How many times have you heard the term SEO and felt confused? Business owners know they need to invest in SEO for their website, but most have no idea how to go about doing it. That’s why the team here at WPamplify offers this service to you so that you don’t have to worry about it.
We can get you higher rankings in Google search results with these 10 SEO tips for business websites.
1. Speed Optimize Your Website
Slow site speeds can kill your conversions. Many people don’t stick around to see your site if it takes more than 3 seconds to load. Every additional second that it takes to get your page up, you’ll lose more users.
Google cares what your speeds are. It’s their main goal to show websites that will provide the user with the best experience. So, if your site isn’t loading quickly, it won’t rank as high as others that do.
Some of the ways we can increase the speeds include:
- Uninstall plugins that aren’t necessary
- Use a caching plugin
- Turn off the pingback or trackback feature
- Compress your images and site
There are many ways you can improve your speeds. It’s important that you let a developer look over your page and figure out what’s causing it to load slowly.
2. Update your Google My Business (GMB) Page
If you haven’t already, you need to claim your Google My Business (GMB) page or create one if it doesn’t exist. This is a free service that helps your business get found. It’s important to fill out your profile completely.
Even if your site isn’t ranking, your GMB page can rank. When you set up the account, you’ll want to make sure you add this information:
- Verify your address – you’ll need for Google to send you a postcard with a verification code to the business address you post.
- Add hours of operation – you can even add your business hours for holidays.
- Upload many different images – take pictures of the inside and outside of your business. Also, you should include some of yourself and staff.
- Attach your website address – you’ll have to use the main URL of your website on your GMB page.
- Phone number – input the number associated with your business.
As much information you can give about your business the better. You can also publish posts to get more exposure to your page. They usually expire after a week.
One of the great things about Google My Business is that they will send you an email each month to let you know how many people found your listing. It will give you statistics showing the number of users that clicked over to your site, asked for directions, or called you.
3. Research The Right Keywords For Your Industry
One difficulty business owners have is choosing the right keywords. You have to think like your consumer and consider the words that they would use to find your services. There are a few ways you can figure out what people are searching for.
Here are some of the ways our team uses to determine the right keywords for your industry:
- Autofill suggestions from Google- when you start to type in a phrase or question, Google will autofill the page with common searches. If there are many common searches, there will be a dropdown of suggestions.
- Related searches- type in the keywords or search terms that are associated with your industry. Go to the results page and then scroll to the bottom of the page. You’ll see a section called “related searches”. These are other important terms to target on your site.
- Uber Suggest– Neil Patel puts out a free keywords search system. It allows you to put in a competitor’s site to get ideas of what you should target. Also, you can put in keywords that you are considering and see other suggestions of what’s being searched.
Without the right keywords, your target audience won’t be able to find you. You have to give Google as much information as possible about what you do and can offer the reader. When you do that, they will show your page to your ideal customer.
4. Give Your Content an SEO Upgrade
The way you write the content on your site has a lot to do with the position of your page on search results. Remember, Google wants the best possible user experience for all searches. It’s your job to make your content as user-friendly and engaging as possible.
Here are a few things you should consider doing to upgrade your content:
Readability Score
The readability score is based on the Fleischman reading scale. This determines how hard your content is to read. It’s best to keep your score between a 6-7.
Use Header 2 and Header 3 Properly
When you are writing, make sure you create headers and select that when you upload a post on your site. The title of your page or post is automatically coded as Header 1. Think of the Header 1 as the title of a book.
Header 2 is like a chapter title. You’ll want to create several Header 2’s throughout your content to make it easy to skim.
Header 3 is like a sub-section within the chapter. Use this to bring out points under the main point you are trying to make.
Write Short Paragraphs and Sentences
Forget everything you were taught about paragraphs in school. When you are writing for your website, paragraphs should be no more than 3 sentences long. Each sentence should be about a line and a half.
Short paragraphs and sentences make your posts easier to read. Google will show your site to a broader audience if they know the reader can understand it. This is particularly helpful for people whose first language is not English.
