What is SEO? You’ve presumably heard of it, but do you know what’s hiding behind these three letters? Well, all the mysteries of the known universe are intertwined there. We are kidding, of course, but there is maybe a hidden secret to your success.
To put it simply, when you need something, where do you go first? Whether you need to find a place, a piece of information, or something to buy – Google is always your first stop.
You hit the search button, and you are amazed that you get precisely what you need in just a few seconds. Moreover, that’s the moment when you realize the true mastery of SEO. Although it seems spontaneous, someone worked hard to get that first spot.
But how? Let’s dive into that!
Some interesting facts about SEO
SEO is sorcery. Alchemy. A craft. For most people. Something everyone is mentioning, but no one gets what the purpose behind it is. It is often a very misunderstood part of your digital marketing, yet one of the most important pillars of your online presence. SEO stands for Search Engine Optimization. People maybe mix this term with SEM, which stands for Search Engine Marketing.
To help differentiate these two terms, here we explain:
– SEO is about organic results, while SEM is about paid marketing.
Let’s check some quick and most interesting SEO facts:
- Google algorithm uses 200 different factors to rank websites.
- There are two most important signals that Google uses for ranking: High-quality content and getting backlinks.
- More backlinks mean more traffic but not all the links are created equally. Quality over quantity is the key in SEO.
- Only 0,78% of searches will visit the second page. If you occur on the second page, you apparently fall into oblivion.
- Reusing old blog posts and content can increase your traffic by 106%.
- Most marketers prefer SEO over PPC because paid traffic stops the moment you lose all the keywords.
- The world of SEO is vast and pretty dynamic. Unfortunately, there is no universal recipe for everyone, and the key lies in patience and consistency.
Crucial steps for SEO are understanding your audience, understanding the search intent, keeping your website healthy, and doing rounds of regular checkups. Point for links that are relevant to your niche.
Black hat SEO and white hat SEO
When we talk about SEO sorcery, you might visualize two wizards – one with a black hat and white. Black SEO wizard uses some dark SEO techniques to get some quick results. Unfortunately, although the results show up very quickly, you might get at the risk of penalization.
These techniques include gathering links from Private Blog Networks, keyword stuffing, invisible text, and duplicated content. So if you are tempted to get some easy results to show your customers or gain traction – think again.
With white hat techniques, such as keeping your website fast, responsive, and your content relevant – you are on the right track.
Proper SEO hygiene of your website
It is always great to set the right foundations before you decide to create a long-term SEO strategy. First, of course, that means your website needs to be healthy. So what does a beneficial webpage need to have? Well, you need to locate the broken links first, duplicate content issues, and thin and outdated content.
When crafting your strategy, you need to think about evergreen content that will always remain relevant. So remove everything that is highly outdated from your website. You can also update the old content with new info and repurpose it – Google will appreciate the effort.
Optimizing all the essential elements on your website for Google search
Make sure that you know which keywords are essential for your business and position them strategically. Optimize H1, H2, and H3 tags with keywords and optimize images for search.
Except for keyword positioning, you need to write an optimized and compelling meta description and title description.
Rich snippets are also a great way to make your business stand out. Today, you can customize your snippets very quickly, and these eye-catching results will generate more clicks.
Your website is like your own online business card, therefore it needs to be perfect. The first “rendezvous” your potential customers will have with your business is acctually visiting your website.
Backlinks as your bridge to a better website authority
Backlinks are the backbone of your website. More links mean that you will establish a more substantial authority for both your domain and your pages. If you offer relevant and informative content – it would attract the links naturally. Yet the sad fact is that 55% of the websites on the internet don’t have backlinks at all.
Link building is not the easiest sport, and people that don’t have enough knowledge on how SEO works could quickly end up as victims of various link schemes.
Unfortunately, various link-building frauds are more common than Nigerian royalty on the internet. Just remember the principle – quantity over quality. Yes, you can purchase 5000 links, but you will soon hurry to remove or disclaim them all.
Core web vitals and SEO
Google updates its algorithm regularly, but since June of 2021, we see more tectonic changes in the rankings. That is why Google set the core web vitals as a ranking factor.
What are the core web vitals?
Core web vitals are sets of ranking factors that are helping Google to determine the page experience.
Core web vitals are about loading speed, interactivity, or your page and page stability as well. With these changes, things will become even more dynamic.
SEO will be dictated by user experience. So to remain at the top, you need to focus on this aspect as well.
How long does SEO take to see results?
SEO takes time. It depends on the various factors, but consistent efforts are the main ingredient. Things don’t happen overnight in the SEO world. It takes 3 to 6 months to see the results and to see what works or not.
Why do things go at such a slow pace? It is because your competitors are also working on that. It would be great for the entire world to pause so you can take your place among the top results, but you know it doesn’t work that way.
Yet, keeping an eye on your competitors is a great idea. They also know a thing or two about SEO. It is up to you to listen and follow the impulse.
Is SEO still worth it?
Just like the evergreen content that will always attract the links and traffic, SEO is also evergreen. As long as there is a search engine – SEO will live. Of course, the competition will grow, the ranking factors will become even harsher, but it will keep things interesting. To find out if SEO is still worth it, SEOlium is our Google rank tracker of choice.
How to recognize a good SEO?
As long as you are at the balans with your link-building and content strategy efforts – you are on the right track. However, if you see the fluctuations in your traffic – don’t grab your SEO expert by the neck. It is entirely normal.
Why is SEO important?
SEO is crucial for your online presence. You might have a fantastic product everyone will adore, but people will go for the first result they notice on a Google page.
If everything from above seems overwhelming, we can help you set the stage for your further SEO growth. Of course, Google will keep constantly changing the game rules, but we enjoy playing it!