By Rieva Lesonsky
SEO specialists understand knowing the algorithms of today, doesn’t mean you’ll still be in the know tomorrow. According to Advertising Age, companies are replacing their marketing directors in droves because they need people with a better handle on digital marketing. That means SEO in 2017 will focus more on proving the ROI.
Is your SEO up to par? At my company we’re still educating ourselves on what works and what’s a waste of time. It’s a constant game we’re playing and, like you, I get frustrated when Google constantly changes the rules. As CEO, I wish I had more time to really dig into the nitty gritty of the SEO world. Instead, I read all I can, ask my SEO smart friends and test—and then test again.
But I do have some tips forgetting great organic SEO results? Here’s what I’ve learned:
- Update your plugins: I know it sounds basic, but particularly for SEO purposes you need to keep on top of your plugin updates. Without weighing down (and slowing down) your website with too many plugins, your SEO plugin will help you craft the best possible keyword dense post, plus show you your snippet before you publish. Let the experts guide you to the best SEO for your website.
- Anchor text diversity: Once you find a winning anchor text (hyperlinking to relevant pages on your website), do not overuse it. A major mistake in SEO is trying to rank your site by loading it with a high volume of one particular anchor text for your links. The practice is frowned on by Google and will actually lower your ranking.
- Link relevance: The days of linking just for linking sake is way past. Search engines want your content to have a variety of relevant inbound links from relevant and complementary sites and businesses, or sites with similar content.
- Sponsored links: I can’t tell you how many requests I get for placing links in already existing content (we don’t do this) but Google knows this happens and may strip your ranking or keep you low when your domain is associated with paid linking. Establish relationships with high-quality websites by adding valuable content the site wants to link with.
- Rich Answers: Notice how the best answer to a search is now boxed at the top before the other results? According to Stone Temple Consulting, rich answers appear on 19.45% of Google search resultsout of the 850,000 keyword queries used to trigger these. Why not make the effort and your goal to be in that Rich Answer box? Use string keywords, start your headline with a command, be clear and unambiguous, include a tag and keep the blurb short.
I already know more questions are forming in your minds and I want to help! Why not join me and a panel of SEO experts at the NextCon SEO Powerhouse: Excelling at Organic Search on Tuesday, November 15, 2016 in Scottsdale, AZ. Register today.