Increase the Length of Your Page
Starting in 2018, Google started preferring pages that were 1,900+ words. The theory is that users want all the information they need on a subject in one place. It used to be the custom to send them all over the website to get more page clicks, but now, we put all the information they need in one place.
Backlinko did a study that showed pages that are over 2,000 words have a diminishing return. It’s important to be detailed and give a lot of information, but make sure you don’t waste your efforts. Publish a few power posts on your site to increase page rankings.
5. Publish Pages That Target Your Local Market
Whether you have a local market or a worldwide audience, you should write pages that target areas. Write each page as though it were a landing page with city-specific information. These pages should be outlined like this:
- Short 3 sentence introduction that includes the name of your company, the service you provide and the name of the city you are targeting.
- Use an engaging headline with a promise you make to your customers. Write a 3 sentence paragraph sharing why people chose your service.
- The next headline should include the name of the service you provide to your audience. Write 2-3 short paragraphs informing the reader what you can offer to them.
- Write a headline using the name of the city or area you are targeting. Write 1-2 paragraphs talking specifically about the city and what’s nearby. If you have a brick-and-mortar business, you can include brief directions to your location in this section.
- Include a call to action headline (CTA) at the end. In this final paragraph, use your company name, the service you are offering, and the city you are targetting.
Create landing pages for every area that’s near your business. If you have a global market, consider targetting large cities first and then work your way down.
6. Customize Your Meta Descriptions
The meta description is the paragraph that is displayed on search results pages. You will want to write a custom description of the page or blog post you publish. In this description, make sure you use the keywords you are trying to target on your page.
When you write the description, include enough information to help the reader determine if your page will answer their question. Just know that your descriptions can be no longer than 158 characters. Any longer than that and the description will run off the page.
7. Get The Right Type of Backlinks For Your Site
A backlink is when another site links back to your website. It’s important to note that not all backlinks are created equal. If you get a lot of links on fishy or spammy websites, it can hurt your page rankings rather than help them.
We work to get your website several backlinks per month when you use our SEO team. One of the ways we do this is by adding your site to business directories. You can find local directories by searching for “business directory in your city”.
8. Hook Your Website Into Google Analytics and The Search Console
It’s important that you have Google Analytics and the Google Search Console. We learn so much from these resources. The analytics will show you information such as:
- Search terms that bought a visitor to your site
- Which pages and posts are getting traffic
- User demographics
- Bounce rates
- Referral sources
- Links clicked from your site
This information will help you know what efforts are working and places you can do more work. You might be surprised at the demographics you are attracting and what your page is ranking for. Whatever pages are getting the most traffic, you should update with more calls to action and valuable information.
9. Put Together a Website That’s Easy to Use
You can drive all the traffic on the internet to your site, but if it is not easy to use, it won’t convert. The information on your site should be easy to locate and intuitive. Make your call to action buttons on the top of your page and simple to get to.
Other things you should consider adding to your page:
- Welcome video
- High-quality images
- Easy to read content
- A simple to understand navigation menu
- Customize the 404 pages to include top posts
This is also where fast load times plays a part. Every page that you click on should load within 3 seconds. Otherwise, the user will abandon the page, even if they wanted to know what you had to say.
10. Strategically Target Keywords in Your Content
Every page on your website should target the keywords you are trying to rank for. If you have old content, make sure you go in and update it to reflect current keyword strategies. For example, keyword stuffing used to be a practice that Google penalizes now.
In order to target the keywords on your site, you’ll need to make sure your keywords appear in these places:
- Title
- URL
- First paragraph
- First header
- Another header on the page
- Title of the image
- Tags
- Last paragraph of the page
It’s important that you keep your keyword density between 3%-5%. If it is too low, it will be hard to rank for the words. If it is too high, you could get penalized by Google. If you have a penalty, it will show up in the Google Search Console.
Contact us Today to Learn More About SEO
Need help with your SEO strategy? If so, get in touch with our team here at WPamplify. We help businesses just like you to target their audience with a customized SEO plan. Our team can’t wait to help you!
