January is for new beginnings, setting goals and reworking that to-do list.
What in social media marketing can benefit more from a fresh start than SEO? Important and enigmatic, search engine optimization is a moving target that needs to be part of your strategy even if you’re part of a small department or team of one. Doing so will not only help you get found but can also improve your content.
Lauren Simonis-Hunter, Digital Marketing Manager with Advarra, to the rescue! Her tips and tools at the January #SMBMad virtual event — Tips for Adding SEO to your Marketing Strategy — will help improve your SEO without increasing your workload or busting your budget.
If you didn’t make it to the Facebook Live event, you can view it archived at our Facebook page. In the meantime, here’s a recap of Lauren’s top tips.
First things first: Become familiar with your marketing strategy to focus and prioritize your SEO goals. Also, set up Google Search Console. This is a free tool that will give you insights into your site searches.
Set attainable goals
Go for the low-hanging search fruit and pick up some easy SEO wins by doing your keyword homework. Lauren recommends semrush, MOZ, Spyfu, ahrefs as top keyword research tools. Each has a free version to play with that will let you know if you’re on the right track with your keywords with information on search volume and difficulty and help you consider user search intent.
In your research, consider search intent from the user point of view . Ask yourself what a searcher is trying to accomplish. Are they searching for information, trying to find a site, looking to purchase or researching a purchase?
She advised you to not fall into the keyword trap and avoid picking words based on high traffic ratings. Also, refine keywords to fit location-based searches.
Focus on quality content
Content drives the search, not keywords. Your content will rank higher if you write it for your human audience and talks to customers rather than Google.
Fully explain your product, service and topic. The acronym EAT will help you with this goal while keeping search in mind. Produce content that has expertise (E), authoritative (A) and trustworthy (T). Keywords should be in your title and content. But, if you produce content for people and your keywords don’t show up, choose another keyword.
What’s the ideal length of content for search ranking? Says Lauren, “It is my opinion that you should really just focus on the content itself. Focus on fully explaining the topic or service and do not focus on the word count.”
Be sure to make sure content is mobile friendly, which is important in search.
Get backlinks
Links to your site will increase your search ranking. But be certain that they are valuable links from reputable sites that are relevant to your industry. Think beyond news outlets and reach out to blogs, influencers and thought leaders — look for authority in your space.
How do you get a link? Build it into your PR outreach strategy. Write a guest blog post or join the HARO site, which connects journalists to experts. Buying links does not help your search rankings, nor do comments or forums any longer.
To dive deeper into SEO, check out the following resources:
Moz
Search Engine Journal
Yoast SEO
Help a Reporter Out (HARO)
SEMrush
Google Search Console
Spotibo SEO analyzer
Get more tips by viewing Lauren’s presentation. Wishing you all the best in improving your search results!
Nonprofit Spotlight: Wisconsin Technology Council
The Tech Council was created in 2001 as the nonpartisan science and technology advisor to the Governor and state Legislature. Its Innovation Network offers information and networking opportunities through conferences, luncheons and special events to foster economic development. Learn more and connect on their website, or find them on Twitter (@WisTechCouncil), Facebook (@WisTechCouncil), LinkedIn (Wisconsin Technology Council) and Instagram (@witechcouncil).
