On-page SEO basics are the next step in our article series. Learning the basics will really help you. The point of on-page SEO is to get your website to rank for keywords. Quite a few people think that you can just write content, add in a few headings and build links. The truth is that a little bit of on-page SEO goes a long way into building a strong online presence. This is an 8 part series on what to do if your SEO flatlined:
- SEO Flatlined
- Website Audit
- Negative Ranking Penalty Recovery Strategy
- Create Strategic Content
- On-Page SEO Basics – Optimize Content – You are Here
- Link Building
- Keyword Maintenance
- Traffic Optimization
Basic SEO Guidelines for Optimizing Your Content – On-Page SEO
Basic optimization is important so that search engines can find your content. The best part about this is that anyone can do the basics. All you need are some simple guidelines. Here is our basic on-page SEO checklist. Careful not to overoptimize. Your content needs to read well, not look like it is stuffed with keywords. You will need to put your primary keyword in your:
- Page title at the beginning
- Meta description (and please use a CTA)
- Bold text in the first and last paragraphs
- h1, h2 and an h3
- Image name
- In your image title, description and caption
- Inbound links (be sure to fix broken links) & social mention (link building)
Pro tip: When you use your primary keyword in a link to another page you are saying that another page is more relevant for that keyword. We have seen this mistake many, many times. Avoid doing this. This brings us to building links.
On-Page SEO and Link Building Work Together
On-page SEO and link building come together to reinforce the other and show search engines that they should pay attention to your website. Bonus points if you integrate posting relevant content on social media. Therefore, it is possible to rank for keywords without building links. That just means you need to work harder. Adding more content, keeping site health in check and staying on top of other search signals. Links are a very important search signal and have a lot of weight. In addition, a few quality inbound links may have more authority than a few internal links. High-quality inbound links can also help you to rank for keywords faster.
Contact Us for Help With On-Page SEO Today
Want more than the on-Page SEO basics or aren’t sure how to implement these tips? We are happy to do this for you. We’re an SEO Vancouver firm and you can count on us. If you need a full SEO tuneup, a website audit, a keyword audit or something else we’re ready to assist. For your convenience, you can contact us in many ways. Through email, by phone 604-779-8438 or you can chat with us online right now. Need help with off-page SEO? Next up in this series to help you if your SEO flatlined is: Link Building – Part 6