics? Invest in video production?

This isn’t about personal preferences. Instead, ask yourself this question: what content format does your target audience prefer?

After all, they’re the ones who will open their wallets and pay for your products. So, where are they? What do they want to see? Creating a blog article for an audience that responds best to video content or a podcast is an exercise in futility.

Also, you need to look at what your competitors are doing. No one is saying that you have to copy them, but if they’re beating you, you’ll have to figure out what they’ve got that you don’t.

Step 3: Produce and post your content

Now it’s time to produce the pieces of content you’ve planned out and post them to the proper platform.

When producing said content, make sure that you do so with keywords in mind. However, there’s a fine line between adding keywords and keyword stuffing. Ensure that the keywords you’re including fit naturally and don’t stick out.

Incorporate keywords into every page’s title tag and meta description. Optimize all headers with semantic keywords and relevant questions to appeal to both search engine crawlers and the casual readers who are going to skim.

While it’s important to optimize, you also must ensure that your content covers the topic in depth. If people come to your page and can’t find answers to the questions they have, they’re going to bounce and look for answers elsewhere.

Step 4: Linking

When creating content, you need internal links that connect each piece of content to other pages on your site. Not only can this increase the amount of time people spend on your site, but it also helps search bots find your pages.

You’re essentially creating an interconnected web of content that Google’s search bots can navigate to index your pages more easily.

If you’re working with text content, this is easy to do. Simply place relevant links in the body of your article where it makes sense. Video content can (and should) have links placed in the description. Images can have links included in captions.

You’ll also have to get outside pages to link back to your content. This is a crucial step that can’t be overlooked. Powerful high ranking websites can give credibility to the pages you’re trying to build. These backlinks are something that Google puts a lot of emphasis on.

Step 5: Audit your content, analyze data, and update accordingly

It’s important to know who is viewing your content and where they’re coming from. This will show you what strategies are working and which aren’t. You’ll also track the movement of your content pages through the SERP. Obviously, you want to see steady upward movement.

Leave your ego at the door and alter plans when needed. Sometimes a search engine optimization strategy that looks foolproof on paper turns out to be a big dud. But as a marketer, you’re going to need to determine where it went wrong and switch things up to get back on track.

Regularly return to the content you create and update it. This isn’t a set it and forget it process, and the content you make now could still pay off for you in five years if it remains relevant.

That means:

• Updating stats
• Adding new relevant keywords
• Updating images
• Updating tags
• Updating headers

If this sounds like a lot of work, that’s because it is. That’s why we created HOTH X as a service that can help with all of your search engine optimization needs.

Optimizing Existing Text Content for People and Search Engines

When optimizing text content, you want to make sure that it’s well-written and appeals to Google’s search algorithm.

Ensure that you’re using the proper keyword density, covering important related topics, and including semantic keywords in your copy. You can determine this with an SEO content optimization tool like Frase or MarketMuse.

By optimizing your article headers, title tags, and meta description with keywords, you’ll be able to generate more organic traffic. But you’re also looking to create content that people will find appealing — something that shows your expertise and inspires trust in your audience.

To that end, make sure that you’re adding suitable images or other visuals to break up the text. This also provides you with another opportunity to inject some keywords through image alt tags, file names, and URLs.

Address the specific questions that people in your target audience are asking. You’ll be able to find these questions through the “People Also Ask” section of Google. If you optimize for these questions, you might even show up in the PAA section or rank for a featured snippet.

Finally, make sure that your content is well-edited and checked for plagiarism. We recommend using a grammar checker like Grammarly.

If you want a shortcut to high-quality text content for your blog or website, hire experts like our HOTH Blogger team.

Optimizing Video Content on YouTube

Video has become easier to produce with advanced video production software and the availability of stock footage and open-source music. But creating an interesting video is only the first step. You also have to optimize it for the platform you post it on.

To start optimizing video content, create an account on a video-sharing site like YouTube. Use all the proper branding on your YouTube account that aligns with your website and social media pages. It should look like an extension of those pages to ease customer engagement across platforms. The next step is to find YouTube video ideas that will speak to your target audience.

Optimize your video titles to ensure that they contain the keywords you’re trying to rank for. Make them both exciting and optimized simultaneously, creating a catchy title that will generate interest. You also need to make sure the first 10 seconds really capture the viewer’s attention with a punchy opening line or interesting visual.

Your video descriptions should also tell what the video is about while containing keywords. This will allow you to address the needs of your audience and the YouTube search engine at the same time.

