Introduction to SEO
Ever wondered how certain websites always seem to appear at the top of Google search results? Or why?
If you have, you’re going to want to know about SEO.
Have you maybe even got a website yourself that you would like to show up at the top of search rankings?
If you do, you’re going to want to know about SEO.
But where do I find out about SEO? You may ask.
Fear not, you’re in the right place!
Whether you’re interested in why a website shows at the top of search rankings, or how you can boost your own website’s rankings, we’ve got you covered. This guide will walk you through the fundamentals of SEO, breaking down its importance, how search engines operate, and the steps you can take to start ranking higher.
Let’s dive in!
What Is SEO?
SEO stands for search engine optimization, and as the name suggests, it is the process of optimizing a website for search engines, so that it is more visible on search engine results pages (SERPs). The purpose of this is to increase the quality and quantity of organic website traffic, by ensuring that a website shows up when users search for search queries that are relevant to the content of the site.
Why Is SEO Important?
Why is SEO important, and why do you want to rank highly on search engines – you wonder.
Google search alone processes roughly 8.5 billion searches per day. Yes, 8.5 BILLION… PER DAY!
Accordingly, SEO’s importance within digital marketing cannot be understated. A successful SEO strategy that captures even a tiny percentage of this audience can significantly increase brand visibility and organic website traffic, ultimately achieving better leads, sales, and customer engagement.
It doesn’t stop there either. Websites that rank at the top are usually perceived to be more credible and trustworthy. SEO best practices such as creating high-quality content and earning backlinks further this credibility. Additional user experience best practices add to this, enhancing user satisfaction and engagement.
Moreover, increased website traffic and engagement mean SEO can provide in-depth insights into user behaviour. Website analytics tools can track which keywords and landing pages drive traffic and how users interact with different parts of a website. Analysis of this data can then signify where improvements can be made, facilitating the continuous optimization of a digital marketing strategy.
Furthermore, despite the myth that SEO is expensive, the organic element of SEO means that it is cost-effective in the long run. Unlike paid advertising, with SEO you do not pay for every new user who is directed to your site. Once a website is well-optimized and ranks highly, it can bring in consistent traffic over time, without paying for each additional user.
How Do I Rank Highly On Search Engines?
There are various strategies and practices to consider if you want to rank highly on search engines. These can be grouped into 3 main categories: on-page SEO, off-page SEO, and technical SEO.
This article will break down these different types of SEO and explain how they can improve search rankings. But first, you must understand how search engines work. So let’s start with that.
How Do Search Engines Work?
How exactly do search engines work, and how do they determine where on the search engine results page a website ranks?
By understanding this, we are better equipped to establish a successful SEO strategy, as knowing the factors that search engines consider means that we know which areas of a website we should focus on to improve search rankings.
So let’s get into it, starting with some definitions and basic explanations of the core functions — crawling, indexing, and ranking! Before discussing ranking algorithms and the E-E-A-T guidelines.
Crawling
Crawling can be thought of as the discovery stage. It refers to the process of search engines discovering and understanding a website’s content. Search engines use automated bots (known as “spiders” or “crawlers”) to scan content, and determine what a website is about. For example, a spider would crawl this particular webpage and discover that it is about SEO and how it works.
Without crawling, search engines would not be able to find or understand a website’s content. Therefore, indexing and ranking would be impossible, as there would be no content for the search engine to work from.
Indexing
Assuming that a search engine has successfully crawled a page, the next step is indexing.
Indexing refers to the organization of all of the content that has been found through crawling. Once the content of a website has been collected, this is then analyzed, categorized, and stored within the search engine’s database, or index.
The index is a huge library where all websites that a search engine has crawled are kept and catalogued. This ensures that a website’s content is organized and retrievable by the search engine, allowing it to produce super-fast and relevant responses to search queries.
Accordingly, a website that is correctly categorized and retrievable can show up in the search results for relevant queries, as search engines can instantly tell that it contains information that the searcher is looking for.
Ranking
But that’s not all, as many websites are relevant to the same search queries. This means these websites need to be analyzed further and placed into an order, as only one can show up first in the search rankings.
But what exactly determines where on the search engine results page a website shows up?
Ranking!
Ranking refers to the order of relevance for websites that show up when a user conducts a search query. After all, the primary function of a search engine is to provide the searcher with the most relevant and useful search results. Ranking also has the most significant influence on SEO, as the primary function of SEO is to rank as highly as possible.
Therefore, SEO best practices revolve around the factors that rankings are based on. Some you may already know about such as keyword relevance, but there are lots more in the form of complete and complex algorithms that evaluate and rank websites, where all factors are taken into account, and weighted.
