Understanding On-Page Search Engine Optimization

by Gaby | Sep 17, 2020 | Course, SEO Basics

Your website needs to be well-equipped to respond to searchers’ questions. These questions come in varied ways and include different words to express a similar query. You have to crack the art of optimizing your page through On-Page Search Engine Optimization.

Let’s say you have super-engaging content as well as multiple keywords in your mind. Your content won’t mean anything unless you use On-Page Optimization to rank higher in search results.

Simply put, Google needs to understand what you’re saying to place you in their top searches. Can’t wait to learn more? Without much ado, let’s dive right into the technical aspects of On-Page SEO!

What is On-Page Search Engine Optimization?

The On-Page SEO process aims at getting your page to rank higher in search results. This eventually increases traffic to your webpage. This process initially involves the strategic placement of the right keywords.

On-Page SEO also comprises modification of internal links, title tags, URS, as well as your content. However, Google has become much smarter than before. It skims through webpages to find keywords as well as looks at several other aspects.

Finally, Google also checks the bounce rate, search intent, user-experience, search intent, as well as the click-through-rate to decide your page’s rank.

Target the Right Keywords

It is important to understand keyword-use for On-Page Search Engine Optimization. Keywords are mere single or multiple-word phrases that hold power to make your website a high-ranked one.

Keywords need to be curated smartly to grab a visitor’s attention when they search for something particular on Google. Google’s job is to scan your websites to see where the keywords are located. It also notices the frequency of keywords.

Search engines don’t show your rank. Instead, it simply indexes your website as well as lists the pages. Let’s look at the different kinds of keywords and their usage.

Primary Keyword

Primary keyword usage is the first step to ranking high on a search result page. Once you get your primary keywords right, you need secondary as well as supporting keywords to back your page.

Here are some tips for identifying and using the right primary keyword for your website.

Research your keywords

• Create an Excel Sheet to track keywords.

• Put your brain to use. Keywords often come from brainstorming hard. The trick is to analyze each word that comes to your mind as well as ranking them in order of relevance.

• Look up your competitors’ webpages. Check their URLs or Title Tags and incorporate a similar pattern for your page. You can use Google Keyword Planner to do in-depth primary keyword research.

• Another option is to look up your search console data. You can study the keywords that are boosting your page’s traffic and the ones that require alteration. This is a very important step to get your primary keywords right.

Choose the right keyword from your research

• Search for your webpage on Google and analyze its current ranking.

• Go through your competitors’ webpages to select the keywords that will help your page the best. Do not blindly copy keywords.

• Study the basic services that your website offers and the purpose for which you’ve created it. Analyze the category you come under and find the exact fitment of your page. This will help you target the right primary keywords to make your page rank higher.

Secondary Keyword

Primary words are not the only source of traffic for your webpage. Your page is ranked through other keywords called secondary keywords. If the primary keywords are not strong enough, the secondary keywords will help strengthen your page.

(Source : Google Images)

Secondary keywords are part of a group of keywords that optimize the content on your page. These groups are also called ‘clusters.’ The best way to look for secondary keywords is to look up related searches on Google. Google Trends can also be an effective tool to determine secondary keywords.

Supporting Keyword

It is crucial to determine the exact difference between primary and secondary keywords and how they assist you in ranking your pages higher on a search result. Supporting keywords also help boost your presence on Google. The best trick is to study other websites in your domain.

Online forums and platforms like Reddit can offer a great deal of help in understanding the target audience. You can use these to keep tabs on what people want to know. It is also very beneficial to look up current discussions on online platforms. This way, you directly read what people are searching for, and you can optimize your page accordingly. This helps you decide supporting keywords to shift these readers’ attention to your page.

You can even head to Wikipedia’s table of contents to analyze the questions asked by readers. This is known to be quite accurate for finding appropriate secondary keywords.

(Source: Google Search)

For example, the above screenshot depicts how you can check Google’s conversations to answer questions using your keywords. This will help your page to rank well on Google.

What are Silos? Why are they important?

(Image 2:

https://www.teachucomp.com/wp-content/uploads/blog-5-29-2015-PlanAWebsite-1024×595.png)

The flow chart above shows the design of a webpage. The most common structure begins with the home page. This is followed by a parent or target page. These pages mostly determine the primary services offered by the brand along with deeper information about the company itself.

Child pages are created after the home and parent pages. The main factor here is the URL structure to understand silos. For example, xyz.com/parent/child or syz.com/category/parent/child makes silos based on the URL.

Google prefers web pages with an effective silo structure-keyword. Secondary keywords are best placed in the target page along with the primary keywords. Most searchers access other pages before the target place.

Let’s imagine a blog with several articles. These articles contain the right keywords that searchers are looking for. These ‘other’ pages offer solutions for a problem that will ultimately lead visitors to the target page. Let’s look at an example to understand this better.

The UK is a popular tourist destination. Let’s say London is hosting the cricket world cup. Your task is to provide backlinks to pages that answer related queries. For example, people might also want to know the weather in London, the flight prices, the cricket match fees, and even see what hotels to book their stay in.

The main aim of these supporting pages is to drive traffic to your website. Adding external links to the target page helps in engaging visitors. If visitors like the content you provided about the UK, they might check out your website for more such information. This tip helps you gain more visitors and even get them to subscribe to updates, newsletters, or even make a purchase.

How to divert your audience to the target page?

You need to meet Google’s expectations to rank well on a search result page. You need to understand what Google wants you to offer. It is important to know the different kinds of pages that exist before you consider making an impression with Google.

Pages like the category page, product page, long-form blogs, and articles, etc. have different purposes. You also need to analyze each kind to meet Google’s requirements.