Make sure that you:

• Add video tags
• Include links to other pages
• Use cards at the end of the video to hype other content
• Embed videos on your site and optimize them with title tags to boost your YouTube SEO

Optimizing Images

Visual content can be a highly effective medium, but only if properly optimized.

People search for images all the time, and you want to make sure that yours pop up when they do. An optimized image might even rank higher on the SERP than the page it’s featured on

When optimizing images, it’s important to remember that search engines can’t just look at an image and know what it is. That’s why you need to optimize the title and alt description of every image with keywords. You can also optimize the URL and file name for an additional SEO boost.

Start Reaping the Rewards of Optimized Content Today

Content is vital to your success, and content marketing can be highly effective. But content without optimization is useless.

Apply the tips and tricks we’ve outlined above to your content and ensure that the people you’re trying to reach can find you. If you are looking for content optimization help from experts with decades of experience and a history of success, you should schedule a call with The HOTH today.

The post The 2022 Guide to Content Optimization appeared first on The HOTH.

This mythical no-man’s land goes by the name position zero since it appears above the organic results. 

If you’ve ever entered search queries that ask questions into Google, you’ve likely come across a featured snippet (or at least if you’ve used Google since 2014). 

A snippet is a brief paragraph, video, list, or table that partially answers the query and encourages users to click to learn more. 

If you want your website to rank higher and generate more organic traffic, you’ll need to know how to optimize for featured snippets. 

That’s why we put together this guide for implementing featured snippets into your SEO strategy. Read on to discover how you can identify featured snippet opportunities and optimize your content for them. 

What Are Featured Snippets on Google?

Starting in 2014, Google added featured snippets to its SERP features. To date, it’s still one of the most significant additions to Google’s search engine – and has drastically changed the SEO landscape as a result.

Google is always looking for ways to match user queries with the relevant content in the quickest and most convenient way possible, leading to the birth of the featured snippet. 

It’s a unique search result that appears at the top of Google search results, even above the #1 ranked organic listing. 

It contains a brief ‘snippet’ of information that Google believes either answers the user’s question or provides enough value to entice them to click and learn more. 

As you can probably guess, you don’t want to answer the question outright in the snippet, as that can lead to losing a click. The best-featured snippets for SEO are ones that provide a partial answer but leave enough out, so the user clicks on your link. 

Regardless, any type of featured snippet is excellent for brand-building and leads to a higher click-through rate (CTR), so they’re worth pursuing. 

Where does Google pull featured snippets?

From existing pages in its index – most commonly pages that already rank in the top 10 or top 5. For this reason, featured snippets are the most powerful when you combine them with an already robust and successful SEO strategy. 

To learn more about featured snippets and other SEO fundamentals, check out our Learning Hub. 

The elements of a featured snippet 

Each featured snippet will contain the following components, regardless of the type:

• Relevant content to the search query
• The title of your web page
• The unique URL
• An image from Google Images that matches the keyword

A featured snippet can take on a few different forms, not just a paragraph of text, so let’s break down each one.  

Learning the Types of Featured Snippets

There are a few ways that Google presents its featured snippets. While the most common type is a paragraph snippet, there are three other ways a snippet can present content.  

Paragraph Snippets

A paragraph snippet displays a brief bit of information pertaining to the topic. If you want to boost your click-through rate, you should optimize for paragraph snippets the most. 

That’s because a paragraph usually isn’t enough space to fully answer a question, only to hint at it or provide a partial explanation. 

Paragraph snippets always appear with images on Google SERPs – yet these images aren’t always from the snippet website. Instead, Google will select an image from its library to match the search intent. 

In the example above, the snippet contains related terms that searchers can click on to find other featured snippets. This is the ‘people also ask‘ section. If you click on one of the terms, the search query will change to the selected term, and you’ll see the new snippet for it. 

Remember, featured snippet optimization is all about encouraging your readers to click on your link to learn additional information. When writing paragraphs that you want to become snippets, don’t provide all the answers in them. 

List Snippets

Sometimes Google will present a featured snippet in a list format. This can take on two forms, bulleted lists or numbered lists. 

Google favors the list format for:

• Queries that require a set of instructions 
• Recipes
• Things that rank in a specific order (movies in a franchise, books, etc.)
• Listing the ‘best’ of something (software tools, TVs, etc.)
• Checklists

Google will typically use an HTML element from your website to create the lists. 

Table Snippets

The table snippet is the third and most rare form of a featured snippet. Google will display

 a simple table containing relevant information to the search query for these results. 

To do so, Google will take information from HTML elements and compile it into a table. 

