You hear a lot about search engine optimisation or SEO, but often what that means is a mixed bag.
Many people don’t understand what SEO is, or that there are many kinds of SEO and that you don’t have to be an expert to improve your SEO. There is both on-page and off-page SEO. Let’s take a look at both types.
The thing to remember is that SEO tactics change continuously based on the algorithms the search engines choose to use to help their audience find what they’re looking for. The big key to remember is that the search engines are trying to deliver excellent results for their target audience. Your job is to help them.
Off-page SEO
Off-page SEO consists of anything you do to improve search engine traffic and results such as inbound links, trust building, social media, blog promotion, videos, press releases, commenting and more. You can use all of these tactics to help build up your website’s traffic and thus your conversions.
Comment on Blogs and Forums – Even if you’re not allowed a link back to your website, your comments on blogs and forums don’t go unnoticed – especially today when most use identification procedures via Gravatar or Google to find you through your profile.
Social Media Posts and Promotions – When you write a blog post or publish anything on your blog use social media to promote it. Not only will you get more traffic to your posts, you’ll get more links to your website via your general social media promotions.
Conduct Interviews – Give interviews on radio shows, on podcasts, and blogs. The more authority you can build by being interviewed, the more links you’ll get back to your website and products and the more people will get to know you.
Finally, when it comes to off-page SEO, don’t underestimate the power and effectiveness of the good old-fashioned press release to get the word out about your business to the media. Press releases are still excellent ways to publish information about your products and services, especially if you can tie it to a popular human interest story and news of the day.
On-page SEO
On-page SEO consists of anything you do on your website to ensure that you get more traffic to your website via the search engines without paying anything for the traffic. Creating perfectly optimised pages is as simple as adding a little extra effort.
Publish Targeted Content – If your content is high quality, unique, and relevant to your audience, this will help them find you. They’ll look for words that are inside that content and be sent to your pages.
Headings on Pages – Using keyword-rich phrases for the headings on your website, including your blog posts, will help search engines find you too. Plus the words will be something your audience will focus on as they scan your page.
Check Grammar and Spelling – You want people who visit your website to come away believing you have authority on the topic that’s in your niche. Therefore, it’s important to double check your grammar and spelling.
Code Your Site Right – Within images, headings, descriptions and more, there are ways to use metatags to give the search engine clues about the topic on your blog or website. Use them properly to describe images and the subject matter, so your audience will find you.
Using both on- and off-page SEO is an effective way to ensure that you set up each page on your site properly. If you use self-hosted WordPress, you can use various plugins like SEO Yoast to help guide you for on-page SEO.
BREAKING NEWS
Facebook Announces Upcoming Improvements to Ads Manager and Business Manager: Facebook is beginning to roll out major changes its core business tools, Ads Manager and Business Manager, and will continue to add more updates throughout the rest of the year. The new Ads Manager interface will have simplified navigation features, a cleaner design, and a new campaign management experience.
Facebook Announces that it Will End P2P Payments in UK and France: Facebook has announced an end to its P2P payments offering in the UK and France, as its cryptocurrency project continues to evolve.
Facebook Rolls Out New Cost Cap Bidding for Ads: Facebook also introduced a new Cost Cap bidding strategy for advertisers. A third bidding option along with Bid Cap and Target Cost strategies, Cost Cap focuses on conversion volume and cost predictability, which maximizes both cost efficiency and results.
Facebook Implements New Rules and Processes to Prevent Spread of Problematic Content: Facebook shared an update on how it’s working to clean up the news feed, looking to promote more trustworthy news sources, and halting the spread of “problematic” content across the platform. It’s also rolling out improvements to Messenger and Instagram to limit harmful and questionable content from being amplified in these networks as well.
Facebook Institutes Brand Safety Controls and Adds Inventory Filter: Facebook introduced more brand safety controls for advertisers, including a new inventory filter that makes it easier for advertisers to control their brand profiles across different forms of media. This filter applies to ads delivered within Instant Articles, Audience Network, and Facebook in-stream video.
Facebook’s Testing New Font Style Options for Posts: Facebook is testing out a new text styles option for News Feed posts, with a selection of fonts to choose from.
Instagram Tests Hiding Like Counts to Reduce Focus on Vanity Metrics: Instagram is experimenting with a new option that would hide total like counts on posts from all but the post creator.
Instagram’s Testing a New Communal Video Viewing Option: Instagram looks to be testing out a new option which would enable users to view video content while also seeing each other’s reactions on screen.
LinkedIn Outlines Improvements to Recruitment Recommendations and Job Tools: LinkedIn, which now hosts 20 million job ads, has outlined its ongoing improvements to its recommendation and connection tools. Through technical improvements (very technical in some respects), LinkedIn’s system now sees a much higher rate of InMails sent to the right candidates.
LinkedIn Adds New ‘Teammates’ Option to Maintain Connection with Colleagues: LinkedIn has added a new tool which will enable users to prioritise updates from colleagues in their feeds.
LinkedIn’s Rolling Out Photo-Tagging, New Photo Stickers: LinkedIn has been gradually rolling out some new image tools and options, adding to your creative capacity, and providing another way to generate more on-platform engagement.
LinkedIn Begins Rolling Out its Own Version of Reactions for Posts: LinkedIn is now rolling out its own variation of Reactions for posts, providing more ways for users to quickly respond to updates.
Pinterest is Now Up to 265 Million Users, Added 51 Million Within the Last Year: Pinterest has released updated usage figures ahead of its IPO, showing solid, steady growth.
Pinterest Adds Conversion Optimization, New Video Ad Options: Pinterest has added some new ad options, including Conversion optimization and Promoted Video for Conversions.
Snapchat
Snapchat’s New Creator Profiles are Now Appearing in the App: After previewing their Creator Profiles at the recent Snap Partner Summit, some users have now reported seeing them in the app.
Twitter Will Test Option to Hide Replies, Outlines Improvements in Platform Safety: Twitter has announced that it will allow users to hide tweet replies as part of its ongoing efforts to improve on platform discourse.