There are times when a webpage’s rank dips. This is quite common, especially with outdated web pages. This happens because Google constantly filters pages as well as analyzes trending keywords to rank pages.

Update your web page

Researching your competitors is important. However, you also need to study the images, videos, and other media they have used. You can use these points to outline your page. Let’s look at the importance of outlining your page.

Why do you need to outline your page?

• A page without an outline looks unorganized, boring, and does not appeal to visitors well.

• A well-outlined page highlights the quality of the content as well as the structure of your page. It is pointless to offer great services and information without a quality outline.

Roman Numeral Outline

Google checks the hierarchical order of the webpage’s content as well as the ‘H’ tags. It is important to have a proper website structure for Google to analyze. You need to format your content using the roman numeral outline.

Where to place keywords

We have studied different keywords, silos, types of pages, etc. Now, we need to know where to place these keywords. When Google looks for websites, it checks the keywords used, contextual terms, as well as the variations offered. These are the best places to place your keywords in various categories.

Groups-

A- Meta Title/Page Title, Body Content, H1, and the URL

B- Anchor Text, H2, H3, H4

C- Bold, Italic, Image Alt

D- Open Graph, Schema, and HTML Tags

What do ranks constitute?

The four main elements of an SEO rank are primary keyword placement, contextual terms, variations of the primary keyword, as well as the final word count. Let’s take a closer look at these elements.

Primary Keyword Placements and Variations

The primary keyword is the main keyword used in ranking your website. Variations are simply the synonyms of your primary keyword. They can be partially relatable or even abbreviations. For example, Dubai Desert Safari Packages could be your primary keyword, and the variations could be Desert Safari in Dubai, Dubai Desert Tours, etc.

Contextual Terms

Contextual terms are conversational words that occur while discussing a certain topic. Let’s say you’re looking for the white sauce pasta recipe. The contextual terms would be white flour, pasta sauce, pasta mix, etc.

Word count

Word count is an important factor in deciding your page’s rank. The ideal word count is 1300-1500 words on a single web page. Studies say that a good word count boosts your ranking. These words are placed in the body in between or among hidden text.

The Basic Approach to Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

Marketing, SEO, or content curation should not take up much time, money, effort. However, the first crucial step is getting the SEO done. It is ideal to use a basic SEO approach, to begin with. Start by placing your primary keyword in Group A. Add a few secondary keywords in your preferred subheadings.

Stick to the 1300-word count approach or look up your competitors’ pages to see the approach they have gone for. Finally, insert a few supporting keywords as well as utilize them as the silo posts. It is also necessary to focus on a content schedule.

Meta Titles and Descriptions

(Source: Google Images)

Unique meta titles, as well as proper descriptions, are important to boost your ranking. A meta title is the best place to introduce your primary keyword. It is better to use the same meta title for your page’s  H1s. Meta descriptions are also used in open paragraphs. There can be more than one meta description. (here)

Frequently Asked Questions

We understand that it could be tough to take this all in once. While you’re processing this data, we understand you might have some questions running through your mind. We’re here to answer your queries and help you understand the On-Page SEO better.

What is the difference between unique and duplicate content?

Google regularly removes web pages that contain duplicate content. This can be avoided by keeping 51% unique content on your webpage. In easier terms, 1 out of every 13 words on your page must be unique. Some tips to make your content unique are:

• A new strategy

• A well-researched list of latest resources

• Strong webpage design and User-experience

• A new and relevant case study

• Stepwise processes

What word count should be maintained for e-commerce web pages?

E-commerce websites have visitors that want a brief product description with just the important details/features. E-commerce websites don’t need to focus on the 1300-word approach. Instead, they can aim for 300-500 words for each product page.

(Source: Amazon)

The page should be crisp, well-designed, informational, as well as contain media. This attracts more readers as well as improves the chances of a purchase.

Is it important to use the right terms/ words on our page?

It is normal to be confused as to whether Google takes grammar seriously or focuses on every ‘ed’ or ‘ing’ you’ve used. You can set your worries aside by checking how your competitors are doing on Google’s search results. You can also refer to Google’s word suggestions to add better or unique words to your page.

Advanced Outlines and Other Elements

We spoke about the importance of a proper structure and an outline for a webpage. Let us understand how an SEO page should ideally look like. In fact, if you have any new content coming up, it is beneficial for you to understand the concepts of page structure, tag totals, etc.

Page Structure and Tag Totals

Page structure includes elements like HTML Tags, H1 H2, H3, etc. These help in delivering exactly what Google expects. The elements we mentioned will allow you to boost your page SEO and make it simple for Google to scan it.

While creating the page structure, you need to focus on some intricacies. For instance, if you have twenty H3s, and your competitor has five to seven of them, then your page lacks somewhere in the structure. Use different plug-ins for your website.

It is not recommended to use plug-ins that do not offer modifications. Modifications are extremely useful for your page’s ranking.

(Image 3: https://www.google.com/url?sa=i&url=https%3A%2F%2Fconcinnitylimited.com)

An ideal Search-Engine Optimized Page should include the following elements:

• Optimized and attractive headings/titles

• Appropriate keywords that help boost page ranking

• Unique content with a high readability score

• Error-free content (No grammatical or spelling errors)

• Bullet points to explain topics in a concise and effective way

• A word count ranging between 1300-1800

• Proper backlinks to guide visitors to target pages

Free Tools

Since we’ve understood what a page structure constitutes, it’s time for us to explain how you can use free tools to make your system. Firstly, you should see competitors’ pages and check the numbers to have an estimate.

You can use SEO Quake for your primary key to extract words that will help analyze your competitors’ approach.  It will also give you ample suggestions to make your web page rank higher.

