ON-PAGE SEO OPTIMIZATION
A component of search engine optimization, on-page SEO refers exclusively to the creation or optimization of a web page’s signals to search engines. Read on to find out what on-site SEO is and why you need to optimize your website.
When we talk about online promotion, we inevitably talk about SEO promotion, a complex process that is divided into two main stages. Below we will explain everything about on-site optimization.
WHAT SEO DOES FOR YOU?
SEO is a fundamental part of online marketing and involves a series of strategies aimed at optimizing a particular website in order to increase its position in the list of results generated by search engines.
Specifically, SEO is about attracting traffic to a particular website through a series of technical and creative activities to make it visible and create awareness. In the case of online shops, optimisation leads to an increase in the number of customers and, therefore, in sales.
If you want your website to be displayed in the top positions in Google searches, this online promotion technique cannot be missing from your marketing strategy. You need to understand that we are not talking about something you should do, but something you must do. Without SEO services, your audience has no way to reach you.
SEO optimization means evaluation, strategy, implementation and analysis, and includes both sets of actions carried out on-page – i.e. on the site whose increased visibility is sought – and off-page strategies, which aim to obtain links to the site in question. Next we will talk about on-page SEO optimization.
HOW DOES A SEARCH ENGINE RANK A WEBSITE?
A search engine, such as Google, is basically a database made up of a multitude of websites. The purpose of this database is to recommend to users the most relevant site that talks about the searched terms.
For example, when someone searches on Google for “what is on-page SEO optimization”, the search engine analyzes in a few milliseconds all the sites indexed in its database and returns to the user the results it considers the best.
To build their database, search engines use spiders/crawlers, i.e. programs run by a super-computer that access existing sites constantly and repeatedly. The process is called crawling and involves scanning each individual site to gather all relevant information about it: titles, page numbers, meta descriptions, keywords, images, videos, links, etc.
When a new domain is registered, search engines are the first to know. After an initial scan, the site is categorised and periodically reviewed to see if any changes, additions, etc. have been made. The more popular a website becomes and the more visits it gets, the more often the search engine updates its database.
When a new domain is registered, search engines are the first to know. After an initial scan, the site is categorised and periodically reviewed to see if any changes, additions, etc. have been made. The more popular a website becomes and the more visits it gets, the more often the search engine updates its database.
The main purpose of the crawling process is not to store information, but to provide results relevant to specific searches. Thus, placing and classifying in a database all the information gathered by crawlers will be used later to rank a site and generate relevant results for users.
When building a site from scratch, you need to keep in mind that search engine indexing is based on two key conditions: the content of the site must be relevant to users and of sufficient quality to build the authority of that site.
Thus, everything starts with content, and content is built around the most important players of optimization: keywords.
WHAT ARE KEYWORDS?
According to statistics, about 75% of Romanians use the internet, surfing online for more than 4 hours. That means a lot of time spent searching for different combinations of words and key phrases!
An SEO keyword is that word or combination of words that best describes the content of a web page. Here are some examples: “seo agency”, “car rental”, “event management”.
From the users’ point of view, the keyword best expresses the search intent, i.e. basically the terms entered in the Google search bar.
In order for the search engine to return your site as a relevant result when someone searches for your services or products, you need to consider what users might be looking for and make sure that these keywords are found on your site.
In order for the search engine to return your site as a relevant result when someone searches for your services or products, you need to consider what users might be looking for and make sure that these keywords are found on your site.
Since everything in marketing revolves around customers, understanding their search behaviour is decisive for the SEO promotion process. The better this behaviour is understood, the better the SEO will work.
Keyword research also allows a detailed analysis of the competition, which helps to better structure the site and set SEO campaign goals.
Consequently, on-page optimization is essentially about finding the most appropriate keywords around which to build your site content and making it clear to search engines that your page/site is about those keywords.
Include keywords in the title tag, headline, content, subheading or meta description, but try not to abuse them. You might think that if you have as many keywords as possible on the page, Google will prioritise you, but unfortunately things are different. Aggressive use of keywords is not a tactic that will benefit you.
When building your content, think about the quality of your page and choose keywords that will increase its value and, instead of repeating the same word over and over, try to use a diverse set of words that will help you get indexed for long tail words. Long tail words are generally much more specific searches and harder to identify, so the competition for them will not be as tight. For example, “agency specialising in SEO campaigns”.
Don’t forget that choosing the right keywords helps to understand search behaviour, streamline the portfolio of products or services offered, effectively proportion the marketing budget, analyse the competition and provide a better user experience.
