Over 80% of searches are conducted using search engines. It’s interesting to note that the typical internet user tends to focus on the first five results displayed on a search engine results page (SERP). A study conducted in 2014 by Advanced Web Rankings revealed that approximately 67% of all clicks on SERPs are directed towards those top five listings. As of 2019, this percentage has risen significantly to 94.53%.
So SEO; Search Engine Optimization, is all about ensuring that your web page achieves a good ranking on search engines, particularly Google. It’s worth noting that according to Net Market Share, Google holds a significant 81.64% share of the Search Engine Market. So, optimizing your website for Google can greatly enhance its visibility and reach.
Here are a few tips that can significantly boost your SEO and help you rank higher on any Search Engine.
1. Metadata
Meta Tags define the metadata for the page and also enable you to add additional details to your website.
Metadata won’t appear on the webpage itself, but it’s formatted for machines to understand. Browsers, search engines (like Google), and other web services can utilize this information.
Here are a few commonly used Meta Tags that you should definitely consider including. Simply fill in the required details and add them to the head section.
<!-- Basic SEO --> <meta httpEquiv="cache-control" content="max-age=<age in seconds>" /> <meta charset="utf-8" /> <meta name="viewport" content="width=device-width, initial-scale=1" /> <meta name="theme-color" content="<theme color hex>" /> <meta name="keywords" content="comma separated keywords" /> <meta httpEquiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8" /> <meta name="language" content="English" /> <meta name="description" content="<description>" /> <meta name="image" content="/image-link.png" /> <meta name="thumbnail" content="/image-link.png" /> <meta name="title" content="<title>" /> <!-- Schema.org for Google+ --> <meta itemprop="description" content="<description>" /> <meta itemprop="image" content="/image-link.png" /> <meta itemprop="name" content="<title>" /> <!-- Twitter --> <meta name="twitter:card" content="summary" /> <meta name="twitter:description" content="<description>" /> <meta name="twitter:image" content="/image-link.png" /> <meta name="twitter:title" content="<title>" /> <!-- Open Graph general (Facebook, Pinterest & Google+) --> <meta property="og:description" content="<description>" /> <meta property="og:image" content="/image-link.png" /> <meta property="og:site_name" content="<site name>" /> <meta property="og:title" content="<title>" /> <meta property="og:type" content="website" /> <meta property="og:url" content="<url for the website>" /> 2. Load Time and User Experience
Remember people are impatient, The stats are shocking.
25% of users will have left your site after only 4 seconds of loading time.
That’s one-fourth of your prospective leads gone in just four seconds…
Website load time is a crucial factor in your users’ experience. And, Google started tracking page speed in 2018.
Your web page load times are directly related to design.
Websites featuring complex graphics, many photos (think online shopping), or videos take longer to load.
You can reduce the page load time by:
- Reduce unused JavaScript.
- Eliminate render-blocking resources.
- Reduce initial server response time.
3. Use appropriate keywords In The Right Places
Keywords are terms or expressions that describe the content of your website. They allow search engines to understand the subject of your site and to display relevant results for Internet users. It is therefore important to choose your keywords well and to use them strategically in the right place.
Ensure your keyword appears in the page title.
Webpage URL:
And in the first 100 words of your content.
4. Provide useful and fresh content
It’s common for content to come last in the web design process, but that is a mistake. In SEO, content is king! Content is the new SEO these days. Now, you might have some ideas about how important content is.
If your content is static, old, or out of date then most probably your visitors will go away quickly and never come back.
There is big competition in every keyword you search and those websites that have the most useful and fresh content, have more chances of winning the race.
5. Don’t forget the fundamentals
Just like a strong house requires a solid foundation, achieving overall website optimization is impossible without following best practices in application development. Well organised, minimal code is the key.
That’s it and you’re on your way to skyrocketing your website SEO.
Summing Up by an interesting quote from Wendy Piersall
“Google only loves you when everyone else loves you first.” – Wendy Piersall
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