You can also choose to search for your term and jot down the variations (bold highlighted terms on the search engine results page (SERP)).

(Source: Google Search)

The image above shows variation keywords. These are the search results in bold letters. For example, Washington DC, cheap flights, etc.

Advanced Keyword Research

We have explained the concept of keyword variations and how to incorporate them in your page. Now, we’ll shift our focus towards some advanced keyword research concepts like Lost Keywords, Keyword Cannibalization, as well as additional opportunities.

Lost keywords are the ones used to rank your page. It is important to identify these keywords if your site’s ranking on Google has gone down. Keyword Cannibalization assists you to come up with extra opportunities to save various keywords.

These two techniques are effective tools to make changes or have a quick impact on your page’s ranking. All you have to do is look for the right words since they already pre-exist within your content.

How to incorporate lost keywords?

• Create a new page for lost keywords

• Re-target the page that contains the lost keyword

• Make supporting pages for your silo

There are two approaches to search for a lost keyword. One way is through Ahrefs. Click on Organic Keywords within the dashboard, click on movements, and then select lost. The other option is to click on compare data in GSC, and then ‘download,’ followed by ‘use sheet.’

(Source: Google Images)

Understanding SEO Page Audit

Google Webmaster Guidelines organizes such audits. There are four things to keep in mind for SEO:

• Find: The search engine finds your web page

• Crawl: The search engine scans through your page structure

• Index: Google indexes your site after finding it

• Rank: Google analyses your page and decides its rank

Guide To A Comprehensive On-Page SEO Audit

You are already aware that your website requires optimizing for enhanced performance, augmented visibility, and maximum traffic. After tackling the first step of understanding on-page search engine optimization, find out what this module has in store for you.

On-page SEO refers to everything you can control on your website, and that is what we will talk about. The on-page SEO audit is loosely based on the Google Webmaster Guidelines. The GWB guidelines were only used to outline this module better. With this outline, you can expect your website to elevate in terms of ranking and branding.

While Google may not always be right, it is still the leading search engine. Many brands refer to Google to see what is ranking and what should be on your website, and you should too. With this module, you will learn exactly how to do that.

Before we go ahead with this module, here are the stages of SEO that you should know about. This is the usual method for search engines to identify brands based on search engine optimization.

• Find

• Crawl

• Index

• Rank

• Brand

To explore an on-page SEO audit better, let’s break these SEO stages down.

Learning in-depth about On-page SEO?

On-page SEO is the method of optimizing web pages to rank higher and gain traction through search pages. On-page refers to a few components on your website that you can manage to optimize and bring in benefits. These components include content, keywords, and other such technical elements that help your website increase visibility.

Search engines follow a few stages for search engine optimization to help brands gain traction and visibility.

Find

The first step that search engines get into is finding your webpage. This is critical, essentially because it will determine whether or not your brand will be ranked.

Search engines are a powerful platform that can organically find your webpage. But there are a few ways in which you can contribute to fasten this process and direct the search engines to your webpage.

Analytics/Webmaster Tools – One of the best practices for your website is to have a Verified Google Search Console Account, also known as the Google Webmaster Tools, Google Analytics Account, and Bing Webmaster Tools Account. These accounts will evaluate your website and provide information on site performance and issues.

(Source : Google Images)

Sitemap – Search engines use a sitemap to crawl your website, while humans use it to search pages on your website. You can submit your XML sitemaps to Google and Bing search tools so that their search engines can easily find all of your websites. On the other hand, an HTML sitemap is used by us, humans. The HTML sitemap offers a good user experience to your audience.

Robots.txt file – You can use robots.txt file to stop search engines from crawling your pages that you do not wish to be indexed. For example, you most definitely do not want your admin page to be indexed.

Meta Robots – This allows you to assign search engines some instructions to do while they crawl your pages. Meta Robots are those instructions. For ranking pages, you can set up a Meta Robots with a configuration including ‘index,’ ‘follow,’ and ‘archive.’

(Source : Google Images)

The configuration helps to inform search engines that they have to index the webpage, follow site links, and archive the webpage. Moreover, they prevent the search engines from displaying descriptions of other directories such as Yahoo or DMOZ. If you utilize resources like Yoast or Jetpack, then you do not need this method. These resources will automatically optimize your page with tags.  

Malware – No one likes malware, and your website should be free from it. In case your website is found with malware, your rankings will decline instantly. In fact, in extreme scenarios, you could also get de-indexed.

Manual Penalties – Manual Penalties are also known as Manual Actions. These are displayed in a tab in the search console. If a human reviewer on your webpage feels like it has violated Google’s policies, then they take action called a manual penalty. Try to resolve your manual penalties instantly and submit them for review.

HTTP(S) – Search engines will prefer your website more if you completely follow the required security measures. Search engines prefer a secured URL such as https://. Besides being widely used, https also plays a key role in your website’s ranking. 

WWW Redirect – Another best practice followed in SEO is the non-www domain record redirecting to www record for your website. This is also practiced to ensure there are no duplicate content issues with your website.

(Source : Google Images)

Domain Property (Search Console) – Make sure you claim your domain property in the search console. This automatically allows you to claim several other versions of the domain, including https, https, www, and non-www. Additionally, you can access your domain in entirety in one place.

Rel=Canonical – Rel=Canonical is a tag that will determine an URL for your webpage and the content on it. This tag combines all the external links that point to your webpage and make sure that the target page is given credit. The tag also resolves duplicate content issues for your website and provides maximum security against SEO attacks. It is recommended that you implement the Rel=Canonical tag on all webpages for your site.

Crawl

After the first step of finding your website, it is necessary to have little to no structural issues. Structural issues will restrict search engines from crawling your website. Here are some examples of structural issues.