BASICS OF ON-PAGE OPTIMIZATION
I said earlier that search engines create their database by crawling, i.e. by searching for information to be indexed. During indexing all the words on a page are processed, as well as their position. Images are also indexed by the ALT attribute. Therefore, when talking about on-page optimization, we have to consider all elements of a page, from URL and meta descriptions, to alt text images, loading speed and content.
Because every word or HTML element on your site can positively or negatively influence how it is indexed and returned as a search result, you need to pay close attention to its optimization.
Meta tags
Although they are among the most important SEO elements, Google claims that meta tags are not a ranking factor, but indirectly influence a site’s performance and can play an important role in click-through rates. The most popular meta tags are Title tag and Meta description
Title tag. The first element a search engine encounters when visiting a site is the title tag, so it would be inspired to make a good first impression. Include keywords relevant to you and limit yourself to 50-55 characters (including spaces). If you use a meta title that is too long, you risk not being displayed in full in the search results, so be clear and succinct!
Meta description. This meta tag provides a concise description of the content of a web page and, written properly, can persuade the user to visit the site it presents. A well-designed meta description will include keywords and a call-to-action. One important aspect to keep in mind when adding a meta description is that Google usually only displays the first 160 characters, so it would be inspired to stick to this limit.
The better designed the writing of these tags, the more users will be interested in clicking through. This leads to higher click-through and traffic rates and, in the long run, better positions in the SERP (Search Engine Results Page).
Build meta tags keeping in mind the keywords for which you want your site to appear in searches. Use synonyms and other words from the same lexical family, both in the page URL and in the title, content, descriptions and subtitles (H1, H2 etc).
Remember that the text should appeal to users, not search engines, so design text that sounds natural and gets people to visit you.
The content
Website content is a crucial component of on-page optimization because it is what search engine spiders use to associate the page with a set of keywords. Content must be valuable and, most importantly, relevant to your audience and their interests. Write short paragraphs with subheadings to make it easier for the reader to read.
Depending on the length of the content, there is a recommended number of occurrences of the keyword. The accepted standard for keyword density is between 3% and 5%. In order to be recognised by search engines it is advisable not to exceed this density. If the keyword, together with its synonyms, is used too often, the page will be considered as spam by search engines and will be removed from the search results.
Rather than writing a text for the mere purpose of repeating a keyword, better describe the product or service you offer in a natural way. Also, use hyperlinks that keep or take the reader out of the website. The important thing is that they still lead the user to an easy-to-navigate page with quality content.
Content is equally important for off-page optimization, the second major stage of search engine optimization strategy.
Location
If you offer services in a specific geographic region, use the location and include keywords related to it when building your content. This will help search engines know where you are based.
Iti poti aduga locatia folosind urmatoarele instrumente:
- Google My Business
- Bing Places for Business
- Yahoo Local
Other elements
Besides content and tags, a well-optimized on-page site must have a good loading speed, be mobile friendly, and the robots.txt and sitemap.xml files must be properly configured.
The robots.txt and sitemap.xml files are exclusively for search engines.
Robots.txt. As you can see in the ending, robots.txt is a text file that you can edit at will to tell search engines what to index on your site and what not. Once a robots.txt file is implemented on a website, it will stop search engines from indexing files, folders or links with sensitive data, such as the customer cart of an online shop. Also, robots.txt indicates the location of the sitemap.
Sitemap.xml. A sitemap creates a map of the site for crawlers and indicates all valid addresses on the site where articles, pages, products, etc. can be found. This file can be extremely useful to a search engine because it does not have to crawl the website from scratch each time. The search engine will know exactly which pages have been crawled, which pages have changed, which are the most important and which new pages have been published.
Attention! Any mistake made in the optimization process of these two files (robots.txt and sitemap.xml) can result in the exclusion of pages from Google or the inclusion of pages that should not be indexed.
In terms of mobile friendly functionality, Google has recently switched to mobile first indexing. This indexing refers to the fact that the site will be seen by Google bots exactly as it appears on users’ phones, not on computers or laptops. Because of this, websites that are not optimised for mobile will rank lower in search engine results.
TOOLS FOR ON-PAGE OPTIMIZATION
There are a huge number of tools that can be used to optimise an on-page website. For research and planning you can use:
And for analysing pages from a technical point of view, but also for tracking the position of keywords and getting recommendations for better positioning in results, you can use:
CONTACT
