How to perform Search Engine Optimisation (SEO)
Discussion
Crikey.
I've done this on and off for many years.
Google changed the game with their SEO and it's very much a dark-art to getting good results. Good SEO will require every part of your website to be optimised, which is a bit like car cleaning - a quick wash to be presentable, or a complete detailing for 'best in show'.
Depending on your technical knowledge, you could certainly have a go at it yourself. There are loads of free learning resources around, such as:
https://moz.com/beginners-guide-to-seo
Google also have some good resources too.
A lot will depend on how your website is built: Did you commission someone to do it, or is from one of the popular 'template' sites? Often the template sites have built in SEO tools that you can play with, which is often sufficient. If someone has built it for you, you'll have to speak with them firstly, as you'll need access to the code.
My knowledge isn't current - I stopped when it became a specialist skill. The last agency I worked at had a department dedicated to this .You can buy the services of Web agencies who will provide this for you (for a decent fee of course). Alternatively you could hire someone on a contract basis to advise.
I'd probably combine it with a budget for Google Ads, which you certainly can run yourself (bidding on keywords for searches).
Not sure if that's very useful, but a lot depends on what you're wanting to achieve, and much budget you can throw at it.
I've done this on and off for many years.
Google changed the game with their SEO and it's very much a dark-art to getting good results. Good SEO will require every part of your website to be optimised, which is a bit like car cleaning - a quick wash to be presentable, or a complete detailing for 'best in show'.
Depending on your technical knowledge, you could certainly have a go at it yourself. There are loads of free learning resources around, such as:
https://moz.com/beginners-guide-to-seo
Google also have some good resources too.
A lot will depend on how your website is built: Did you commission someone to do it, or is from one of the popular 'template' sites? Often the template sites have built in SEO tools that you can play with, which is often sufficient. If someone has built it for you, you'll have to speak with them firstly, as you'll need access to the code.
My knowledge isn't current - I stopped when it became a specialist skill. The last agency I worked at had a department dedicated to this .You can buy the services of Web agencies who will provide this for you (for a decent fee of course). Alternatively you could hire someone on a contract basis to advise.
I'd probably combine it with a budget for Google Ads, which you certainly can run yourself (bidding on keywords for searches).
Not sure if that's very useful, but a lot depends on what you're wanting to achieve, and much budget you can throw at it.
Edited by Big Nanas on Tuesday 31st January 16:13
Edited by Big Nanas on Tuesday 31st January 16:14
Unless you have a lot of time, patience, money or knowledge (lots) I wouldn’t bother but I guess what you are prepared to spend all depends on how much you stand to gain from a high ranking.
Don’t listen to the ‘guaranteed no1/high ranking’ rubbish you will hear if you decide to pay.
Adwords can work well if you do not have to bid against loads of your wealthy competitors.
I stopped doing it when the ‘big boys’ stepped in as I was having to bid £1+ per click to get any kind of visibility.
Don’t listen to the ‘guaranteed no1/high ranking’ rubbish you will hear if you decide to pay.
Adwords can work well if you do not have to bid against loads of your wealthy competitors.
I stopped doing it when the ‘big boys’ stepped in as I was having to bid £1+ per click to get any kind of visibility.
I used to get loads of spam from people offering me SEO services.
Mostly from outfits google couldn't even find.
How far up the pages you come on google depends mostly on how much google is making from you, plus what google knows about the browsing habits of whoever is 'searching'.
The problem is you may think you've done some SEO, but you need to know what search experience the people who you want to find you are getting.
It might be nice if search engines never put me high up the list when the people searching are time wasting morons... Or bots.
The internet is not what it was.
Mostly from outfits google couldn't even find.
How far up the pages you come on google depends mostly on how much google is making from you, plus what google knows about the browsing habits of whoever is 'searching'.
The problem is you may think you've done some SEO, but you need to know what search experience the people who you want to find you are getting.
It might be nice if search engines never put me high up the list when the people searching are time wasting morons... Or bots.
The internet is not what it was.
Friend of mine has a business where he gets a lot of his leads from the web, using SEO/Adwords. I don't pretend to understand the finer technical details but having had sight of some of the machinations, it's a very complex business to get right and to get good results from. He spends a significant amount of money (£several thousand/month) both on people running the SEO and on paying Google.
Don't want you to teach you to suck eggs but here's what you need to do at a minimum:
See how your site is currently performing:
https://pagespeed.web.dev/
Or
https://tools.pingdom.com/
Setup Google search console and fix errors it identifies:
https://search.google.com/u/0/search-console
Setup Google analytics:
https://analytics.google.com/analytics
Make sure you have active FB, Twitter, Insta, YT, TikTok, LinkedIn etc pages.