Structure Issues

• Html/CSS

If your website’s HTML and CSS code have faults, then a code validation test can easily identify these issues. You might not be able to find these issues out, but they’ll hinder the search engine’s crawling on your websites.

Another common issue is cross-browser compatibility code issues that are checked by user experience and is not good for SEO. If you want to outrank a ‘superfluous’ website, then you can use a ‘lean’ code. Even though it is uncertain whether Google uses HTML or CSS as a factor for ranking, you can still start with this.

• HTTP status

Everyone has seen errors popping up on their screens and wondering what they mean. This is what we mean by structural issues from HTML or CSS. Stay updated with the HTTP status, and here’s what each of them means.

500 errors are server-side errors and mean serious server issues. In case you see this, these errors must be resolved immediately.

404 errors are the popular ‘page not found’ error on a website. You don’t have to address them immediately since they have low priority.

302 errors are another low priority error that has temporary redirects. These should be changed to 301 to resolve them.

• Broken links

(Source : Google Images)

Your SEO can be affected by a broken link on your website. For instance, if you have a 404 error on your website, it can go all the way back to a broken link.

Always make sure you check both internal and external links. Internal broken links should be your first priority, followed by broken external links.

Site Speed – Site speed is responsible for your website’s user experience and plays a role in website ranking. You can easily check your website’s details at the site speed report. The report evaluates scores such as Page Speed score, Yslow score, Fully Loaded Time, and Time to Time Byte (TTTB). For SEO specifically, Page Speed and Yslow scores are utilized with a page load time under 7 seconds.

Page load time may be a tiny factor, but it does not play a role as a ranking factor. In fact, Time to Time Byte (TTTB) plays a bigger role in deciding the ranking.

Content Delivery Network – The Content Delivery Network or CDN is a group of servers placed according to their geographical locations. Instead of having only one location of the server on your website, CDN helps disperse your website to servers globally.

(Source: Google Images)

With the help of global distribution, your website will load quickly and provide the visitors with the actual location of the server. CDN also helps to increase security levels because hackers only hack one server and not the entire network.

Mobile Optimization – With the increasing usage of mobile phones, you also have to help your brand adapt to mobile devices. This includes mobile optimization, first index, Google AMP, site speed, click-through rate, or mobile user experience. All of these include optimizing tools for a better mobile-based user experience.

Index

Now comes the third step following finding and crawling your website. The next part to consider is indexing the website. The index simply refers to search engines categorizing webpages from your website according to content into their database.

Once you have a page about a certain topic, it is not directly categorized into a niche. The Index section further breaks into two parts, current, and future content.

Duplicate Content

Search engines curate authentic and unique content. In fact, the original content you post on your website will increase the chances for your website to be ranked. Duplicate content will also be shown as internal or external if detected.

Meta and Page Titles

Every page on your website serves its own purpose. Your page content should not only be different from other websites but your own webpages as well. Try to avoid duplicate meta descriptions and page titles. Keep a description and title that is unique only to your page.

HREFLANG

If your website is in multiple languages targeting several countries, then this tag helps to instruct the search engines to use appropriate language for the visitor. The tag: rel=” alternate” hreflang=”x” aims to ignore duplicate content between numerous languages.  

Schema Markup

(Source: Google Images)

Schema markup is a language from inside a webpage that is only visited by search engines. This happens when your web developer marks up essential information about your business deep into the site with a special code. Essential information could include industry, location, operating hours, contact information, awards, description, etc. These are also known as the Rich Snippets because they allow rich and organic search results about your brand. Not to forget, the schema is a big factor in determining to rank.

Open Graph

Open graph is one of the efficient ways to add metadata to your pages and be able to control them. You can control how these pages land up on social media and are notified when it is shared. Utilizing an open graph literally opens opportunities for you. They increase your click-through-rates, bringing your website more traction. Try not to miss this step since it is the first important step for indexing and ranking.

Thin Content

Besides being unique, your webpage needs to add value to the World Wide Web. Search engines will only curate your content if they feel like it benefits the users. The measurement of content value is the word limit. Webpages with less than 250 words are considered to be ‘thin’ and are difficult to rank later on.

Reverse Silo Structure

A silo structure allows you to organize your website content. It helps you to structure your content in a way to increase your chances of higher rankings. Moreover, they also gain traction for target pages and supporting pages, both of them that work in combination through internal and external linking.

Here are some steps to set up a reverse silo structure.

• Select the target page that you want to rank for your brand. Further, select a few articles published on the site that are related to your target page. Feel free to create new content, as well.

• Then, link out to one of the supporting pages, and keep in mind that you can use the anchor text of your choice.

• Go to the paragraph text on the supporting blog articles and link it back to the target page and then a supporting page.

• Try to outreach to other websites interested in linking your supporting pages as well.

• Make sure you create a silo structure like this for every target page on your website.

• Choosing Keywords

When you are writing for your website, keywords are the most important part because they determine how the search engines will categorize your website. With the help of keywords, search engines also try to match visitor searches to related search results. Since search engines cannot ‘read’ the content, keywords placed in specific locations make it simpler to connect. Consider keywords to be your biggest strength and make it easy for search engines to figure out what your webpages are all about.

Make sure your target page is of a single niche. Try to optimize more than one primary keyword and phrases. This way, you get access to secondary keywords as well that are basically related keywords. These secondary keywords make up a cluster that will powerfully optimize your target pages.

Find these cluster keywords in the related searches section on your search engine results page (SERP), auto drop-down suggestions, ‘people also ask’ section or Google trends.

