SEO has become a hot term in recent years, especially in the digital world we live in. With more and more businesses jumping online and the requirement for digital content growing so rapidly, SEO-friendly words have become an essential need for growing businesses. I should know, coming from a marketing background.
As a common prerequisite for copywriters, it is one of the key questions I get asked by anyone seeking copywriting for their online world. So how do I tackle this you may ask? Well, it's not as scary as it sounds. I've put together a quick checklist to get you on your way to understanding SEO.
What is SEO?
Before I jump into giving you a quick cheat sheet, it's important to understand what SEO is and how it works.
SEO is short for Search Engine Optimisation. Put simply, it's the practice of increasing the quality and quantity of traffic to your website through organic search engine results.
How SEO works
Have you ever wondered how a search engine, such as Google, Yahoo or Safari magically conjures up the results to your query when you type or speak into them?
Well, it's a three-step process.
Crawling: the search engine sends out its team of robots, also known as crawlers or spiders to find content. This can include a webpage, an image, or a video.
Indexing: once content is found, the search engine stores this information in its enormous library. But hey, you've got to be the best of the best to be deemed good enough for this library!
Ranking: When you perform a search the engine searches its meticulously organised library of information and provides you with the content hoping to solve your query.
I guess you can look at the search engine as the world's largest library with hundreds and thousands of Oompa Loompas working hard to ensure it can provide its readers with content from all genres and topics.
So, now that you have the basic idea of what SEO is and how it works, let's get cracking with that checklist.
SEO checklist
Research your keywords. Carefully research your keywords and target something you have a chance at ranking on. Not sure where to begin? Semrush is a great tool for this. Google Keywords researcher is also another very useful tool.
Use that keyword in your content. Add the keyword into the following: - Post titles - Image Alt tags - Image descriptions - Image titles - H2 tags
Organic linking. Link to yourself organically 3-4 times and make sure you are linking on the keyword you are targeting.
External linking. Be a good community member and link out to someone offering something similar or even the opposite that is relevant. Be careful not to link to someone targeting the same keywords as your post is targeting.
Check your URL. You do not want to be changing this after you publish. So make sure you are certain it is what you want it to be.
Now that you have this checklist, go ahead and have a play around for yourself.
In the meantime, if you would like some assistance on a project give me a call on 0452588384 or email vishma@mistryofwords.com and let’s boost those conversions through some creative, engaging copy.
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