It can feel like there is a new blog post about SEO every other day. The truth is even if the techniques are helpful, you might get frustrated if you don’t master the basics first.
Think about it: trying to do guest posting when you don’t understand keyword research is just like putting the proverbial cart before the horse. It barely ends well. Plus, you put in all that time and effort for nothing.
So, to avoid a scenario like that, we are going way back to the beginning. You know, back to the building blocks of what makes for a good start to SEO.
Why Is SEO Important for Any Website These Days?
This is actually the first and the most important tip in our guide. Why? Because unless you understand the importance of search engine optimization, you will never be motivated enough to go on and reach great results.
Plus, even basic SEO strategies can make a huge impact, making it possible to:
- Triple your web traffic.
- Increase the odds of your website showing up on the first page of SERPs, which means higher click-through rates (and can result in more leads if your copy is good enough).
- Raise your brand awareness and reach more people.
- Improve your credibility.
- Gain a competitive edge and stay relevant in your industry.
The more skilled you are at SEO, the more perks you get. Plus, SEO has a compounding ROI. This means that even if you are getting good results now, you can expect them to become even better over time. This is probably the only marketing strategy that can claim this.
Now, imagine what happens when you use advanced SEO tactics. One way this plays out is when you use quality backlinks or at least collaborate with a US-based experienced link builder as part of your SEO tactics.
You get to push your page in front of new eyes while showing Google that other websites also trust you. The result is that you get a higher domain authority, which, in turn, helps improve your online presence.
8 SEO Tips for Beginners That Bring the Biggest Results
These are some of the best SEO tips for beginners that can help you achieve your optimization goals (or at least start moving in that direction):
#1 Understand How Keywords Work and Do Keyword Research
Keywords are phrases your target customers are googling to find products/services like yours. Knowing what these search queries are means that you can create content that is actually valuable for your clients.
If you optimize your copy well, eventually, your website will start popping up when people type those keywords.
How do you find these phrases? That’s where keyword research comes in. You can use an SEO tool (highly recommended) or do it manually. But here are our favorite methods:
- Make a list of all the words that capture your brand, offers, and products/services. So, for example, let’s say you own a cute dog clothing shop in Oregon. That means your primary keyword could be “dog clothing” or something like that.
- Then, type those words into Google’s search box and see what else pops up next to it. This gives you your long-tail keywords.
Source: Google search
- You can look up those phrases using SEO tools like Semrush or Ahrefs. This is how you find out important metrics like search intent, search volume, keyword difficulty, and so on. You also get other variations of your main keywords.
- You should also pay attention to who is ranking for those keywords and what type of content they have.
Source: Google
- Besides, take note of the People Also Ask section.
- And the People Also Search For section.
Source: Google
The general idea is to know what people are looking for and what kind of answers they need. Then, you will create blog posts using those keywords. You can also use those search queries in your landing pages, URLs, alt tags, etc., to improve your site performance.
#2 Learn the Best Practices of SEO Content Creation
Even a complete beginner to SEO knows you need to create original content. But that’s not all. Your writing also has to be properly structured. That means using appropriate headings — H1, H2, H3, etc.
Of course, you’ll also have to put keywords in the headers and sprinkle them strategically in the body of the article. Just be sure not to overdo it. Too many keywords attract penalties for keyword stuffing.
You’ll need to include quality, relevant pictures that will help your readers get the message you are trying to pass. That will mean adding alt texts (image descriptions), and yes, you can add a keyword here as well (if it fits).
#3 Optimize Your Home Pages and Landing Pages (If Any)
Before you go on and write tons of blogs because someone told you that it works for SEO, make sure your main website pages are SEO-friendly.
Your landing page is the first place visitors “land” when they click on any of your links. Sometimes, that’s the homepage. Either way, it’s got to be the best representation of you, both visually and content-wise.
Apart from keyword optimization, you have to make sure that your landing pages and/or homepage are actually informative. Yes, you want to do your SEO, but your target is real people, not search engine algorithms. This brings us to the next point.
#4 Create People-First Content (Blogging)
One of the best tips for search engine optimization is to make sure your content is useful. Yes, you can rank pretty high when you do SEO, but what’s the point if all those clicks don’t convert?