The Role of Algorithms in Search Engine Rankings
The algorithms used by search engines are essentially an amalgamation of all SEO best practices. Although exact algorithms, much like KFC’s secret recipe, are not made to be public knowledge. Nevertheless, consensus ranks content quality and relevance, backlinks, search intent, and user experience as some of the most important factors. Site authority and trust are also paramount, and form part of Google’s E-E-A-T guidelines that we will discuss below.
However, it should be noted that search engines frequently update their algorithms to improve and adapt to a changing internet landscape. Google is known to ‘retire’ particular ranking systems (Panda and Penguin to name two), which are then incorporated into updated systems, or added to Google’s core ranking systems. New systems are also added such as BERT and MUM, which are AI systems that allow search engines to better understand language and search intent.
Accordingly, it is necessary to remain up to date with search engine rankings and systems when implementing an SEO strategy, as it is an environment that is constantly evolving.
But don’t let this scare you! You can stay in the loop with our comprehensive guide to SEO updates, which is constantly refreshed and relevant!
Google’s E-E-A-T Guidelines
As mentioned, two of the most essential factors search engines consider when ranking websites are site authority and trust. This is where Google’s E-E-A-T guidelines come into play. Their purpose is to deliver high-quality, relevant, and trustworthy information to users, by helping search engines determine the overall quality and credibility of a website.
E-E-A-T stands for Experience, Expertise, Authoritativeness, and Trustworthiness.
Experience refers to the level of first-hand or direct experience the content creator has with the subject matter. For example, a surgeon sharing insights about their area of expertise, like surgery techniques, is trusted more because they’ve personally performed those surgeries.
Similarly, Expertise assesses the knowledge and skills of the content creator. Content produced by someone with in-depth knowledge of a subject (again, like a surgeon discussing surgery) is more likely to rank higher, particularly when the topic requires specialized understanding.
Authoritativeness evaluates the reputation of the website or content creator within its industry. Websites that are recognized as reliable and leading sources of information, or have lots of backlinks from authoritative sources, are seen as more credible by search engines.
Trustworthiness is arguably the most important factor, as it comes from a blend of experience, authority, and expertise. It also considers whether the website is safe and reliable for users. This means that having a secure (HTTPS) site, displaying relevant credentials, and ensuring content is fact-checked and current contributes to trustworthiness.
It should be noted that E-E-A-T is not an algorithm in itself. Although, it does have a strong influence on the way Google’s algorithms evaluate and rank content. So, when creating SEO content, you should showcase expertise, experience, and trust, to gain a competitive edge in rankings.
How Search Engines Work: A Summary
To summarize, search engines operate on three core functions – crawling, indexing, and ranking. Understanding these functions and how they operate, as well as the critical role that search engine algorithms and E-E-A-T guidelines play, lays the foundation for a successful SEO strategy.
By utilizing this understanding and optimizing a website for these core functions – and thereby ensuring crawlability; creating relevant, high-quality, index-worthy content; and optimizing ranking factors – significant progress can be made in improving a website’s visibility and performance on search engines.
As such, this article will now explore specific strategies that leverage this understanding to rank highly on search engine results pages. Once again, this will be broken down into on-page, off-page, and technical SEO – and all that comes with it!
On-Page SEO
Let’s start with on-page SEO!
On-page SEO refers to everything you can do within a website to help it rank highly on search engine results pages. This includes creating high-quality content that provides value to users who are searching for relevant search queries. This can be done by giving answers to users’ questions or solutions to their problems; or by selling a product/service that they want; or even by keeping them entertained!
But first, you need to know what users are searching for, which is where another element of on-page SEO comes in – keyword research. Keyword research revolves around identifying keywords and search queries that people are searching for. These keywords form the foundations for SEO content on the website. They can then be naturally incorporated into the content to signal to search engines that a website is relevant and should rank highly.
It is important to note that on-page content that can be optimized is not just exclusive to what a user sees once they are on the web page either. Meta tags, which are HTML code snippets that provide information about the content of a website to search engines, can also be optimized. These come in the form of meta title tags, descriptions, and headers. Incorporating keywords into these elements further signals to search engines that a website is relevant and should rank highly.
Want to know how to perform keyword research? How to organically incorporate keywords into your content? As well as best practices for meta tags?
Find our step-by-step guide here!
Off-Page SEO
Now onto off-page SEO!
