Search Engine Optimization, better known as SEO, is the use of various techniques to improve a website’s ranking in search engines. This is done in the hopes of attracting more visitors. After all, more visitors means more conversions which means higher potential profit.
Consider these facts:
- Did you know that your website is a competitor to more than 1.7 billion other websites? Yes! You’ll need good SEO scores, for your website to rank high. And without substantial traffic, you can’t make the most out of your website.
- Less than one-quarter of internet users browse past the first page of search engine results. That means if your content doesn’t feature on page 1, over 75% of search engine users will not discover your products/services.
- If you want your online content to get found by search engines such as Google — you may want to enlist the services of SEO experts or SEO specialists.
- SEO experts are the gurus who have vast knowledge and technical experience with the ins and outs of the SEO industry. On the other hand, companies may hire SEO specialists to oversee the implementation of recommendations made by SEO experts.
What’s SEO All About?
SEO is the art of tweaking your digital content to have a high priority in search engine rankings. The goal is to derive maximum organic traffic from search engines. Some SEO techniques which are commonly employed to boost website search rankings include — production of good quality content, centering your content on targeted keywords, and creating backlinks (hyperlinks to web pages from external sites).
About 90% of people with smartphones use search engines daily to shop or to research. Do you want your website or blog articles to feature on the number-one spot of search engine results without paying for adverts? Then consult SEO experts about tunneling free web traffic to your site all the time.
How Search Engines Rank Content
Smart algorithms (computer programs) analyze queries to turn out the most appropriate answers (results) to your question. Within fractions of seconds, the Google search engine scans its index containing millions and millions of web pages, to determine the best results to be shown to you.
The big question is, what criteria do the internal algorithms use to figure out which website’s content is the best answer to a search query? So far, it’s understood that Google doesn’t want to reveal the mode of operation of its algorithms.
That means that an SEO expert and SEO specialists cannot really claim to know everything about search engine optimization. Nevertheless, the tech-giant Google has given some clues about the possible factors that determine which website content constitutes a right answer.
Here are some factors that Google uses to determine which website to show or not to show.
Related Keywords
Assuming you entered the query “SEO” into a Google search page. It will be absurd to see results about “goats and chickens”. These are unrelated terms that don’t have any meaning with respect to the query. So, Google immediately knows that they are irrelevant to the request. On the other hand, pages containing related keywords such as “search engine optimization SEO” will be given much consideration.
This explains why some content creators often cram repetitive keywords into their articles and assume that they are SEO experts.
Authoritative Websites
Search engines also determine the authenticity of your content by considering the number of external websites that are linked to your blog (site). The assumption here is that if more links are referencing your site, it could be that your content is more authoritative.
That’s why SEO experts attach importance to back-linking. For example, if website A has 20 backlinks, and website B has ten backlinks — Google may conclude that the former is more authoritative than the latter. Consequently, website A may get higher rankings than website B.
If you are wondering why Yahoo is losing the search engine race to Google, the answer lies in the ability of the Google search engine to measure backlinks statistics.
Content Usefulness
Google clarifies that your content can be authoritative and also relevant, but if it lacks the elements of usefulness, it won’t be promoted to the top spot in search rankings.
To further break this down, assuming a world-renowned doctor writes an article on the coronavirus pandemic. The doctor’s content may have high authority, but if it’s not well-organized and simplified, it may not rank for usefulness. On the other hand, if a high school student writes a well-organized article on the coronavirus pandemic, he/she can rank higher for usefulness than the doctor and his authority article.
The way end-users react to your material also suggests whether it’s useful or not. In general, a content that receives many positive comments may receive a significant boost in rankings because it’s deemed as valuable.
What Do SEO Experts Work On?
Modern SEO experts work on three key pillars of search engine optimization. These are summarized as the on-page (on-site), off-page (off-site), and technical SEO. For better results, SEO experts strive to perfect their tasks on these three main components.
Technical SEO
This talks about how you can best optimize your content so that search engine crawlers and indexers will not have a hard time understanding your content. SEO experts may shoulder it upon themselves to properly set up your content in a way that will make it easier for search engines to crawl and index your site.
On-Page SEO
Here, experts perform extensive keyword research studies to tailor their optimization to the individual pages on your website. When SEO insights reveal a popular keyword relating to your niche, you can then create content around the specific keywords you’re targeting.
To summarize, an optimization process that takes place on the admin panel of your website is known as on-page SEO. Optimization of your content title, subtitles, descriptions, thumbnails, and images — all constitute on-site SEO.
Off-Site SEO
Simply put, this refers to link building. As explained earlier, more backlinks pointing to your site suggest to search engines that your content is trustworthy. Apart from taking charge of the on-page SEO stuff, SEO experts may also work on increasing your link building to your website.
However, link building may not count much if the number of external websites referencing your content is not authoritative enough.
Search Engine Marketing and SEO
SEO experts and search engine marketers also share a close relationship. Search engine marketing (SEM) falls under the universal set of digital marketing. SEM processes usually are directed towards improving the online visibility of a website organically, or through paid advertising.
By leveraging paid search advertising opportunities, you can literally purchase ranking spaces in the search engine. This can be done by creating campaigns to target some keywords that best describe the content you want to promote through PPC (pay-per-click) advertising.
PPC advertising is an alternative path to gaining web traffic if your site doesn’t rank organically. Instead of waiting for too long for your website to naturally hit the number one spot, advertisers can use networks like Google AdWords to steer their content to the top of search engine results. With Google AdWords, advertisers only pay for each valid click on their promoted content.
Even though search engines like Yahoo and Bing also offer PPC advertising services, they’re not very popular when compared to Google Ads.
Search Engine Marketing vs Search Engine Optimization
When mention is made of SEM, many marketers tune their minds to PPC advertising. You can, however, compare organic SEO and paid SEM in terms of their advantages. SEO experts recommend organic SEO as the best marketing technique that can help businesses to realize long-term competitive advantages on the web. If a website ranks top organically for specific keywords, online publishers can gain a steady flow of traffic and online income each month.
For websites which employ Google AdWords to market themselves, they can also get significant amounts of web traffic. But they must pay for the ranking spaces each time. Once you cancel your campaign, your traffic will diminish.
However, organic SEO also has its own downsides in the sense that it takes quite a long time for websites to rank. Conversely, paid search advertising can get the SEO job done faster. Whether a content creator chooses organic SEO or paid SEO, that depends on their business goals.
To summarize, SEO strategies continue to evolve with time. So do search engine algorithms get smarter each year. At the center of SEO, stand SEO experts, specialists, managers, and analysts among other professionals. The difference between an SEO expert and SEO is pretty much self-explanatory. SEO experts execute SEO principles to help content creators boost their visibility and web traffic.
For professional SEO consulting services, get in touch with Search Geeks. Our reputable team of SEO experts help clients to hit the top spot on Search Engine Results Pages (SERP) rankings.
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Location: 230 McCosh Rd., Montclair, NJ 07043
Phone: 973.264.9340