Make sure you are using a CDN. Cloudflare has a free offering for sites:
https://www.cloudflare.com/
Make sure you have listed your website on Yahoo, Bing & Google.
Install Yoast SEO if you are using wordpress and complete it's recommendations like making sure you have the sitemap, robots.txt and pictures have descriptions etc.
The rest is ensuring your pages have relavent new content and terms you want to rank for.
If you do all that and still are not ranking how you want, then you may want to approach an SEO company (I have worked with successfully with a few in the past across a few different companies).
See how your site is currently performing:
https://pagespeed.web.dev/
Or
https://tools.pingdom.com/
Setup Google search console and fix errors it identifies:
https://search.google.com/u/0/search-console
Setup Google analytics:
https://analytics.google.com/analytics
Make sure you have active FB, Twitter, Insta, YT, TikTok, LinkedIn etc pages.
Make sure you are using a CDN. Cloudflare has a free offering for sites:
https://www.cloudflare.com/
Make sure you have listed your website on Yahoo, Bing & Google.
Install Yoast SEO if you are using wordpress and complete it's recommendations like making sure you have the sitemap, robots.txt and pictures have descriptions etc.
The rest is ensuring your pages have relavent new content and terms you want to rank for.
If you do all that and still are not ranking how you want, then you may want to approach an SEO company (I have worked with successfully with a few in the past across a few different companies).
The #1 thing to remember is that's individual pages that rank, not whole websites.
So what you do is pick your key pages and optimise them. You may even actively delist some minor pages by tagging them "noIndex". The most important is obviously your home page. You have to optimise the content and text. Use something like the Hemmingway editor and make sure your images are well sized, optimised and tagged.
Ranking is also a product of domain authority . That's a product of your content, the number of backlinks you have & also how long your domain has been up for. If the top ranking site has been running for 10 years and you have just started you won't overtake them any time soon, if ever. Start by registering your site in trade index sites and directories, each one will create a link to your site. Find other legitimate and relevant sites you can link with. NEVER pay anyone to build you a load of backlinks. It's Googles equivalent of spam email and about as popular There is no shortcut.
Mobile performance is also key so use things like Google pagespeed and other tools to ensure your site is loading as fast as it can. It may need tweaking in the back end for things like combining Java script & CSS & remove render blocking resources etc.
The really dark art comes with PPC advertising. Does it make a difference to your organic search results if you are also paying for ppc? Who knows but it's probably naive to think it doesn't, especially if others are paying for it. PPC is a very black art in terms of its setup, you can waste a lot of money very quickly with it. Go to a specialist ( and ignore calls from Googles "experts"!).
There are lots if tools around that you can use to measure the performance of your site ( and your competitors). Also check your domain authority against theirs etc
Last in the equation is also your Web host. You need a good one if you expect to affect the rankings. If you are paying 3 quid a month for web hosting you are likely to get what you pay for. See something like Siteground for a recognised and high performance platform.
So what you do is pick your key pages and optimise them. You may even actively delist some minor pages by tagging them "noIndex". The most important is obviously your home page. You have to optimise the content and text. Use something like the Hemmingway editor and make sure your images are well sized, optimised and tagged.
Ranking is also a product of domain authority . That's a product of your content, the number of backlinks you have & also how long your domain has been up for. If the top ranking site has been running for 10 years and you have just started you won't overtake them any time soon, if ever. Start by registering your site in trade index sites and directories, each one will create a link to your site. Find other legitimate and relevant sites you can link with. NEVER pay anyone to build you a load of backlinks. It's Googles equivalent of spam email and about as popular There is no shortcut.
Mobile performance is also key so use things like Google pagespeed and other tools to ensure your site is loading as fast as it can. It may need tweaking in the back end for things like combining Java script & CSS & remove render blocking resources etc.
The really dark art comes with PPC advertising. Does it make a difference to your organic search results if you are also paying for ppc? Who knows but it's probably naive to think it doesn't, especially if others are paying for it. PPC is a very black art in terms of its setup, you can waste a lot of money very quickly with it. Go to a specialist ( and ignore calls from Googles "experts"!).
There are lots if tools around that you can use to measure the performance of your site ( and your competitors). Also check your domain authority against theirs etc
Last in the equation is also your Web host. You need a good one if you expect to affect the rankings. If you are paying 3 quid a month for web hosting you are likely to get what you pay for. See something like Siteground for a recognised and high performance platform.
Gassing Station | Computers, Gadgets & Stuff | Top of Page | What's New | My Stuff