On-page search engine optimisation (SEO), alongside the development of quality inbound links, is a vital aspect in gaining good search engine rankings and cultivating a healthy online presence. What you're doing essentially with on-page SEO is defining and honing aspects of your web presence directly under your control and making sure that your website is as search engine friendly as possible. Without adequate TLC sites stand far less chance of getting good results in the search engines - neglect leading to neglect. It's a process that surprisingly few organisations complete as thoroughly as they might. The name of the game is to create a synergy with your site content; on-page SEO should offer the holistic application of semantic space as defined during the requirements analysis and keyword definition stages.
Internal linking, content, conventions and off-page SEO need to work in harmony to create the right synergy. A topicality that defines site and subject identity helps the search engines acknowledge the site as relevant when addressing user queries.
Perhaps the most important aspect of good on-page SEO is generating quality content. Without useful and informative copy or content there's little reason for the visit page to exist in the first place.
It's becoming increasing clear that one of the most powerful SEO considerations when generating content is its ability to focus the topical theme of the site to target a specific niche.
Writing themed and relevant content as well as stimulating human readers excites the search engine spiders, which are constantly scouring the web for related material to share with others. You'll want to integrate the relevant keywords into the text to attract the search engines, but it's not something to get hung up on at the expense of a good read. The last thing people need to see when they visit a site are keywords and phrases shoehorned into an article. A 2-8% keyword density is recommended.
If your content is exceptional and manages to link to and from relevant sources, then it has the raw potential to be incorporated into a stella solution and the site is quickly elevated to an authority on its subject. It's authority that optimisation is trying to nurture and that delivers strong search engine returns and subsequent traffic.
It's worth bearing in mind that each page on your site can rank independently, with its own search position. If you group enough pages together around a topic or theme, their relevance can rub off on each other. By focusing on specific subject matter and range of content and by introducing new content regularly you can also increase the crawl rate, get indexed more regularly and be listed on a wider range of terms. Content is well and truly king and the search engines love it.
Search engines and spiders also love light, tight and clean code that lets then rip through a site, pulling out all the relevance and indexing it ready for retrieval. It's vital that the site can be easily crawled and indexed by search engines. From a search engine perspective, the best site in the world is unlikely to rank if the bot can't extract any content from it. Make sure that your code is valid; bad code can lead to search engines not being able to properly read a page. Use the W3C validator to check your mark-up.
Focus on internal linking. Link to your own pages from other pages in your site that have tremendous link weight. Internal link juice is critically important. The nature and quality of internal links to a page says a lot about the page, with contributory factors including the number of inbound links, placement of the inbound links within the linking pages, anchor text patterns, and the content of linking pages. This sends a clear signal to search engines that a phrase or a group of semantically related material is a predominant theme on your site. Make sure that the links within your site are complete, there are no spider blocks in the system and that the links also have a semantic relevance.
Other important on-page SEO considerations include:
- Keyword in title - this was cited as the number one on page factor by SEOmoz.org when their team of SEO experts evaluated the ten factors that have the most effect on Google's ranking algorithm. It's critical that your keyword or phrase is contained in the page title. It's your best chance to achieve a high ranking as well as your best chance to convert a searcher into a site visitor.
- Use H1 and H2 tags properly - your H1 tag should be near the top of your web page and include your most important keywords. Your second most important level of keywords should be listed in your H2 tag. If you have a third level, place it in an H3 tag.
- Keyword in Description - write a concise, informative description of your website, using your selected keywords. This description will appear in search engine result pages, it should attract to potential visitors.
- Domain Name - a domain name that features your keyword(s) or at least closely related words will also help boost your rankings. Similarly, sub-domain names and other inner page URLs should also use words that are relevant to your keywords.
- Meta Tags - a little old school but still worth applying. Google is not the only search engine and meta tags can be more important factors for other search engines. Insert your keywords in all meta tags, but don't over do it and risk penalization.
It's vital to stress again the importance of consistent semantic and topical relevance. The tighter the semantic phrases are, the more concentrated the effect for realising that particular phrase, particularly if you deploy it in your title, H1 tags, in the anchor text on the page and reference it in the first 25 words of the document, the middle and at the end of the page.
The search engines are evolving all the time and smart SEO must follow suit. If your main concerns when thinking of effective on-page SEO is on meta-tags and keywords, instead of thinking about usability, quality semantically themed content development, flawless information architecture and creating robust and dynamic websites that support their own rankings (authority sites), then it's time to speak to SEO Consult.
Contact Us today to discuss how we can apply our SEO expertise to enhance your Internet presence and win you more business.