Rank

Finally, we reach the ranking section once all the previous stages have been tackled. Rank refers to placing your web pages in search results in a certain order. Google lists ten pages organically on every SERP. To claim the ‘first page,’ especially on Google, your webpage must rank in the top ten webpages listed for your target keywords.

This is exactly how the previous steps are so important in determining a webpage’s rank. But sometimes you might have done everything from your end and yet you worry about how to improve your rankings.

In this case, your rankings will improve solely by creating relevant content on the website and having quality backlinks for your target keywords.

Here are some factors to remember that can bring your rankings up.

• Word Count

• Latent Semantic Indexing

• Exact Match Keyword

• Keyword Variations

• Page Score

• Organic Page Performance

• Click-Through Rate by Rank Position

• Potential Traffic by Search Term

• Click-Through Rate

• Optimization Tuning

• Overall Site User Experience

Brand

The final step to getting more visibility for your brand. Search engines are constantly searching for signals to identify legitimate websites and brands. Signals include how your brand is listed across the internet and the positioning in Google and Bing along with some on-page factors.

Brand Signals & Local Optimization – You have understood brand signals, but if you are wondering what the methods to optimize your brand signals are, then here’s how.

• Google My Business Profile

(Source: Google Images)

Google My Business Profile is an essential, authoritative tool for your website, be it local, national, online, B2B, or B2C. Goggle uses this platform to verify if your website represents an actual brand. It does this by linking external links from properties like Facebook, YouTube, LinkedIn, etc. Moreover, it identifies your business location, reviews, and more. If you have not already optimized this for your brand’s website, then definitely should.

• Rel=Publisher

Rel=Publisher is a tag that links your brand and content together. When you write quality content, Google can attribute the content and brand together. This is because Rel=Publisher is the exact same code or tag between the content and your Google+ Business Page. With the help of this tag, your brand can improve in terms of search results. No one can question its credibility as well because the Google+ Business Page is only accessible to G Suite users and businessmen. Due to this, the signal helps to improve website authority.

Authenticity, Citations, and NAP – Your brand needs to get listed in big data aggregators and have a consistent name through NAP (Name, Address, and Phone). Factual specifically serves as a business data aggregator. Many search engines do use Factual or any other leading company. They use other important industry citing sites to verify basic brand information.

Authenticity, Brand Awareness: Owning Your Brand Across the Web – If you want Google to view your brand as trusted and reputed, make sure that you are sending the right business signals. Check the below factors, whether they exist or are accurate.

• Social media itself exists while all their information stays up-to-date and accurate.

• Check if there were any negative reviews across business platforms.

• This goes without saying, and you should stick to one name for your webpage.

Additional Information: On-Page Trust and Authenticity Factors – Google is always looking at a brand to check if they were original and reliable. Most indicators exist at the footer of stronger websites.

KPIs, Benchmarking, and Reporting

These determine the success or failure of a business. That said, these are some vital things to note when SEO is considered. There are several effective ways to do your KPIs and Reporting.

You can start by advocating page-level reporting through various keywords and unique content.

Another way is to analyze your website or specific web pages. You check its past rankings and compare them with current results. You must keep an eye on traffic, conversions, and impressions. Finally, you can benchmark everything by studying your past performance.

How to set up a dashboard?

There are many efficient ways to set up a dashboard. We understand it can get tiring, so we decided to help you out with a few things you can start with:

• Google Data Studio: It is easy to use and free of cost!

• Connect Analytics, Adwords, and Search Console

• Google Analytics Data: This is great for engagement, to check page/site visitors frequently and for conversions.

• Combine trends to build your reports

• Search Console Data: Use this to lookup keyword positions, clicks, CTR, etc.

How to optimize your CTR?

There are millions of websites on the internet. How can you ensure that yours is the one that gets clicked? Well, it might not be a cakewalk, but here are a few ways to optimize your Call-To-Action:

• CTRs with Question Tags get more clicks than others- Question Tags such as “Why should I eat green vegetables?” are visited more than other webpages because readers have shown an inclination towards them.

This is because people relate to questions better and feel like Tags with questions contain more accurate information. See the image below for an example-

(Image Source: Google Search)

• Meta-Descriptions are a must- You need to have a meta-description for your web page. Yes, you get brownie points if it is a compelling description, however, just having one suffices.

• Take help from Review Schema or FAQ Schema- These do not directly optimize your page. However, these are great for connecting to Rich Snippets. Let’s look at these two tools closely.

FAQ Schema

(Source: Google Search)

Review Schema

(Source: Google Search)

• Use Power Words in your Title- Words like “Best,” “Top,” “Free,” and “You” are called power words because of their engaging quality. Using these words can help optimize your CTR.

• Use the current year in your Title: Titles like “Top 10 SUVs in 2020” and “Best Matte Lipstick: 2020 Choice” are more likely to get clicks than other pages due to the effect of time. Visitors will find such titles more recent and hence will visit them first. Here’s a search result screenshot to help you understand better.

(Source: Google Search)

How to divide your reporting?

Reporting must be divided in the following ways:

The Complete Website

The record must include data about visitors, cluster keyword positions, clicks, conversions, CTR, conversion rate, etc.

• A record of the previous three to six months must be maintained.

• Benchmark data must include screenshots of metrics, including those from the start of the campaign to the present one.

Each Target Page

The record must include data about visitors, cluster keyword positions, clicks, conversions, CTR, conversion rate, time on site, and the Bounce Rating.

• You must maintain a complete record of three to six months.

• Benchmark data, including complete metrics from start to finish, must be maintained.