For the most part, table snippets are reserved for queries related to statistics and figures. An example would be searching crime rates for a particular city. 

Video Snippets

Lastly, Google will sometimes link to a related YouTube video in the featured snippet – complete with a timestamp on the spot in the video containing the answer to the query. 

They show up as ‘suggested clips’ – and only videos from YouTube make the cut (which makes sense since Google owns it). 

You won’t need to worry about optimizing for video snippets if you don’t create marketing videos. Even then, it’s difficult to tell when, where, and why Google will use a featured snippet from YouTube.

Google’s Other SERP Features That Aren’t Featured Snippets

Besides featured snippets, Google has other SERP features that look shockingly similar to them. Yet, it’s crucial to distinguish the difference, as your SEO will only benefit from featured snippets, not knowledge cards or entity carousels. 

In other words, you can optimize for featured snippets to heighten your chances of ‘winning’ one. 

You can do no such thing for the other SERP features, as they’re random and don’t highlight one particular website in the SERPs. 

Knowledge cards and entity carousels 

A knowledge card appears nearly identical to a featured snippet with one key difference – it doesn’t draw information from one website. Instead, all the data comes from Google’s Knowledge Graph. 

These features are Google’s way of enhancing its user experience and don’t have anything to do with SEO. 

Knowledge cards and graphs often answer quick questions (such as a company’s founding date), make a calculation, or provide weather forecasting. You can think of them as answer boxes instead of featured snippets.

An entity carousel is a series of links that list related topics. You might see an entity carousel if you Google a band’s discography. All their albums would display from left to right, allowing you to scrub through them. 

It’s also very common for the cast and crew of a movie to appear as an entity carousel. Each ‘entity’ contains a link to each actor and crew member’s IMDB page.

Some Featured Snippet Statistics: 

Results from a study conducted by Mangools:

• 41% of queries on Google display a featured snippet.
• There are an average of 272 characters per paragraph snippet. 
• 23% of all comparison keywords have featured snippets.
• 7% of generic keywords display a featured snippet.
• Nearly all (99%) of question queries have paragraph snippets – except for ‘how’ questions. For those, 52% displayed list snippets.
• A list snippet will never contain more than eight items.
• A majority (70%) of featured snippet URLs use HTTPS.

What Can Featured Snippets Do For You?

These benefits should change your mind if you’re on the fence about optimizing for featured snippets. 

Primarily, any web page containing a featured snippet will have a higher CTR than one without. 

In fact, Hubspot found that, on average, content containing a featured snippet will have a 2x higher CTR than unfeatured content. 

That means even if you suspect your featured snippet answers the question and ends up losing clicks – you’ll still be better off with it than not. 

The proof?

Moz‘s Cyrus Shepard conducted an experiment where he opted out of Google’s featured snippets. So even if one of his articles is a prime candidate for a snippet, Google can’t use it. 

The thinking behind the experiment was that snippets take away from your organic search rankings and cause you to lose traffic – such as a snippet answering a user question, so they don’t need to click through. 

The results found exactly the opposite. As soon as his posts lost their featured snippets, he saw a 12% dropoff in traffic that happened almost immediately. 

That’s proof that it’s always beneficial to have a featured snippet working for you in position zero. 

Besides more organic traffic, featured snippets are excellent tools for brand-building. Users will remember that you answered your question, and the fact that you rank so high on Google reflects well on your brand. 

How to Earn Featured Snippets

All right, now that you know it’s worth optimizing for featured snippets, how do you do it? 

You’ll want to incorporate the featured snippet style into your content marketing strategy. We recommend taking a two-pronged approach to the process:

• Use ‘snippet-friendly’ keywords. Specific keyword phrases, such as ‘how,’ ‘recipe,’ and ‘best,’ tend to appear in featured snippets more than others. It would be best if you also focused on keywords that ask questions. 
• Optimize content for snippets. We’ll go into more detail on this below, but you’ll want to tweak your content in specific ways to heighten the chances of Google displaying a snippet. 

Let’s go into more detail on each part of the process. 

Featured Snippet Keyword Selection 

As with discovering any keyword, it all starts with how you conduct research. For snippets, there are a few online tools you can use. 

There are a few places you can look to find the keywords you should target to earn featured snippets for your site. First off, you can use our free keyword planner tool to conduct in-depth research. 

It would help if you also turned to your Google Search Console (GSC) account to see which keywords you’re already ranking high for – as these are most likely to trigger a snippet. 

To do so, open up GSC and go to the Search Results Performance Report. Next, filter the data to only display keywords that ask questions. You’ll have to do this one question word at a time due to GSC’s limitations. 

