On-page SEO Basics
SEO has traditionally divided into two main areas:
- on-page optimisation,
which covers what can be done on the pages of the website itself
- off-page optimisation,
which covers activity that takes place elsewhere (e.g. link-building)
The majority
of on-page SEO is not seen on by visitors to your website. Instead, the bulk of it is written in the HTML
code of your site. Therefore, the majority of the tips, in this blog need to
be undertaken by your web developer; however it’s still important for you, the
website owner, to understand what is needed, in order to ensure that you are benefitting
from the best possible on-page SEO practices on your website.
Content: This is the most
important component of your website. Make sure that you have unique content on every page of your
website. With so much competition out
there these days, you need to ensure that your text easily and clearly conveys
who you are and what your website is about, in a manner that is professional,
well-researched and is of value to both your exisiting clients and potential
new customers. Take the time to write, or have written for you, unique content
that is well-constructed, informative and relevant to your business. If you are having your content written for
you, take the time to read it carefully and make sure it’s saying what you want
it to say - this content represents your business and so the quality of the
writing and information is all-important.
Headings: Ensure that your headings have heading
tags. You may wonder why heading tags are necessary when you could achieve the
same effect simply by using a larger font. However, headings are pieces of HTML
code that allow you to make certain words stand out on a page, and search
engines pay special attention to these words.
Page title: When looking at a
search results page you will see a blue clickable link. This is the title tag
of your website. Your page title is written with both people
and search engines in mind. Rather than having your Home page simply called
‘Home’, be sure instead to include your business name, and keywords that are relevant
to the content of the page.
Meta description and keywords:
Each page should have its own description and keywords. While less emphasis is
placed on keywords these days, the description is still considered important.
If you do not include your own description, search engines will often use the
first line or two of the content from that page. This may not be the best indication
of what your page is about, and so it’s important to take the time to include a
short summary the page’s content in the meta description.
Alt image attribute: Make sure
that you label all of your images with a descriptive alt attribute. Alt tags
are used in the HTML code to describe images on a web page. Since search
engines cannot see images, they use alt text (along with other factors) to
determine what the image is and how relevant it is to the content of your site
and to a particular search.
HTML sitemap: This is a sitemap
intended for humans and is an easy way to supply your visitors with a snapshot
of the structure of your website, allowing them to navigate quickly and successfully
through your site. HTML sitemaps also help build up Internal links on your
entire website (an internal link is one that points to another page on the same
website).
As with anything
that has to do with search engine optimisation, there is no one miracle step
you can take that will see your site on page 1 tomorrow. SEO is much like baking a cake - it takes a
number of ingredients, each as important as the other - to make it work. You need
to do all that you possibly can to make your website competitive with others in
your business or industry. However, if you can keep this basic checklist in
mind, you will be heading in the right direction.
Written by
+Denise Angus