How to Calculate Return on Interest (ROI)

Businesses have two common goals when they start campaigns. The first aim is pure branding, while the second goal is to generate additional revenue. You’re also the one to decide the complete outcome of your campaign. However, you must be concerned about your Return On Investment (ROI). If you work well with ROI numbers, it will allow you to keep your monthly contracts going as well as demanding higher fees.

The following metrics should be considered before estimating the Return on Investment (ROI).

• Real Search Volume

• The Site’s Conversion Rate

• CTR by Rank Position

• The Lifetime Value of a Customer

Can images optimize your web page?

Images and SEO? Yes, it’s a match made in heaven. It is extremely beneficial to use images in your web pages. Here’s why-

• Makes your page more engaging

• Helps visitors relate to concepts better

• Media makes content more relevant

However, are you adding the images properly? Are you using original/unique photos or resorting to Stock Images?

Well, let us tell you a fact. Stock Photos can hamper all your SEO efforts. It is better to use unique photos on your web pages instead of commonly used images on the internet. This is sure to boost your SEO ranking.

What is Schema?

Schema is tags that are embedded inside your website and will tell search engines what your website contains. Search engines do not understand the symbols and numerals assigned, for instance, the weighing metrics. Instead, you can simply tag Schema and state that this is a metric. This helps search engines to understand your website’s content.

Why is Schema the worst?

When it comes to convenience and easy usage of a tool, Schema does not necessarily qualify. While it may be taking a load off your shoulders, increasing traffic, it still is confusing to understand. Moreover, Schema is mainly difficult to implement.

But here’s the secret. Hide in plain sight!

(Source : Google Images)

Try to gain inspiration from some of the popular sites on any search engine results page. Try to look at their schema and understand the secret of their plain hiding. Further, you can use the Google Data Structure Testing Tool. The tool tells you if the schema you swiped is a good one.

Sitelink Search Box

Sitelink search is a custom search box that is available when you display branded searches. Only you should have a search feature on your website, and this can be put only on the homepage.

Breadcrumbs

You can easily get breadcrumbs displayed for your website. Look at this and tell us if it looks similar, Books > Authors > Ann Leckie > Ancillary Justice.

Yes, this is exactly what breadcrumbs refer to. List all your URLs in the schema. Moreover, the URL mysite.com/type/keyword-phrase displays the 404 error. Most times mysite.com/type/ is not a real page as well.

Main Entity of Page

The main entity of the Page is a simpler opportunity to tell Google that this is what your brand is about; this is the content on it, and here’s why the brand is credible.

Item Page

Many users use the Item Page as a default. This page focuses more on one thing essentially, and it does not include fitting into another schema categories of Bollywood. The item page schema looks exactly the one in the previous schema category.

Additional Schema

Now that you have understood and looked at what Schema does, here are some more branches of Schema.

Spammy Schema Manual Action – It perfectly edits your schema mainly because you get to control a big aspect of it. Since it is manual, you can totally steer your goals into any direction.  

Product Schema – Through this category, you can access all the fun stars, reviews, prices, and more than usually pop out in the SERPs. If you want to make him pop, you can use Aggregate Rating and their offers. It only works when both of them exist since Google is a fickle-minded platform.

Local Business Organization – Studying the organization behind local businesses is a great way to understand how people live. But more so digitally, how do these businesses find their way back into the ranking game.

What is Medic & E-A-T?

Medic began in August 2018, came back in December 2018 and March 2019. Medic began as a series of core updates. A lot of websites started losing their ranks even though they were real websites. Their most demanding niches varied from medics, lifestyle, food, etc. and yet they started declining.

Further, this formed a concept of Expertise, Authoritativeness, and Trustworthiness (E-A-T). Since then, it has become easier to become the real website that you are. Although no search engine is in power to judge whose website is real, the E-A-T concept still is one of the factors. In the end, it is all about whether Google thinks you are a real entity or not.

The first thing you should do as a brand is to create your own knowledge panel if it does not exist. If your brand does not show up in this panel, it may not be as recognized.

While this is only the first step, there are several other factors to take into consideration.

Wikipedia / Wikidata – Google widely uses Wikipedia and Wikidata for information. This is your chance to take the steering wheel in your hands by creating an interesting page. You can try out Wikidata. But here are some key points to keep in mind when creating a Wikidata account.

• Avoid using email addresses with your brand’s name completely visible.
• You can use the same account to contribute to the most random topics by having multiple listings.
• Once you create an account, you can add statements mentioning information like location, industry type, inauguration date, official website, and more.
• In the end, add a ‘qualifier’ for related data to receive similar results, especially about your brand.

Google My Business (GMB) – Another way to verifying yourself is by setting up and optimizing Google My Business. Make sure you submit your website to Google My Business and claim it for every business location of yours. Next, confirm your details such as name, office address, phone number, working hours, etc. Go ahead and add a few appealing photos and then edit your brand introduction.

(Source: Google Images)

Some people go all the way and mention modes of payment, which is a good thing. Once you start getting traction, respond to every review politely, including the negative ones. A few more things that you can do is create a 360-degree virtual tour, post twice a month, or add an optimized image every week.

Yelp Optimization – If your brand is still not verified, claim a listing on Yelp. The process is pretty much similar to that of GMB. Fill in your information, add pictures, and respond nicely to your reviews.

Huge Trust Signal (GMB / G+ / YouTube / Rel=Publisher) – The huge trust signal is like a part two to your GMB optimization. You can create a huge trust signal by simply verifying certain Google properties with the same account. We have simplified the GG Suite optimization easier for you with these basic steps.

• Log in to G+ through the GG Suite and your GMB account.

• Click on your profile to grab the URL and add it to Ref=Publisher. This tag will go in the header of your site.

• Now simply go to YouTube to sync and verify in the settings.