Sort the queries to show the highest-ranking keywords first. The top 10 keywords are the ones you should optimize for featured snippets first. 

Another technique is to use a keyword research tool that displays SERP feature data. For this, we recommend using WooRank’s Keyword Tool. It will let you know if a keyword is likely to show up in a featured snippet or not. 

You should look for:

• Web pages that already rank high on the search engine results page (top 10 or top 5).
• A web page that isn’t ranking #1, as the featured snippet will drive you over the top and beat out the competition. 
• A keyword that will trigger a snippet that doesn’t entirely answer the question.
• Keywords with informational intent. 

Beyond targeting keywords, you can also optimize your content for featured snippets. That way, you’ll be set up to claim a featured snippet if Google decides to display one for your keyword. 

Optimizing Content for Featured Snippets

Once you have question keywords with informational intent, it’s time to create quality content centered around them. 

Hubspot discovered that on-page SEO matters far more for featured snippets than backlinks. That means once you’ve penetrated the top 10, it’s all about optimizing your content more than it is acquiring more links. 

But how should you tweak your content for featured snippets?

Here are some general guidelines for writing content that Google is likely to feature in a snippet:

• Pose the target question in a header (H1, H2, H3, etc.), preferably the H1 header. 
• Don’t forget the <p> tag. Immediately after posing the question, use a <p> tag, and then include the content you want for the featured snippet. If it’s a paragraph, write some text. If it’s a list, include bullet points and so on. 
• Provide a concise answer that encourages users to read more. You’ll have about 50 words to work with here, so think hard about what you want to say.
• Answer related questions later on in the content. Once you’ve answered the target question, back it up with supplementary questions. I.e., if it’s ‘what is a guitar?’ You could follow up with ‘how do guitars work?’ 
• If you’re going for a list or table snippet, use structured data markup for them.
• Write naturally and follow a logical structure. It’s crucial not to overthink it when optimizing your content for snippets. Instead, write as you normally would and consider readability and flow. The last thing you want is for your content to appear unnatural because you injected too many keywords. 

In a nutshell, you want to create high-quality content that answers customer questions. After that, run a savvy link-building campaign to get that content on the first page of Google (where it stands the highest chance of getting displayed as a snippet). 

Track Your Existing Featured Snippets

You should closely monitor the featured snippets that your website has while working on claiming new ones.

Doing so will benefit you in the following ways:

• Know how your site will appear on search engines. SERPs with tons of features will push the #1 organic result further down the page. Knowing this can help you select the right keywords for your website. 
• Understand how Google views the intent behind search queries. That way, you won’t be shooting in the dark with your target keywords. 
• Locate opportunities where you can beat out competitors. The higher that you rank on SERPs, the harder it will be to advance any further. For example, if you’re ranking fourth for a keyword, a featured snippet can act as a shortcut to drive you over the top. 

The WooRank tool will enable you to see which keywords have featured snippets and which don’t. You’ll also be able to see the domain for the page in the snippet. 

Additionally, you’ll be able to see the featured snippets for 3 of your competitors. That helps you get a complete picture of how you’re performing compared to others. 

Concluding Thoughts: Optimize for Featured Snippets 

By now, you should have a better understanding of how to leverage Google’s featured snippets for your SEO. 

Featured snippets are all about obtaining the legendary position zero for your content at its core. Doing so will always enhance your CTR, which is a huge benefit. 

So if you want to circumvent the #1 position and gain an explosive amount of traffic, you should optimize for featured snippets. While it takes a fair bit of work to earn a spot in position zero, the results are more than worth it. 

If you lack time to pursue featured snippets for your website, you can let us handle your SEO at The Hoth with HOTH X. We offer fully managed SEO services, including content creation, link building, and optimizing for snippets. 

If you’d rather receive candid advice from an expert, you can schedule a call to speak with one of our SEO experts today.    

The post Optimize for Featured Snippets to Obtain Position Zero appeared first on The HOTH.

Maybe you don’t have a sales page on your website. Or maybe your sales page needs some work. An incomplete or non-existent sales page is going to hurt your sales. Period.

Websites that neglect to write strong sales pages for their products or services leave customers confused, wanting more, or unsure of what to do next.

I’m going to give you the full breakdown of how to create a killer sales page that’s designed to convert customers, drive sales, and improve the user-experience of your website. It’s a win-win-WIN.

Let’s get to it!

What Is a Sales Page (And Why Should You Have One)?

A sales page is an individual page on your website for each product or service your business offers.

