SEO Basics: Your Guide to Ranking #1 on Google

For instance, well-structured internal links on your pages make it easier for web crawlers to hop from one page to another. It allows them to explore your website in-depth and index more of your content. SEO also serves as a reliable and budget-friendly marketing strategy to help you drive traffic to a website and grow conversion rates. New LinkedIn study finds posts with links boost engagement by 13%, contradicting common advice. Google now allows top-performing ads to appear at the bottom of search results, offering more visibility while reinforcing the importance of ad quality. After 12 years SEO Anomaly and 500+ audits, here are 11 SEO lessons that can save you time, money, and frustration on your journey to better rankings.

Local content strategy

For example, the search engine results page (SERP) for “how to make a latte at home” shows how-to videos and step-by-step guides. Understanding what people want to see when they search for a query means discovering the reason behind a user’s query (this is called search intent). When choosing keywords for your site (or a specific page), focus on relevance first. Once you rank well, you can get consistent organic traffic without paying for visitors. Set up Google Analytics 4 (or an alternative analytics tool) to track SEO metrics like organic traffic and conversions.

Video SEO

You already have connections with other businesses, so turn those relationships into links. Break up content with bullets, numbered lists, and short paragraphs. Another way to quickly identify a keyword’s intent is to use Semrush’s Keyword Overview tool. Making content with a similar format can increase your chances of ranking well. Compare that to social media, where your posts lose traction over time.

• What you may not realize is that bloggers in your niche create these lists for you in the form of “best of” blog posts.
• These tactics have the potential to improve your rankings in search engines.
• SEM stands for Search Engine Marketing, which is just another way of saying search marketing.
• You can boost your marketing return on investment (ROI) by outsourcing ongoing SEO to professionals, like WebFX, to implement and maintain a profitable SEO strategy.
• When analyzing any change in your performance (e.g. sudden drop in clicks), always try to find the root of the problem by checking various dimensions to find what exactly caused the changes.

You can start building your reputation with Semrush’s Link Building Tool. When another site links to your URL, it indicates that your page or site is useful and trustworthy. After you’ve fixed the issues, rerun the audit to check that everything is working properly.

This can further improve your business’ visibility and attract more customers. This means that improving your website’s visibility on search engines can put your business in front of more customers. Unlike paid ads, which let businesses buy top positions, SEO focuses on earning those rankings by creating helpful content and providing a great user experience. SEO works because search engines reward helpful content and great user experiences. When determining how high to rank a particular page on your site, Google doesn’t just look at that one page.