As you may have guessed, off-page SEO refers to actions and practices done outside a website, to help it rank highly on SERPs. Which sounds confusing right? How can anything be done outside of the content and make-up of a website to help it rank highly?
We will get into that!
But first, it helps to know that the purpose of off-page SEO is to build a website’s authority, trust, and popularity – as these things are taken into account when a search engine determines where on the results page a website should rank. (Remember Google’s E-E-A-T guidelines?)
Through off-page SEO, is done through means such as backlink building and social media marketing. Social media marketing you are probably familiar with. The Backlink building, however, will likely need more explaining.
Backlinks
Backlinks are links that take a user from one website to another, and they help with search rankings by acting as a vote of confidence to search engines. Accordingly, a significant part of SEO is building these links and ensuring they come from reputable websites.
This can be done through natural, or manual link-building. Natural backlinks are earned by organic means and are when a website links to another purely because the content on the linked site is valuable. Manual backlinking, on the other hand, refers to the SEO practice of encouraging and influencing other sites to link to yours.
Some of you may be wondering how you can encourage and influence other sites to link to yours. If this is you, then you should definitely check out our how-to-build backlinks guide!
Alternatively, some of you may also be wondering how exactly social media marketing contributes to SEO. But don’t worry, we have you covered on that too!
Technical SEO
Finally, there is technical SEO, which refers to optimizing the technical aspects of a website to ensure that it ranks highly on search engine results pages. This revolves around making a website faster and more user-friendly, as well as making it easier for search engines to understand the content of the website. It also includes showing search engines that a website can be trusted.
Site Speed and User Friendliness
Let’s start with user-friendliness and site speed optimization because everyone likes a fast website that is easy to use – and search engines know this! Fast loading times and user-friendliness are important parts of SEO, and there are many practices that make a website quicker, and more user-friendly.
When it comes to loading times, images can be optimized and unnecessary website code removed to speed things up. For user-friendliness, it is all about making a website easy to understand and navigate, while also ensuring that it is mobile-friendly. This is because most website traffic now comes from mobile.
Helping Search Engines Understand A Website
It is also important to make a website easy to understand for search engines and not just users. Search engines ‘crawl’ websites and their content to understand what a website is about, and what search queries it may be relevant for. Accordingly, it is paramount that the technical aspects of a website are optimized for crawlability.
This can be done by optimizing an XML sitemap to tell search engines which pages and files are most important to a site, and also using robots.txt files to direct search engines to crawl, or not to crawl, a particular part of a site. Schema markup can also be used, which helps search engines better understand a website by adding additional code to provide more information on its content.
Moreover, utilizing proper URL structures, canonicalization, internal linking, and breadcrumbs are additional best practices to consider when ensuring that search engines and users can easily understand and navigate a website. You can find out more about these practices here!
Trustworthiness and Authoritativeness In SEO (Again)
As we know from Google’s E-E-A-T guidelines, best technical SEO practices also ensure that search engines determine a site to be trustworthy and authoritative when they crawl it. In addition to practices that allow for easy understanding and crawlability, it is also strongly recommended that HTTPS is implemented. This encrypts and secures data transferred between a user’s browser and a website, further establishing trust and authority.
Technical SEO: Further Improvements
Once technical SEO has been implemented, the analysis of server log files can provide insight into how a site is being crawled, which can help highlight further areas of improvement for a website’s technical SEO. So, for the techy amongst us, there will always be something technical for you to do! There is also a rabbit hole of technical SEO practices that you can explore to feed your appetite!
Local SEO vs Global SEO
From exploring the core components of SEO you will now know that SEO can be broken down into on-page, off-page, and technical SEO. But what if I told you that that’s not the only way SEO can be segmented? What if we told you that there are two types of SEO?
You’d want to know more, right? I mean you’ve got this far…
Well, ask and you shall receive!
A distinction can be made between Local SEO and Global SEO!
Local SEO
For businesses that operate locally, Local SEO is key. It’s all about making sure that a website shows up in the search results when people from the area are searching for local products and services. This involves optimizing for local keywords, managing a Google Business Profile, and ensuring contact details are consistent everywhere online. Local SEO also focuses on generating reviews, being listed on relevant local directories, and getting backlinks from other local businesses.
For example, a bakery in London would want to make sure that they rank highly for searches like “best bakery in London” or “local cakes near me”. This is because they are competing against other businesses in the same area, and search engines prioritize showing nearby results.
Global SEO
Alternatively, Global SEO is about casting a wider net. This is for businesses that operate internationally or don’t rely on a specific location for their customer base, like an online store that ships globally. This might include creating content to rank for global search trends, optimizing for multiple languages or regions, and having a website that performs well for international visitors.