The point of this page is to connect with a potential customer, address everything they would want to know about the product or service you offer, remove any doubts they may have, and guide them to a sale.

A sales page has the potential to dramatically increase your conversions and rankings, but if it’s not done effectively it could hurt your business. Here are the most common mistakes I see with sales pages:

1. There is no designated page on the website that discusses the service or product
2. All of the services or products have been lumped together onto one page
3. They’ve tried to optimize the sales page for all of the keywords related to the products/services which causes the page to cannibalize itself

If done right, here’s how a killer sales page will help you.

Improved SEO

If you create an individual sales page for each product or service you offer, it will increase your ranking ability.

When you have an individual page for each service, Google will be able to index and rank each page when a customer searches for that service.

Google rankings have a direct impact on your page visits. So the higher you rank, the more visitors you’ll get to your website.

Customer Satisfaction

An individual page for your service or product will also improve the user’s experience on your website.

A page for each service makes it easier to navigate your website. Users like information right at their fingertips, so if anything is difficult to find or confusing to operate they’ll jump right off the page.

If you make it simple and easy, they’ll stay on the page longer–giving you a better chance of achieving a sale.

Now that you know why it’s useful, let’s get into how to create one.

Sales Page Template

A killer sales page highlights the following sections:

1. A Headline
2. An Overview
3. Benefits/Features
4. How it Works
5. Testimonials
6. Pricing
7. A Guarantee
8. CTA (Call to Action)

That said, each product or service can vary significantly, so some sections may not be applicable to you. It is up to you to determine which of these sections you’ll need for your sales page.

Let’s break these sections down step-by-step.

1. Grab Attention & Make An Impression With A Bold Headline

It’s not enough to get a customer to land on your website. The biggest challenge you’ll face is getting them to stay there (and better yet, buy your product or service).

The problem is that the average person spends around 10 seconds on a web page. Those first 10 seconds are meant to assess the page’s validity and usefulness to them. Users are hardwired to bounce from web page to web page because they know most web pages are useless.

If you don’t grab the attention of your customer within the first 10 seconds, they will be long gone before you can say the words “20% OFF!”

That’s where a powerful headline comes in.

Hook Them in With a Catchy Headline

Your headline should be a brief statement of the service or product you offer, and should be catchy enough to grab the interest of the customer.

If a website says “Dog Boarding in St. Pete, FL” and another says “The Most Trusted Dog Boarding Facility in St. Pete FL” which one is the customer more likely to click on? Probably the second one.

If you are creating a local service page, be sure to include the city or region in your headline as well.

Finally, make sure your headline contains your targeted keyword and is formatted with the <h1> tag.

Include a Subhead

Now you’ll need to expand on your headline and answer the question “What benefit will my customer receive?”

Customers are looking for solutions to their problems. If your customer doesn’t know how you’re going to help them right from the beginning, you’ll lose their business.

Keep your subhead short, sweet, and to the point. No more than two sentences. And then format it with the <p> tag.

2. Provide Them With a Quick Overview

When people land on a web page, they are looking to access information quickly and easily. Make sure your page is set up to help someone skim for information.

Your page will need an overview after the headline. This gives the customer a general idea of what they can expect from the page and whether or not it will be useful to them.

Create a Section Headline for the Overview

This should be a compelling headline that encompasses the main problem or solution.

If my page headline is “The Most Trusted Dog Boarding Facility in St. Pete FL” then my Overview Headline might be “Leave Your Dog With People You Can Trust”.

What’s my problem? I don’t want to leave my dog with some sketchy stranger (a valid concern).

What’s the solution? I need to choose a dog-boarding facility with trusted professionals.

Your section headline should use an <h2> tag.

Briefly Describe the Problem and the Solution

Now you need to identify the problem and offer a solution to introduce your product or service.

If my headline is “Leave Your Dog With People You Can Trust” my description might sound something like this:

Address the problem. Acknowledge the solution. Offer the service to help.

Finish Strong With a CTA

Don’t know what a CTA is? Pay attention, because you’re going to need this.

A CTA is a Call to Action. It gets the customer to do something. Do you want your customer to call you? To fill out an online form? To book an appointment?

Give them the tool to do it!

If a customer has to spend more than a couple of seconds combing through your website to find the right link, you’ll risk losing them to a competitor.

People want quick access to what they need. So make their life as easy as possible to keep them on the page.

End your Overview with a CTA like this:

[Call Us Today: 888-988-8909]

-or-

[Schedule a Free Consultation Now]

And then link your CTA accordingly.