Citations – This is the reference information a brand provides, such as a name, address, and contact number. Usually, citation in SEO terms refers to the several business listings that take place on many sites. You can also call citations as business directories due to their large databases. There are two types of citations.

• Major Data Aggregators

These are basically just large databases for brands. They include Factual, Infogroup, Newstar, and Axiom. Factual is widely used for schema identification. Other sources of entry include Whitespark, Brightlocal, Moz Local, Yext, or any credible citation service.

• Niche Citations

The following major data aggregators are niche citations. These are specific to your brand, industry, location, keyword, or content. Find out whether your competitors are getting citations and then go ahead with getting one. Using a citation service, you can also try to conduct an audit. Moreover, you can compare these major citation services before opting for any one of the above.

3rd Party Review Sites – After you have taken the bigger steps of Yelp, GMB, and citations, you can now refer to 3rd party sites. In fact, let this be your moment for earning reviews. There are two ways to find out 3rd party review sites.

• Knowledge Panel – Simply search your business on the knowledge panel and look at ratings or remarks given by other websites.

• SERPs – Search for your brand’s reviews, and you will find numerous articles on it.

Site Information and Outbound Links – You have successfully gone through every step, and this is only to wrap it up. Here are some endnotes for you to keep in mind.

• Establish different ways for your visitor to contact you internationally and locally besides your email or personal mobile number.

• Edit your ‘about us’ or ‘meet the team’ section. Consistently update it so your brand can seem humanized to the visitors.

• Ensure that your Terms of Service and Privacy Policy are specific to your niche and completely in place.

• Form outbound links such as social profiles, content creation, etc. You can link all these externally as well.

Summing it up

Make sure you follow through with all or most of these steps to guarantee complete optimization, increased traffic, and maximum visibility.

Lastly, do not have duplicate content and be real with the content on your webpage. Make sure your originality stands out for Google to know that you exist. There are many ways Google will eventually discover your content and your website.

This guide has probably taught you as much as you would need to know about setting up your own optimization tools. As long as you are putting out original content in the world, your brand will surely get recognized and ranked.

That being said, just be yourself, and everyone will simply be drawn to your content.

Endnotes

Well, we’ve sure come a long way from the start. We spoke about essential On-Page SEO tips and gave you the latest insights into the concept. Now, we understand that it is a very vast concept and requires more than just 4,000 words. However, we’re also sure this guide has given you a massive head start.

The most important concepts we discussed were the keyword research tools, CTR optimization, Page Structures, and Outlines. Even though these may not look very intense, they are the most crucial elements of an optimized web page.

On-Page SEO is more than just adding the right keywords to your title or description. It aims at fulfilling the search intent and offering the most accurate data. That is the most vital part. If you fail at providing valuable data, optimization is pretty much pointless.

That said, we need to focus on keeping the ‘Giant G’ satisfied. All On-Page SEO tips also have one common goal- to crack Google’s ranking algorithm. It’s not easy but can be done by following the steps we mentioned in our guide. Well, we wouldn’t like to keep you waiting! Go on, optimize your pages, and conquer the ranks.

On-Page SEO: How to Rank Higher on Google the Right Way

Your Complete Guide To KPIs Vs ROI

by Gaby | Sep 17, 2020 | Course, SEO Basics

Well-researched and insightful websites amount to nothing if you can’t reach the audience you intend them for. Search Engine Optimization (SEO) indicates the key aspects that can increase your website ranking and traffic. While you might inculcate all the best SEO practices in your website content, you need a way to measure the same.

Having set benchmarks and understanding how to measure your success in terms of SEO is extremely important. Whether you measure the success of your website or clients, this is the most important aspect. Everyone likes seeing tangible results, but due to the nuances and technical nature of SEO, it can get difficult to see the result transparently.

For this reason, you must have a thorough knowledge of key performance indicators and calculators that give insight into your approach. This can even help you tweak your method to suit your website and personalize your approach with SEO. Without further ado, let us discuss some of the most effective ways to measure results.

What is KPI and How Do You Measure Its Success?

When you use search engine optimization techniques, you, your team, and the client are putting in a lot of time, money, and effort into tactics that help the website increase its ranking. KPI stands for Key Performance indicators, which measures the success or failure of these tactics so that you know if you are getting your money’s worth.

Now to measure success, you need to set up a certain benchmark. You can measure the it before you begin your optimization.

Set this as a benchmark from which you can measure progress after a certain period of optimization (for example, three months). This gives you a tangible measure of your practices and allows you to show your client that they’re getting their money’s worth.

Setting up benchmarks, having consistent reports with updates to your approach and set KPI’s can take your practice to the next level. However, this also means that you must know which ones are useful and points to the true measure of growth. Read on to get an insight into the same.

Which KPI’s can you track?

Today, there are multiple approaches that you can use to evaluate the success of your optimization techniques. With more than 100 measures of success, it is difficult to figure out exactly what shows true growth and which KPI you must focus on reporting.

Page-level reporting with a focus on certain KPIs can give you a more in-depth and holistic approach than pinpointing on one measure. Discussing your clients’ needs and including those points in your report is also equally important. Aside from those, here are some of the most important KPIs that help you measure your SEO success and make informed decisions:

Conversion

Most websites focus on lead generation or sales made as to the end goal for success. Conversion is the first step towards succeeding in that goal. You can measure individual page conversion by setting up goals on your dashboard and looking for the conversion rate through certain actions.

For example, signing up for a newsletter or opting in for email updates is an action that is considered a conversion.

Traffic

Measuring the organic traffic directly points to your ranking and site visibility. If you have a relatively larger audience streaming onto your website, it means that your page probably has one of the top rankings. While many individuals prefer to track keywords to measure the site visibility, the traffic received gives a broader perspective for the same.

