If your Search Engine rankings are suffering, SEO can often be a big help and if you do it yourself, it can often mean quality SEO for free. Search Engine traffic is one of the best ways to get more business out of your website and SEO is one of the best ways to get more traffic coming in from Search Engines!
SEO can also be expensive and if you’re small, or just starting out and you have a bit of spare time available there’s a lot of SEO you can do yourself, with little to no technical knowledge.
Note: This article assumes that you’re using a Web123 website, or a website with an easy-to-use CMS (Content Management System). If your website isn’t one you can update yourself, or it’s very difficult to do so why not consider a Web123 website?
Before you start
Make some notes about your current position in Google for the search terms and phrases that you’re interested in. You’ll want to have something to refer back to later, to see how you’ve improved!
Research your Keywords
The first thing to do, before you start editing your content, is to research your keywords. Which keywords will get you the most traffic, and which keywords will get you the most sales?
Once you know which keywords will be the most valuable you can use them in your content and your meta information.
Read more about How to Research your Keywords
Where are you now?
Now that you know your Keywords you might want to revise the list of search terms you’re interested in. Record your placement on any new search phrases or terms you’ve thought of in the meantime!
Use your Keywords in your Website copy
Once you know what your keywords are, you’ll want to make sure you’re using them!
Concentrate on your homepage and the pages dedicated to your most important products and services.
- Use each keyword once or twice (no more than 3 times)
- Don’t repeat your keywords over and over
- 1-2 short paragraphs
- At least one keyword or phrase per sentence
Read more about Using your Keywords in your Website Copy.
More about Website Content
Update your Meta Information
Your Meta Information is where you can describe your website outside of the content itself. Meta Title and Meta Description are often used to display your website in the Google Results so they’re great not only for getting you up there, but for enticing people to click through!
Read more about Meta Information
Build your Links
There’s only so much you can do on your own website, once you’ve polished your website up it’s time to build your “backlinks”.
The number and quality of links that point to your website has a big influence on your placement in Google’s listings.
In Link Building vs Link Exchange you’ll learn about what sorts of links can help or hurt you.
Assess your results
Once you’ve made your changes you’ll want to know how it’s affecting your ranking in Google… but remember that it can take up to 2 weeks for Google to have another look at your website (it’s not usually that long, though!). Google won’t know about your changes right away, so be a little patient and give it a week or so.
Once Google has re-spidered your website go and compare your ranking on the search terms you made a note of in the first step.
Hopefully you’ve moved up a notch or two! Now keep experimenting, keep tweaking, keep refining.
Congratulations! You’ve just saved yourself a boatload of money on SEO.
Have any more questions? Still don’t know how to proceed? Let me know in the comments!
If you’re not the DIY type, check out Web123’s cost effective SEO packages.