3. Let Them Know Why Your Product or Service Is The Best

Odds are you’ve got a lot of competitors out there, and your customer will undoubtedly be weighing their options.

Why should they choose your service/product over the X amount of options out there?

You need to highlight the reasons your service is THE BEST hands down. How do you do that? By spotlighting the benefits or features of your service.

Add a Compelling Benefit or Feature Headline

Don’t get lazy here. This is your selling point. If the customer sees a section that just says “Benefits” they’ll likely keep scrolling.

Be specific and make it POP!

Try something like:

• “Fast and Reliable Service”
• “Data-Driven Strategy”

The customer should read the headline and instantly want to know more.

Don’t forget to format your headline with an <h2> tag.

Highlight the Feature or Benefit With a Quick Description

One of the biggest mistakes you can make here is drone on and on and on about why your product or service is soooo great.

Nobody is going to read a huge wall of text. It’s an eye-sore. And as previously mentioned, no one wants their time wasted.

Your description should get straight to the point about why you’re their best option.

Keep your sentences short and straightforward and add bullet points when you can. This should be as easy to read as possible.

Here’s an example:

See what I mean? Quick. Easy to read. Attention to the highlights. Done.

4. Walk Them Through Your Process

Now that the customer knows what they’re buying, you’ll want to show them the process.

If they don’t know where to start or what to expect, they might jump to a different site. So break down the process and make it fool-proof.

Create a Headline for Your Process

This Headline doesn’t need to be complicated. You can use “Our Process” or “How it Works” to start it off.

You want the customer to know exactly what this section is about.

This will use the <h2> tag.

Breakdown Your Process Steps

The worst thing you can do here is confuse or overwhelm your customer. You want them to feel like this process is going to be a walk in the park!

If your process shows a ton of complicated steps, they’re going to run in the other direction to find someone who makes it easy.

Use the <h3> tag to format your process steps, and then break down the step in a sentence or two.

It’s easier than it seems. Here’s a visual:

Sounds easy, right? Now the customer feels good getting started.

5. Give The Buyer Confidence With Social Proof

The customer will be looking for proof that they can trust YOU, so now’s your chance to convince them with some testimonials.

If you have any positive feedback from previous customers, show it off. If you don’t, you can include a snippet about your business that will help establish trust.

You want them to think, “If other people like it, I probably will too!”

Start With a Trust-Building Headline

Yeah, you could say “Customer Testimonials” but where’s the fun in that? Your headline has just as much potential to build trust as the actual proof does.

Kick it up a notch with “We Are Your Best Choice for Your Pet.”

And then add that <h2> tag.

Show off a Little

Now you can share your testimonials. If you have a lot–kudos to you–try to narrow it down to your top two or three.

A good rule of thumb is to choose testimonials that highlight the benefits or features you talked about earlier on in the page.

Remember to get the point across quickly and efficiently. Too much text and the customer will stop reading.

6. Clearly Address Pricing

If the customer has made it this far into your sales page, they’re going to be wondering about the cost.

If you don’t address the pricing upfront, or if you tiptoe around it because you’re worried about spooking the customer, you might lose the customer.

Instead, build trust with them by staying honest and direct with the pricing section.

Add a Pricing Headline

Now is not the time to get fancy. Call the pricing section what it is. “Pricing” “Packages and Pricing” or another headline that clearly introduces the pricing.

You can even pose the exact question the customer will ask, like “How Much Does It Cost To XYZ?”

Format it with the <h2> tag and you’re set.

Give a Price Breakdown

Clearly show the pricing for the service or product, or address how the pricing is calculated and where to find it.

If the pricing requires a quote or contact to the business–explain it while being as straightforward as possible.

Here’s an example:

Simple, yet informative.

7. Risk-Reversal With A Guarantee

If your company has a Guarantee, this is a great way to start wrapping up your page.

If the customer has doubts, a guarantee will help put their mind at ease. The fewer the doubts the customer has, the easier it will be to secure their business.

A Guarantee should look like this:

If you do not have a guarantee, go ahead and skip this part (or consider creating one!).

8. Finish Off Strong With A Final CTA

Wrap your page up with a killer CTA. This is the final move to lock in your customer.

Create Your Final Headline

This is the last thing the customer sees. Finish it off with a powerful headline that compels the customer to do something.

Be sure to format it with the <h2> tag.

Sum It Up

In one to two sentences, sum up your page and give them the next step to take action.

Your final CTA can look like this:

And you’re done!

Conclusion

Our sales page guide is one of many you’ll find online–but we can assure you that this template will boost sales and convince customers to buy your service or product.