Even Google has this policy called “people-first content.” They always say that they prioritize unique, helpful pieces over random, optimized stuff.
Ideally, you want your blog posts to contain verifiable data and maybe some anecdote or two to make your writing more relatable. If you have relevant personal experiences, that will make your message clearer, even better.
So, first, focus on your message, and only then add keywords, alt tags, and all the other optimization.
Source: X
If you are targeting other countries (i.e., doing international SEO), SERPwatch advises that you create content targeted to each specific area. Of course, that would need more resources, like bilingual writers or editors, etc. But it’s worth it if the content is high-quality.
#5 Use Internal Linking
Internal links help search engine crawlers get to find the pages of your website and rank them better. It’s also how people can discover other content that is relevant to the current page they’re looking at.
By adding them, you’ll make it easy for crawlers to understand the structure of your site and help send traffic to other pages. Pretty cool, huh? While there is no rule, it’s best to aim for at least two internal links per page.
Source: X
You just have to make sure you’re not just randomly linking pages. Instead, it’s more effective when the links lead to related articles, and you use anchor texts that make sense.
This will look more natural and encourage people to see what else you have to offer.
#6 Start Working on Your Link Building
Backlinks are links from other websites that lead to one of your web pages. This is a huge deal if those links come from high-authority sites that are relevant and get lots of traffic.
Most pages that top SERPs actually have 3x more backlinks than all the rest. So, clearly, search engines pay attention to this. It’s not always easy to get some, though. That’s why there is a huge industry around link building.
But you can attract some links by creating really cool content like infographics, surveys, case studies, etc. If you add some powerful SEO link-building tools to it, the whole process will get much easier.
You can also write to other site owners and offer to publish a post on their site (for free or for a small fee). This is called guest posting and is one of the most effective ways to build links.
Source: X
But since it can be so time-consuming, many marketers simply hire link builders to take care of all that stuff for them. You can have them in-house or simply find a freelancer or an agency.
If you go for an agency, you can “outsmart” the system and hire the one that offers white-label services. Likely, their services will be cheaper as they don’t simply insert backlinks in the text but are responsible for the whole link-building process.
#7 Check Core Web Vitals and Optimize What You Can
Now, it might sound like we’re speaking a foreign language. But don’t panic! As this guide is beginner-friendly, we won’t get into what Core Web Vitals are. Honestly, you don’t even need to know the definition to use them to your advantage.
The only thing you have to know is that these are the metrics that help Google understand how fast and well your website loads. And loading speed is one of the major factors search engines use to rank your page. So yes, it is quite important to keep an eye on this.
Source: SEOmator
One of the easiest ways to check how your page performs is by using PageSpeed Insights (it’s a free tool Google offers). There, you can find how your website is doing on both desktop and mobile. Besides, you’ll see a list of issues you can solve to improve the loading speed.
Most of those issues will be extremely technical. Unless you’re a dev, it’ll be hard (read as impossible) to solve them. Still, there might be some “easy wins.” For example, if you see that your visuals are too big, you can simply compress and replace them.
#8 Make Sure You Leverage Google Analytics and Google Search Console
When people are just starting with search engine optimization, many forget about monitoring their SEO performance. But it is one of the worst things you can do.
You see — SEO is all about trying different tactics and checking how your website responds to them (i.e., how your rankings are growing, whether your traffic is increasing, etc.). And when you ignore all the analytics, you’re basically acting blindly. Doesn’t sound like a good plan, right?
There are a couple of options you can use to find all this data. You can monitor your progress with any paid tool, whether it’s Ahrefs, Semrush, or any similar alternative. Still, there are also amazing free solutions that even SEO pros use — Google Search Console and Google Analytics.
To work with them, you’ll need to confirm your website ownership. But rather than that, the signup process is super easy. These tools are very helpful when you want to see traffic, keywords, backlinks, and tons of other useful details.
Conclusion
When you first get started with SEO, it might look like a lot of work, and you probably won’t see any results in the beginning. But you have to stick with it. SEO doesn’t produce the best results overnight, but consistency is what makes all the difference.
One more thing — don’t try to do everything at once. This is one big reason why some people throw in the towel before they see any tangible results. Start with what feels natural, and then work your way to the more advanced tactics.