Many website owners in the Philippines are just relying on link building and social media, hoping that these methods will help them increase their rankings in Google and other search engines. If you are one of them, this may be the time for you to learn about the benefits of on-page SEO and how to start implementing it to your website.
Why is it important to optimize your website for search engines?
Search engines are smart but there is a limit to how they can operate. For them to be able to crawl your site and place it on top of their search results for relevant and profitable keywords, you also need to make sure that your site is structured in a way that they understand.So, how do you do this?
In this article, I will give you a list of the components in your site that you need to look at and give you insights on how to optimize them.1. URL Structure
If your site has several categories, you should consider creating URLs in a manner that human users can understand. Instead of using long ID numbers, you should use readable words. You should also consider using hyphens to separate words. Let’s say you are running a website about pets. A URL like www.allaboutpets.com/dog-breeds/siberian-husky is better than www.allaboutpets.com/siberian-husky or www.allaboutpets.com/siberian-husky/?p=123.2. HTTPS
Google started to use HTTPS as a ranking signal a year ago so you may want to use secure, encrypted connection.3. Main Navigation
Consider creating a static navigation strip at the top of every page. It is not necessary to list too many links, only the ones that point to the highest level, most important pages.4. Heading Tags
There are six heading elements – H1, H2, H3, H4, H5 and H6. You can use these tags to represent different sections of a webpage. The main title of the page should be the H1 tag. Use H2 for the subheadings of the H1, H3 for the subheadings of the H2, H4 for the subheadings of the H3, and so on. Use only the necessary headers.5. Meta Tags
Meta tags contain important information about a web page. This information is used by search engines to index a page, so that someone searching for that kind of information that a page contains will be able to find it. The meta tag is placed within the head section of a page.The 2 most important meta tags that you should optimize for search engines are the meta title and the meta description. When writing metadata, consider using words that clearly describe the page’s content. You can use this online tool to create SEO-friendly meta tags for your site: http://www.seomofo.com/snippet-optimizer.html.
6. Content
When writing content for your website, you should know first the right topic to cover through keyword research. In this way, you can make sure that your content will drive highly targeted traffic to your site. Click here to learn how to do keyword research.Remember that Google and other search engines hate web pages with little content so you should consider writing a lengthy one that will engage and entertain readers. You can add illustrative images, videos or links to other related web pages as long as they don’t belong to your competitors.
You should avoid keyword stuffing. If you need to repeat to the exact keywords many times in the body of the content, you can use its synonymous terms.
7. Images
It is not recommended for website owners to use images on other sites without permission. Remember that Google can block, remove or restrict access to content that violates applicable copyright law.To optimize your images for search engines, consider using the alt attribute to include a few words of descriptive text.
8. Keywords
There are online tools that you can use to search for the right keywords, such as Google Keyword Planner and SEMRush. Through keyword research, you can not only learn which terms and phrases to target with SEO, but also learn more about your target audience.It is very important to use appropriate and relevant terms for your site’s URLs, meta tags, headings, image alt text, page title, anchor text and content. You can always use synonymous words or phrases to avoid keyword stuffing.