If you want help creating a killer sales page for your website, you’re going to love our HOTH Web Copy product.

Let us know your thoughts in the comments below. We love hearing from you!

The post The Anatomy of a Killer Sales Page: Boost Traffic & Conversions! appeared first on The HOTH.

Most businesses create a site to list their products and services for potential customers. They want to turn a profit or expand their business. In their view, everything else is just window dressing. Or is it?

Why should you care about an About Us page if it’s not answering questions about your products or directly selling services?

Marketing studies have actually shown that more than half of website visitors check out the About Us page first. They want to get to know you and make an emotional connection with your brand.

Potential customers spend hours researching products, reading reviews, and comparing your prices to competitors, but it’s trust in your brand that pushes them over the edge to make a purchase.

That’s why building an effective About Us page is so important. In fact, one professor from Harvard Business School pointed out in 2017 that 95% of purchasing decisions are subconscious.

In this blog, we’ll show you the importance of having a good About Us page and provide a step-by-step guide on how to create your own.

Ready to dive in?

What Is an About Us Page?

As we mentioned above, the About Us page is an opportunity to establish trust with potential customers by sharing your unique story.

There are three objectives any good About Us page tries to achieve:

1. Reflect your brand’s image (as originally seen on the Home Page)
2. Build trust with the reader
3. Share the unique story behind your company

Remember that your company is unique. Even if you’re selling the same products as hundreds of other competitors, your story is different than theirs.

You want to share the reason for founding your company in an About Us page, as well as what you provide that others don’t and your core mission or values.

Consider that 83% of millennials think it’s important to buy from companies that align with their own beliefs and values. Millennials are now the largest generational block in the United States and a majority of them shop online.

You need to engage them in order to stay competitive going into the future.

About Us pages typically include a story about the company, high-res photographs or videos of staff, and mission or value statements.

The visual elements of an About Us page are up to you as the website owner, but we’ve identified key elements that need to be there for better results.

When helping clients create their About Us page, The HOTH follows an outline approach:

1. Headline & Subhead
2. Unique Selling Proposition (USP)
3. Our Story & History
4. Social Proof
5. Contact Information & Locations
6. Call to Action (CTA)

Keep reading below and we’ll discuss each of these sections in greater detail.

Use An Attention-Grabbing Headline & Subhead

Headlines are so important because it’s the first thing visitors will see. Think about walking past the front page of a newspaper. What do you notice first?

Your page’s headline should be in the <h1> format and answer the question of what services you offer. It should also be engaging and concise.

Underneath the headline is your subhead in the <h2> format. You’ll have more room here to explain what benefits a visitor can expect from your company. Don’t write more than 1-2 short sentences.

If your web copy is effective, you’ll grab their attention and they’ll continue reading the rest of the page.

Develop a Unique Selling Proposition

A unique selling proposition is a marketing term. It describes why your company is a better choice than your competitors.

This is where you can discuss your mission and demonstrate how your values align with theirs.

You’ll want to create a section title in the <h2> format and a description of your company in <p>. Most companies will post a few short paragraphs to get their point across. Don’t make it too long or they’ll be more likely to navigate away.

Here’s an example of The HOTH’s USP:

Share Your Company Story

This next section is an opportunity to dive deeper into the history of your brand. Some people will want to know how long you’ve been open and what accomplishments you’ve made over that time.

Make a headline in <h2>. The choice is yours whether you want it to be called “Our Story,” “Our History,” or something creative your team comes up with.

If you’re creating an interactive timeline or adding multiple sections, then use the <h3> format to break up the copy.

The description of your brand will be in <p> format and include any information that you think is relevant to potential customers. This section can get long real fast, so make it easy for visitors to scan the text by using short paragraphs.

Check out our page:

See our full About Us page here.

Provide Social Proof

One of the best ways to demonstrate your company’s excellence is through social proof. This includes testimonials from happy customers or third-party recognitions.

Testimonials on your website can appear as short paragraphs or video clips. Potential customers like to see these to learn more about your company.

Have you earned any prestigious certifications or awards? This is the place to brag about it!

As with the other sections above, your headline will be in <h2>, subheadings in <h3>, and any descriptions in <p>.

At The HOTH, we decided to have a little fun with ours and created the “Trophy Room” to showcase our accomplishments:

Check our reviews page for inspiration. You can also access our SEO case studies from there.

Don’t Forget Your Contact Information & Locations

Too many companies forget to add contact information to their website. This is a bad idea. Remember that an About Us page is attempting to establish trust with a prospective customer.

You want to give the customer all the pertinent information they need about who you are, and how to reach you.