Local SEO vs Global SEO
Essentially, deciding between local vs. global SEO (or a combination) depends on your target audience’s location and how they are searching for what you offer. Accordingly, whether you are aiming for the top of the search results in your local area or across the globe, your strategies should be tailored to meet the specific demands of your audience.
SEO Strategy
As you will now know, an effective SEO strategy is the cornerstone of any successful online presence. Whether you’re running a local business, a personal blog, or a global online store, a successful SEO strategy ensures that your site ranks highly in search engine results. As a result, this can drive growth in leads, sales, and customer engagement.
In this section, we’ll break down the process step-by-step, ensuring you can take actionable steps to create a strategy that aligns with your business goals.
White Hat vs. Black Hat
When building your SEO strategy, you will encounter two distinct approaches: white-hat SEO and black-hat SEO. These refer to the different methods used to improve search engine rankings. Both of these are very different, so you must take note!
White Hat SEO involves ethical techniques that align with search engine guidelines. It focuses on creating high-quality content, optimizing site structure, building legitimate backlinks, and ensuring a positive user experience. The benefits of white hat SEO are long-lasting, and although it may take more time to see results, this approach reduces the risk of penalties and helps ensure sustainable growth.
Conversely, black hat SEO involves using manipulative tactics to achieve quick gains in rankings. Common strategies include keyword stuffing, cloaking, and purchasing low-quality backlinks. While these tactics may deliver short-term success, they come with significant risks. Search engines are constantly updating their algorithms to penalize websites that use these techniques, which could result in your site being de-indexed or losing rankings.
Ultimately, choosing between white hat and black hat SEO will impact the longevity of your site’s success. White hat SEO is widely recommended to build a sustainable, trustworthy online presence. Although black hat tactics might seem tempting for quick results, they are not a viable long-term strategy.
Of course, we therefore strongly suggest choosing white hat SEO.
Creating Your SEO Strategy from Scratch: Step-by-Step
Now that we have gone through the key components of SEO, and (hopefully) decided on a white hat approach, it’s time to bring everything together by creating an effective SEO strategy. This can be done by breaking things down step-by-step. Starting with defining what you want to achieve with SEO.
Step 1: Define your Objectives
Defining your objectives for SEO ensures that you have a specific goal to work towards, which provides the foundations for your strategy.
There are plenty of common SEO objectives. Most of which can be traced back to the purpose of a particular website. So if you are struggling to determine your SEO strategy, consider the following examples and see if any apply to you.
If you are an e-commerce store, the purpose of your website is likely to achieve online sales. Accordingly, your SEO objective will be to drive sales. Similarly, if the purpose of your site is to generate leads for your services, then your SEO objective will be to generate leads. Again, if the purpose of your website is to build brand awareness or provide information to the masses, your SEO objective will be to increase website traffic. You get the picture…
It is however possible that you want to achieve all of these objectives. But you should be careful. When creating an SEO strategy, your goals must be SMART. This means they are Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Time-bound.
A SMART objective would be to increase organic traffic by 25% within six months by targeting long-tail keywords in your niche. This is because you can work back from this objective, and create a very specific plan, with clear direction. On the other hand, the goal of bringing loads of organic traffic that generates leads and online sales does not provide this same direction.
In addition, it’s essential to consider whether your business goals are best achieved through local SEO, global SEO, or a combination of both. For example, if your objective is to increase foot traffic to a physical location, local SEO should be prioritized. On the other hand, if you’re aiming to reach an international audience, your objectives should align with a global SEO approach.
Step 2: Conduct Keyword Research
Now that you have outlined your SEO objective, what next? How will you achieve this objective?
A great place to start is with keyword research.
As mentioned previously, to create high-quality content, you need to know what users are searching for. To do this, you can use tools like Google Keyword Planner, SEMrush, Ahrefs, Moz, and Ubersuggest. These tools will not only show you the search volume of particular search terms, but they will also provide insight into how difficult they are to rank for.
You should then use this information to find a mix of high-volume, competitive keywords, and long-tail keywords that are easier to rank for but still relevant to your website. You should also ensure that your choice of keywords is tailored to your desired reach, whether local or global.
Step 3: Optimizing On-Page SEO
Once you have your keywords, then you can get to work on optimizing your on-page SEO!
This can be done by creating on-page content that uses your keywords. But remember, your content is not just about keywords! It should also be high-quality, informative, and provide value to your users.
