If you run a website, whether an eCommerce store or a business
website you might know how challenging it is to keep up with the online pace.
You surely want to get more traffic, quality leads, make more sales, and up
your returns on investment, but the major wheel- SEO, seems to get you nowhere.
You ought to know that SEO is in different forms i.e local SEO,
technical SEO, On-page SEO, and Off-page SEO. These involve a range of
practices that effectively optimize a website to rank higher on SERPs.
Precisely, local SEO is the practice of improving a website’s
quality to appear in local searches. Findings indicate that over 45% of all
searches on Google have local intent and there are so many ways businesses can
improve their local ranking on the search engine.
Technical SEO on the other hand is the core of website
optimization. It involves website architecture, crawling, indexing, and
rendering. The different aspects of technical SEO must be prioritized while
developing a site. However, a website manager must continue analyzing a site’s
performance to deal with possible errors.
Off-page SEO involves activities that are conducted outside the
site but they help it rank better on search engines. There are different
off-page optimization practices and they include backlink building, local
listing, guest blogging, and social media marketing. Besides these vital SEO
facets, there is also On-page SEO. This article explores the different on-page
SEO tactics that you can consider to improve your site’s rankings, brand
awareness, and online presence. Let’s take a deep dive into the subject.
On-page SEO Practices
On-page SEO refers to the tactics that a website manager uses on
the site to improve its quality. These practices help website users enjoy
better experiences as they navigate the site. On-page optimization plays a
vital role in user experience.
When neglected, a site’s rankings may be affected alongside other
concerns like credibility, sales, and revenue. But when kept in check, on-page
SEO can improve a site’s visibility, customer retention, ROI, etc. So, let’s
look at the different on-page SEO techniques you can consider for your site.
Actionable On-Page SEO Techniques for Your Site in 2023
There are many on-page SEO strategies you can leverage to keep
your site competitive, but here are the tactics you can start with;
1. Site Audit
A website audit is simply an examination of your site to attain
insights into its performance. Although a website may suffer no glitches, there
are different concerns it must be evaluated for to keep it optimized for users
and search engines. A website audit is intended to assess the efficiency of a
site and it can be done on a weekly or monthly basis.
During the evaluation, you can check for broken links, and
technical errors, and analyze website design among other elements. A
comprehensive checkup can help you keep your site up-to-date, improve
conversions, and stand out on SERPs.
2. Voice Optimization
Unlike decades ago, technologies are helping digital marketers
take their campaigns to higher heights. The latest technological capabilities
cater to voice optimization or voice SEO. It refers to the optimization of
keywords for voice search. In this case, the content is optimized with keyword
phrases that voice assistants detect to offer answers to online users who
search with voice.
Optimizing content for voice search extends its reach and enables
a site to stay relevant. If you optimize your site and content for voice
search, simply know that you’re pacing to the future. More than 40% of internet
users in the US use a voice assistant monthly and the figures are expected to
increase, according to Insider Intelligence.
Optimizing a website for voice helps users of all kinds access it
which improves traffic. Moreso, it helps the site improve conversions. Some of
the best practices for voice search optimization include optimizing for local SEO, targeting long tail keywords, using
schema markup, and Google featured snippets among others.
3. Competitor Research
Running a website is like operating a brick-and-mortar store. You
need to keep your competitors in check otherwise you might miss out on a lot
and lag behind. All you have to do is conduct a competitor analysis to discover
your competitors’ strengths, weaknesses, and the marketing tactics they
leverage on their sites. A competitors analysis will also help you discover
online opportunities and understand the latest trends in the online realm. You
will surely understand the mistakes you’re making on your site and eliminate
them to boost your site’s rankings.
Analyze major competitor websites, starting with their website
designs, content quality, keywords, and CTAs among others. These will help you
improve website navigation and traffic.
4. Quality Content
A competitive website requires more than just content. It needs
unique and high-quality content created with the target audience in mind.
Besides that, you must ensure that your site’s content meets search engine
guidelines. Keep the following in mind when creating content for your website.
Core Web Vitals- These are metrics that Google leverages to measure a site’s
overall user experience. They comprise “ Largest Contentful Paint (LCP)” which
indicates the time it takes for the main content of a page to load.
The second metric is “First Input Delay (FID)”. It points to the
time a user waits to interact with a page. Precisely, the time it takes a page
to become interactive and it’s usually 100 milliseconds. Lastly, it’s the
“Cumulative Layout Shift (CLS)”. This points to the number of layout shifts
that users experience on a page.
E-E-A-T- This metric is among the Quality Rater Guidelines (QRG) and it was
E-A-T before it became E-E-A-T. It translates to experience, expertise,
authoritativeness, and trustworthiness. Any quality content creator must follow
E-E-A-T and copywriting tips to produce high-quality content for online users.
This aspect of Google’s guidelines indicates that the content
creator has first-hand experience with the topic. Demonstrating first-hand
experience, helps a content creator foster and maintain trust. With that,
consider the reputation of the sites and contributors you use while creating
your content or the links you include in the content.
On the other hand, you can follow pillar pages and topic clusters.
These help content creators thoroughly delve into topics and showcase their
expertise in a given niche. Also, make your content easy to skim.
5. Keywords Analysis
Keywords are still essential for effective on-page SEO practices.
Conduct thorough keyword research to identify the keywords you can incorporate
into your content. Quality keywords point to the search terms that your target
audience uses while searching for services or products online.
Depending on your goal, leverage keywords that optimize your
content and site for the right customers. Investing time in searching for
quality keywords and utilizing them effectively on the site helps to reach
goals easily.
However, set metrics (Key performance indicators) to indicate the
performance of your keywords. Marketing KPIs can help you track the performance of your site effectively
or guide your change implementation strategies.
6. Meta Descriptions & Page Title Optimization
A meta description is merely a summary of a page’s or website’s
content. It tells the online users what the page or site is all about. Meta
descriptions must have 150 characters or between 150 and 160. They must be
written in a way that convinces online users to click on a page. Apart from
that, page title optimization is also important for performing web pages.
A page title is merely the heading of a web page that an online
user clicks on to interact with the site. Good page titles must have less than
60 characters and should have relevant keywords to improve rankings. You can
also write short descriptions, which are the overview of a topic. For
frictionless navigation on a site, include a header too.
7. Internal Linking
If there is anything that you must do to improve organic traffic,
conversions, and sales, is internal linking. Internal linking precisely refers
to the practice of inserting links in a page’s content. However, these links
must direct your visitors to your site. In simple words, internal links take
visitors from one page of your site to another.
Internal linking is an effective way to boost website performance.
Besides that, it helps Google to find, understand and index your site. All you
have to do is to avoid stuffing links and ensure that you use relevant ones.
8. Mobile Responsiveness
Over 4.32 billion people worldwide access the internet using
mobile phones and can you imagine the amount of traffic you can get from that?
Mobile responsiveness in SEO refers to the practice of adapting a site or its
content to fit the user’s device.
There are many ways a website design can improve SEO, but everything starts with responsiveness. When you ensure
that your website is responsive, it enables more internet users to access it
from all devices. In so doing, this improves the site’s traffic and rankings.
Bottom Line
SEO or search engine optimization is an ongoing process of
improving a site’s quality to help it rank higher on SERPs, boost conversions,
generate leads, and improve ROI. However, marketers and website managers must
follow competent tactics to attain the desired results.
This article throws more light on the different on-page SEO techniques that can improve a site’s performance. Whether you’re an eCommerce site or a business website, leveraging these practices will help you improve your site’s performance.