You’ll also want to list all of your locations so they can find the one closest to their home or business.

Format your Contact Information & Locations section the same as the others. Start off with a <h2> headline and write the information in <p>. Use <h3> if you need to break up the content even further.

Wrap It up With a Strong CTA

You should never skip an opportunity to get your online visitors to take what they learned on your About Us page and perform an action.

First, decide what is the most important conversion for this page. Is it asking them to sign up for an e-newsletter? Or is it booking a phone call with an expert?

Once you’ve figured that out, write a targeted call to action (CTA) and consider using a button or graphic to highlight it. Here’s an example of a strong CTA from The HOTH:

Use the <h2> format for the title and <h3> if you want to include a subheading. We didn’t add a description to this CTA, but that would be in <p>.

Do You Need Help Updating Your About Us Page?

It’s easy to disregard the About Us page of your website when you’re so focused on making optimized sales pages. But, the truth is an About Us page has the potential to get a lot of traffic.

You should be using it to reinforce your brand and establish trust with visitors.

If you need help reworking your About Us page or if you simply don’t have the time to do it, you can reach out to the HOTH Web Copy team. Our content writing team is made up of the top 1% of all applicants. They’ll provide SEO optimized web copy that is crafted with conversions in mind.

The best part is you can monitor the performance of your new page any time with our transparent reporting system.

Book a call with us now to discuss your goals and learn what we can do to help you!

The post Anatomy of a Great About Us Page appeared first on The HOTH.

What does this mean for your site? Basically, if your site is desktop-only it will no longer be seen in search. This includes content like comments, data, images, videos, or anything else you want indexed.

Although the original switch was scheduled for September 2020, Google developers never expected a global pandemic to impact businesses. In some cases, the virus has delayed older websites moving to mobile.

They’ve now indicated that this huge switch will happen in March 2021.

John Mueller, Google Developer Advocate, said earlier this year that 70% of sites shown in search results have already shifted over. But, if you’re not one of these sites, you have some work to do.

What can you do to make sure this change won’t destroy your online presence? Keep reading below to learn how you can prepare.

What Happens in March 2021 Exactly?

The switch will happen rapidly but not overnight.

Mueller explained that there will be an increase in Googlebot crawling after switching to mobile-first. The change will take some time and he said it could take longer depending on the size of your domain.

“Afterwards, we’ll still occasionally crawl with the traditional desktop Googlebot, but most crawling for search will be done with our mobile smartphone user-agent,” he said.

This change is also concerning for mobile sites set up as a m-dot version.

After the update they’ll only be able to link m-dot sites to desktop, which could result in dropped content if you aren’t redirecting desktop users. It’s more likely to happen with sites using hreflang attributes.

In fact, Google developers are recommending that sites no longer use m-dot because of the confusion between search engines and users.

Preparing Your Site for Mobile First Indexing

We understand that the big question on your mind is how can you protect your website going into March 2021?

Pat yourself on the back if you’re one of those sites who already set up mobile capabilities, otherwise take a deep breath and get to work.

First, you’re able to check the status of your mobile-first indexing in the Google Search Console. Another way is to use the URL Inspection Tool. Either one can help you tell where you’re at in the process.

Here are some mobile-first indexing best practices directly from Google:

1. Use the same meta robots tags on mobile and desktop
2. Don’t lazy-load primary content upon user interaction
3. Don’t block URLs from crawling
4. Use the same content on your mobile and desktop site (especially clear headlines)
5. Have the same structured data (bread crumb, product, video object, etc.) on both versions of your site
6. Make sure your ads are also placing on mobile
7. Follow the best practices for images (high-quality images, supported formats, and alt-text)
8. Place videos in supported formats at easy-to-find spots on your site

There are many other suggestions, including how to check hreflang links, cutting fragment URLs, and verifying your robots.txt directives. The best thing you can do is read about it from the source.

Don’t Panic About Mobile-First Indexing

This announcement from Google seems scary for businesses running older websites without a mobile component, but there’s plenty of time to update and optimize websites before March 2021.

Follow some of the best practices we listed above when working on your site. You may consider hiring a professional web designer to help if you don’t have someone on staff to do it.

Are you in the middle of updating your site and need help with web copy? We can help you to write SEO-optimized, conversion-focused copy that represents your brand and builds trust with visitors.

We’ll ensure that the copy for both your desktop and mobile site is the best it can be. Reach out today to discuss your site and what can be done to prepare for the next Google update.

The post Google’s Mobile-First Index Is Coming—Is Your Site Ready? appeared first on The HOTH.