Again, it should also be tailored to your audience. Local content should utilize the fact that users are nearby by encouraging foot traffic and fostering a local community spirit. Whereas global content should be optimized not just for multiple languages, but multiple cultures and worldviews.
Once your content is created, you can then strategically place your keywords in your title tags, as well as your meta descriptions and headers.
You can then further optimize your on-page SEO by optimizing any images or videos within your content. This can be done by using descriptive alt text and compressing file sizes for faster loading times, and better user experience.
Step 4: Build Some Backlinks
Now that you have some high-quality content, you are well-placed to build some backlinks.
Utilize the quality of your content to reach out to reputable websites in your industry, or other local businesses if you opt for local SEO. You can then acquire quality backlinks from these websites by showcasing that your content is not only high-quality but shareable. You can also partake in guest blogging on these sites, or reach out to influencers or partners for link exchanges.
If your content is that good, you may even begin to acquire backlinks naturally!
But remember, the quality of your backlinks is more important than the quantity.
Step 5: Don’t Forget About Technical SEO!
So you have created high-quality content, and people are starting to take note. You are acquiring backlinks, and now new users. That’s all you need to do right?
Wrong! Don’t forget about technical SEO!
There is no point directing users to your site if it is not technically sound. You should check your site’s technical SEO by looking at site speed, mobile-friendliness, and secure connections (HTTPS).
You also need to ensure that backlinks aren’t the only thing driving organic traffic. This means that you need to optimize your website’s crawlability and ensure that you are directing search engines to the most important parts of your site. If you remember, this can be done by optimizing your sitemap, as well as using robots.txt and schema markup.
You can then monitor your technical SEO by analyzing server log files, as mentioned previously. You can also use tools like Google Search Console and Screaming Frog to help you identify and fix technical issues that could be setting your SEO performance back.
Step 6: Monitor & Measure!
At this point, you have methodically planned your SEO strategy and put it into action. You have ensured that all components of SEO are covered. You have created high-quality content, you have plenty of high-quality backlinks, and your technical SEO is on point. You now rank highly for your chosen keywords, and the organic traffic is rolling in.
Mission complete. SEO is complete, and you can now move on to the next thing that will grow your business. Right?
Unfortunately not. Despite all your hard work and the success you have achieved up until this point, SEO is constantly evolving. This means that your strategy has to evolve too, which means going back to step one and defining your new objective.
But this time it’s easier, and your objective can be even SMART-er. This is because it will be based on the data that you collect on your SEO performance up until this point.
To determine your next objective, and next strategy, you should continuously monitor your SEO performance using tools like Google Analytics, SEMrush, and Ahrefs. Track metrics such as organic traffic, bounce rates, conversion rates, and keyword rankings. Regularly analyze this data to understand what’s working and what needs improvement. This ongoing process will then allow you to tweak your strategy and optimize your website for even better results.
And there you have it! Follow these steps and you will be well on your way to successful SEO performance.
In the meantime, for a more detailed breakdown of each tool mentioned above, you can check out our in-depth guide on the best SEO tools for 2024.
Conclusion and Next Steps
You made it till here?! Congratulations!
You now not only have a comprehensive understanding of SEO but also the tools necessary to create your strategy. Accordingly, you are well-equipped to begin implementing an SEO strategy and improving your website’s search engine rankings.
That being said, SEO is a long-term commitment that requires continuous effort and adaptation to the ever-changing digital landscape. If you find yourself overwhelmed or unsure of where to start, Elysiumm is here to help.
We offer comprehensive SEO services tailored to your specific needs and goals. Whether you need help with keyword research, technical SEO, or a full-scale SEO strategy, our team of experts is ready to assist!
Ready to take your SEO to the next level? Explore our SEO services here, and let’s work together to achieve your digital marketing goals today.
Thank you for reading, and we look forward to helping you succeed online!
FAQ
SEO, or Search Engine Optimization, is the practice of optimizing web pages to rank higher on search engines like Google, aiming to increase organic (unpaid) traffic to a website.
SEO typically takes 3-6 months to show noticeable results. It’s a long-term strategy requiring consistent updates and content improvements for sustained growth.
No, SEO is an ongoing process. Search engine algorithms, trends, and competitors constantly change, so regular optimization is essential for maintaining rankings.
Not necessarily. Quality matters more than quantity. Content should be relevant, engaging, and valuable to users to perform well in search rankings.
If you serve a specific location, absolutely! Local SEO helps your business appear in local search results, reaching customers near you more effectively.
No legitimate SEO strategy can promise #1 rankings, as search results depend on multiple factors, including competition and constantly changing algorithms.
