Research

The cornerstone of every successful SEO campaign is research. Keyword research, market research, and competitor research are all a must. Without proper research your SEO campaign could be targeting unrelated keywords or targeting the wrong market entirely. Before hiring an SEO company make sure that research is something they value. Ask them if they are willing to share with you the results of keyword research.

Better User Experience

Part of the SEO battle is getting your site to appear in search engines for well researched keywords. The rest of the battle is delivering informational content, turning potential customers into paying customers, and turning one time readers into returning readers. Sometimes lost in the shuffle to get more traffic to your website is the ability to keep people interested once they reach your site. Before hiring an SEO company you need to make sure they are considering what happens once someone clicks on the site. Targeting unrelated keywords, keyword stuffing, and not adhering to great usability and design standards may gain more traffic but not quality traffic. Make your SEO company agree to using no spamming tactics that will almost certainly not work out in the long run.

Break Down the Quote

When your potential SEO company gives you a quote or proposal, look for a break down of services to be performed. If they do not provide a break down, do not be afraid to ask for one.

Here are some MUST HAVES:

• Site Audit for Technical Issues – There are many issues that can prevent search engines from effectively indexing a website. Among them are duplicate pages, broken links, and bad URLs.
• Keyword Research – The keyword research to find the keywords your site should target is vital to the success of any SEO campaign. So vital in fact, that if this step is skipped no SEO campaign will reach its maximum return on investment.
• Content Optimization – Using the knowledge gained from keyword research the next step is to optimize your website’s content.

If you have the budget, I would additionally recommend link building, local search optimization, & social media optimization.

So let’s keep it simple. Here are just a few items to consider with your website content.  Read your content, does it accomplish the items on this simple content checklist?

• Content is what answers questions
• Content is what builds trust
• Content is what educates
• Content is what makes you an expert
• Content is what ranks in Google
• Content is what attracts a link
• Content is what sparks conversation
• Content is what provides clarity
• Content is what makes you different
• Content is what motivates the next click
• Content is what converts a visitor, to a client

Solid content, when combined with a good web design is a dynamic duo. Your content is darn important. In most projects, it’s more important than the design. Don’t forget that.

While creating content that hits upon all of these elements can be a challenge, writing with them in mind is a great start that will put you ahead. While others are writing to “sound cool”, you’ll be creating real value that actually interacts with your website visitors.

For those of you new to the term Usability, it covers how easy user interfaces are to use. The word “usability” also refers to methods for improving ease-of-use during the design process. So in short: making it easy to use your website.

First up we’ll take a look at an easy adjustment for any website to make, making your web content easier to read.

Rid your website of long blocks of content and use sub-headings and one or two sentence paragraphs.  This simple rule easily makes your content easier to digest and a more scanable read.

Here is the wrong way to display content:

Here is the right way to make content easy to read:

So take a look at your website’s content and keep these usability tips in mind.  It’s simple to make these adjustments and improve your site quickly:

• Avoid large blocks of content (blocks=boring)
• Use 1 to 2 sentence paragraphs when possible
• Use sub-headers (size or color variance used correctly)
• Use bullet points or other call-outs

Give your page the scan test.  Can you look at it for 10 seconds and grasp what it’s about?  If not, apply the tips above and see your improvement take shape.

In making your content easier to digest for your user, you will likely make it easier for search engines as well to understand what your page is about … but the SEO benefits of usability, that’s a whole other blog post.