Learn Search Engine Optimization Basics
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Search Engine Optimization Basics
How do you describe your website with a machine?
This is the foundation of great SEO.
SEO provides clues about your website that robots understand.
The more information you provide, the more likely your site will be indexed and ranked.
Google uses 200+ ranking signals.
These signs contain a lot of information about your website and special pages - what your content says, how popular it is.
Improving these signals or completing more of them can make your website more discoverable and help search engines serve the most relevant users.
The most important include:
Title Tag - A title tag tells users and search engines what the subject of the page is.
(This is the title that appears in the search engine results page (SERP) and in the title bar of your web browser.)
Title tags are included in the code of the HTML document.
For maximum SEO value, the title tag should be between 50-60 characters and include relevant keywords.
Description Meta - Your meta description is a short description of what is included on the page.
It appears in the title and URL on the SERP.
Ideally, each page's meta description should be 165 characters or less description about the page and should include relevant keywords (phrases) or phrases targeting you.
Image Alt Tags - Image alt tags describe an image within HTML.
Crawlers cannot scan images.
Instead, they read HTML for clues about what an image is.
Therefore, you can describe the text included in your image.
If your business sells smartphones, for example, you can include keywords in your top tag, such as "iPhone 8, Black, 64GB for iPhone photo".
Unique Content - Duplicate content is content that appears in many places on your website.
If you use multiple URLs for a single page, you can ding for duplicate content.
Or if you borrowed text from a distributor's website - it could also result in duplicate content fines.
Crawlers have no idea what to do when they find duplicate content.
Which page is most relevant to users?
Result: Traffic gets divided between two pages.
Keep your content unique on all pages, and if you are using multiple URLs, use the canonical URL tag to make crawlers aware.
Canonical URL - Sometimes, a web page can be accessed by multiple URLs.
For example, you have a single page with a unique URL for mobile and desktop.
Therefore, in your HTML file, you must tell the bot which URL is the master copy and which duplicate.
For example, if your mobile and desktop page use the same URL, then for your mobile page, you can add a canonical URL to the homepage, letting the crawler know that your mobile page is duplicate.
Snippets - Have you looked at rating stars or recipe information in search results?
Both are examples of rich snippets.
Essentially, snippets are structured data in your HTML code, i.e. reviews, author-by-lines, videos, music, and more.
By adding these snippets, you are helping the crawler understand what is on your page and provide more information for users.
Keywords and Keyword Phrases - Use relevant keywords and keyword phrases in your content.
These are the exact words / phrases and synonyms that clearly explain the information on your page.
And you should use them to create a clear hierarchy.
Use your title tag, meta description, your H1 and H2 tags, as well as keywords in the body of the webpage.
Keywords help search engines determine which pages are most relevant to users.
Avoid keyword stuffing - Beware of overusing or spamming keywords.
Use keywords and keyword synonyms carefully.
Do not overuse a specific keyword; Instead, use fractions that mean the same thing and place them strategically throughout the body of the page.
Use keywords naturally. Dramatically increasing the number of keywords on a page will not help rank.
Your content should be easy to read, meaningful, unique and predictable for a reader.
Pathfinding - An easy-to-navigate site provides a great user experience. And this is some search engine reward.
The key is making your navigation clear. Your navigation hierarchy should look like a pyramid - your homepage at the top, your category pages at the next level, and at the bottom.
Also, create your navigation in HTML or CSS; Using JavaScript can prevent bots from crawling properly on your site.
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