There are three main factors that the search engines look at when deciding where to rank your business website in the organic search engine ranking positions – technical, on-page, and off-page.
In years gone by, many businesses would put most emphasis on using off-page techniques. Content management, link building, social networking, and other techniques were used while on-page was often overlooked.
However, anyone that knows their stuff will tell you that all that off-page SEO is not going to take you very far without focusing on the on-page fundamentals too. Now more than ever – due to the constant shifting of the search landscape, it is important that you not only prioritise your on-page SEO but also keep your knowledge of it right up to date.
We have listed the 9 most important elements that you should consider for your onpage optimisation. If you can ensure that you get it all right, you stand a better chance of higher rankings and reaping the benefits (increased traffic and conversions) that brings.
So, ready? Here goes!
- Expertise, Authoritativeness, And Trustworthiness (E-A-T)
Google uses the three factors of E-A-T to determine how much trust a brand or website deserves. Since day one, Google has strived to give people browsing the internet using their search engine, a quality experience.
Thus, any website that focuses on producing high quality content that oozes expertise, authoritativeness, and trustworthiness will be promoted and rewarded by Google. Websites that display the opposite will get far less visibility in the search rankings.
E-A-T plays a part in your rankings and should definitely be considered when forming your SEO strategy.
- Title Tags
When you search on Google, each search result will have a blue link that you can click. That link is formed of text which is called a title tag. Its sole purpose is to provide visitors and search engines a short description of what that particular webpage is about.
Title tags by themselves will not have a huge positive impact on your rankings but if they are missing, duplicate or badly written, they can have a negative impact. Ensure that all of your pages have well-written title tags.
- Meta Descriptions
Just below the title tag in the search results is the meta description. This is used to provide a longer description of what the user can expect if they click the link. These descriptions have long been an important factor of onpage optimisation despite Google claiming they have no direct effect on search engine rankings.
Indirectly, however, well-written and descriptive meta descriptions have been shown to improve a websites click-through rate. They also give off a level of professionalism and create a positive perception for searchers.
- Header Tags
Ranked in order of importance between H1 and H6, header tags are what are used to separate the content on your pages. H1 will normally be the title, H2 subtitles, H3 a further subsection within a subtitle, and H4 are what’s normally used for lists/bullets. H5 and H6 are rarely used.
These tags not only help with the oo-page optimisation of your pages but also the readability for your visitors. Keywords and phrases used correctly in these tags can increase the chances of the page ranking.
- Avoiding Keyword Cannibalisation
What would your answer be if we asked you whether you thought targeting a single keyword or term on multiple pages is a good thing? If you thought it was, you are sorely mistaken. All this does is cause keyword cannibalisation. You are not going to rank better and potentially you will rank worse as each page targeting that keyword is effectively competing against each other.
Check your pages to make sure that you do not have any cases of keyword cannibalisation.
- Headlines
A compelling headline could be the difference between somebody reading your content or leaving the page. While the content itself is extremely important, first impressions can be huge. Think about your content titles and come up with something imaginative that will hook visitors into reading the rest of your content.
A boring title suggests boring content while something compelling could do wonders for your CTR.
- Written Content
The content beneath the title should not disappoint either. The difference here is that while you are writing to keep the reader interested, you’re also writing for the search engines too.
There should be a strategy on the keywords used, their density and whether they should be in subtitles. Avoid over-optimising your content with keywords as this could be deemed as stuffing. Find the right balance of perfectly optimised content that is written to a high standard and you will be onto a winner.
- Image Optimisation
There is more to it than just finding an image and adding it to your content. A nice image helps to add appeal to a page but you have to think about page speed and whether that image fits your content.
One good thing about images is that there is another opportunity to get your targeted keywords into your content via the image alts and image descriptions.
- Content Audit
Churning out lots of engaging, authoritative, and quality content is a great thing. Trouble is, that many businesses often forget to audit their existing content. This is an important element as your content might be out of date, no longer accurate, or not performing as well as it used to.
You should regularly audit the content on your website and make the required changes when necessary.
Tick Those Boxes and Up the Rankings You Go
If you can ensure that you keep on top of all of the above, you stand a far better chance of consistently good search engine ranking positions. Take our advice when we say that on-page optimisation is an important part of SEO – so do not be one of the many businesses that neglects it!
If you want to learn more about our services and what we can do for you – drop us a message and one of our team members will get back to you right away.
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