Search engines run on hundreds of ranking signals, but a small number of them account for most of the difference between a page on position one and a page buried on page three.
You don’t need to chase every algorithm update to improve your rankings, you just need to get the fundamentals right and keep them right. Business owners trying to get their company visible online can utilise modern SEO-strategies to make this happen.
Why You Need A Proper SEO Audit
Before anything else, you need to know where you stand in the rankings. An SEO audit looks at your site’s health in terms of the 4 key areas that influence SEO: technical, content, links and keywords.
You may end up fixing something that wasn’t broken while the things that are causing you to lose traffic the most are still broken. Most of the best SEO projects that DSR Digital works with will begin with a complete website audit to understand what is working, leading clients to your site and what is contributing to poor website stats.
Be Sure To Match Content With Search Intent
To rank well on search queries, it is important to first assess and understand the motivations or intentions of the searchers. For the search queries, ‘What are the best running shoes for flat feet’ and ‘How do running shoes work,’ one expects a comparison of running shoes and a recommendation, while the other expects a differentiated answer. If you analyse the ranked content for your desired queries, you can better assess what content needs to be produced.
Repair Your Core Web Vitals
Page speed, visual stability and interactivity directly affect your rankings and there are so many businesses that have websites that still don’t get them right. Improving Core Web Vitals scores from ‘poor’ to ‘good’ improves a website’s conversion rate by 25% and decreases the bounce rate by 35% and a one second increase in load time can decrease conversion by 7%. Common core web vitals issues are due to large images and unoptimised or blocked scripts or fonts.
How To Optimise Title Tags And Meta Descriptions
The most crucial part of the page for improving keyword rankings and the click-through rate (CTR) is the title tag. You should make your title tag between 50 to 60 characters and be sure that it is natural, adding the keyword at the start of the title tag.
The meta description is like the advertisement that shows up with your result and while it does not affect the rank of the page, a more informative and succinct meta description will get more clicks than a vague, less informative meta description.
What Does Meta Data Look Like In Practice?
Let’s say you have a law firm called ‘John Doe Law’ which is based in London and specialises in commercial property. An example meta title and description might look something like this:
Example Meta Title: Commercial Property Law London | John Doe Law
This meta title is perfect for your business’ website landing page as it describes what you do, where you are located and your business name in just 45 characters. Now you must do this across all of your websites URLs and make them as specific as possible.
Example Meta Description: John Doe Law offer expert advice on commercial property law in London and across the UK with more than 15 years experience call them today on xxxxxx.
This meta description is using the same key words vital for John Doe Law such as commercial property law, London while offering a clear CTA and where you offer your expert advice, too.
Build Topical Authority Instead Of Isolated Pages
Sites that show depth to a subject area are being rewarded more and more by search engines. Isolated pages that rank for one keyword are being less and less considered. Instead, search engines want pages that contain pillar content with supported articles that reference each other.
A website that contains twenty irrelevant pages on a subject will be outperformed by five pages that are comprehensive, well-linked to each other and on the same subject.
How To De-Clutter Your Website
If your website already consists of too many content pieces that lack depth or links to one-another, you should inspect which URLs are ranking on Google Search Console and begin deleting, merging and optimising your content. This is a time-consuming task but will help your website appear in searches and reach your potential clientele.