Impressions

Impressions simply point out the visibility of your brand. If an ad for your website is seen, it counts as an impression regardless of if the viewer interacts with it. Impressions point towards brand awareness and help you keep a check on the ROI for campaigns. However, your conversion rate must grow along with impressions for a successful campaign.

CTR

The click-through rate or CTR measures the success of your impressions. If you see an amazon advertisement and decide to add it to your saved videos, amazon records this as a click-through and adds it to the total percentage. The CTR is a great calculator for audience engagement and interest.

What is ROI?

ROI is an acronym for Return On Investment, that measures the performance of your investments and how profitable they are. In simple words, you can say that this metric is used to check the amount of money you invested in an investment and how much profit you made.

This is important to know whether you are making money and need more money to invest. Digital marketers are often using this method to measure success and share the details with the higher management.

How do I estimate the ROI?

When you look towards SEO and invest in marketing strategies that rank your website higher on search, it is to achieve a certain goal. For some organizations, this may be to simply get the word out about their brand and to increase brand awareness. However, for most websites, spending money on optimization and digital marketing efforts means that you must get some kind of Return on Investment.

Now this ROI can include an increase in conversions or an increase in sales, but the result needs to be tangible. It also needs to justify the money that the clients or you are putting into to fulfil the goals and objectives and get effective results.

Measuring the ROI can help you see that you’ve acquired satisfactory results. This justifies your contract and even attracts quality customers with higher pay. Here are some of the metrics that you must pay attention to when looking to estimate the ROI.

Real Search Volume

The real search volume is essentially the impressions divided by the impression share. The best way to calculate the same is to check the keywords in Google AdWords and get an exact number for your query.

If you do not have access to AdWords for any reason, you can use an alternate solution. This includes doing a broad search for your term that gives you keyword suggestions. These suggestions are your secondary keyword cluster and can give you general sensing of your search volume.

CTR by Rank Position

The CTR or Click Through Rate for a particular position is determined from data gathered from Google Search Console and Industry Averages. This helps you get an idea of the CTR you receive if you are at a certain ranking or position on the search.

If you take both the CTR and the search volume, it helps you get an idea of what course of action will give you the estimated returns you require.

Conversion Rate and Lifetime Value

The conversion rate and lifetime value are estimates that you can get from the client. The conversion rate is generally set against a certain benchmark goal that every website can get if they are using Google Console. The lifetime value of a customer is the amount that the customer has contributed to the website. This contribution occurs through their interaction with the brand.

If you or your client doesn’t have access to either or haven’t set it up, it’s important to do so before moving forward. Lifetime value is lower for goods that are precious or other luxury services. So, you must measure this metric in your ROI only if it matches the website goal for its customers.

Calculating all these metrics together by multiplying them gives you a very realistic estimate of the value your optimization practices bring to the website. This is a great way to gain trust and make client acquisition easier.

Difference Between KPI and ROI Metrics

Whether online or offline, these play a crucial role in seeing how well the business is performing and working on future budget allocation. The differences between marketing metrics are evident as they are used differently and concentrate on different business needs. However, both determine a business’s success and ultimately contribute to revenue growth.

What They Do?

ROI is a financial metric used to check the benefits and value one gets back from one’s investment. KPIs are forward-looking predictors with pre-set measurable metrics to determine how they are performing and whether or not they are aligning with the business objectives.

What Do They Measure?

KPIs are leading indicators that assess the short-term impact on a business in different areas, such as costs incurred, customer satisfaction, marketing campaigns, total revenue, customer acquisition cost, sales growth, etc. Whereas ROI is a long-term game that helps gauge profit, businesses make from their marketing costs and investment and check areas of improvement. 

How Are They Measured?

KPI vs ROI have different formulas to measure business goals and objectives. To measure ROI, the benefit is divided by the total investment made. On the other hand, KPI metrics are calculated by tracking the indicators on Google Analytics or other reporting tools.

Endnotes

On-page search engine optimization has a unique purpose in today’s rapidly growing digital background. It’s important that your website not only stands out but also appears to have all the right data that reaches the target audience. However, when you are working as an SEO professional, putting in time and money for a project needs outcome.

The outcome is something tangible and measurable of a projects lifecycle, whether that’s through KPIs and Reports. Having a good return on investment and learning how to check for it is as much a part of SEO used to optimize.

Hence, you must understand the use of the best SEO practices. At the same time, you should also identify the changes and growth that it reaps for your website.

If you or your client doesn’t have access to either or haven’t set it up, it’s important to do so before moving forward for employee satisfaction. Lifetime value is lower for goods that are precious or other luxury services. To have its true impact, you must measure this metric in your ROI only if it matches the website goal for its customers.

Calculating all these metrics together by multiplying them gives you a very realistic and accurate measurement of the value your optimization practices bring to the website. This is a great way to gain trust and make client acquisition easier.

FAQ

Are KPIs and ROI the same?

No, both the metrics are not the same. In fact, ROI is a category that falls under KPI that marketers use to gauge ROI. ROI calculations assess the financial aspect and performance of a marketing campaign or a project. However, KPIs can include different metrics to help in project management and reach organizational goals. 

What are ROI and KPI in digital marketing?

These two metrics determine the performance and effectiveness of marketing campaigns for successful businesses. KPIs are set indicators used to measure success, considering different parameters. ROI looks at the financial aspect of how much money is spent and whether or not a business has benefitted from the investment.

How do marketers use KPI metrics to reach their business objectives?

Through cost per acquisition, marketing managers can build successful marketing funnels. A company can have a high profit margin if the cost per acquisition is low.