A presentation of the powers of SEO and how to properly use it!

1. The Power of SEO
By Jared Spears

2. What is SEO?
• Search Engine Optimization
• An essential tool for businesses to gain more online traffic

3. • 93% of all online experiences begin with a search engine

4. • Nearly 80% of users ignore paid ads in search results

5. Search Engines
• Google, Yahoo, Bing etc
• Search engines perform several activities in order to deliver search
results.
– Crawling
– Indexing
– Processing
– Retrieving results

6. Crawling
• The process of fetching all the web pages linked to a website. This
task is performed by software, called a crawler or a spider.

7. Indexing
• The process of creating an index for all the fetched web pages and
keeping them in a giant database from where it can be retrieved
later.
• Indexing is identifying the words and expressions that best
describe the page and assigning that page to particular keywords.

8. Processing
• After receiving a search request, the search engine compares the
search string in the search request with the database indexed
pages.

9. Retrieving Results
• At last, the best-matched results will be retrieved, which is nothing
but simply displaying them in the browser.

10. How does SEO help me?
• Improve Search Engine Ranking
• Brand Awareness
• Better Conversion Rates
• Engage With Your Customers

11. Where do I start?
• Research, Research, Research!
• Ask yourself, “What’s my intent?”
– Informational
– Navigational
– Commercial
– Transactional

12. Informational Intent
• Just like it says on the tin, people are trying to find information on
a specific topic.
• This approach is as simple as a Q & A approach

13. Navigational Intent
• Navigational intent is an internet search with the intent of finding
a specific website or web page. For example, the search query
“facebook” is navigational because the intent is to access
Facebook

14. Commercial Intent
• The process of evaluating the likelihood that someone searching
for a keyword becomes a lead or customer.
• People want to buy something sometime soon and are doing
research before making a purchase.

15. Transactional Intent
• People are looking to buy something after doing their commercial
intent searches.
• Find out which kinds of intent apply to you and try to match these
search intents, giving people what they want.

16. Now that you’ve done your research, it’s time to
jump into the code

17. Key Terms
• Focus Keyphrase
• Keyword Research
• Longtail Keywords
• Search Intent
• Metadata

18. Focus Keyphrase
• Is the search term that you want your page to rank for most. So
when people search for that phrase, they should find you
– Keyphrase length (maximum 4 words)
– Same keyphrase should not be used for more than one page of a website

19. Keyword Research
• Keyword research can be defined as the work you do to come up
with an extensive list of keywords you want to rank for.
• Extensive research should be done in order to narrow down the
list of keywords/phrases that you wish to rank for

20. Longtail Keywords
• Longtail kwywords are more specific and less common because
they focus more on a niche.
• The longer (and more specific) search terms are, the easier it will
be to rank for the term.

21. Search Intent
• Search Intent is all about discovering what a searcher actually
wants. These are not just keywords, but the underlying goals of
what a searcher wants to know, do or buy.
• Place yourself in your target audiences shoes and try to think how
they would

22. Metadata
• SEO metadata is what appears on search engine result pages
(SERP) when a website comes up for certain queries. It includes the
title of the page and its metadescription (descriptive text below
the title)

23. Keyphrase in Metadata
• Use in filename (easy to read) without stop words like a, the, or
and
• Use in the title at the beginning (between 50 and 75 characters)
– <title>Powers of SEO</title>
• Use in meta description (at the beginning). Description should be
120 to 155 characters
– <meta name=“description” content=“the power of SEO is immense and
should be used by all businesses.”>

24. Metadata = Free Advertising
• The title is the first thing to appear in the search results
• Use your description as a call to action to get more clicks and
engagement on your site

25. Keyphrase in Text
• Within the content of your page, add your keyphrase in the first
sentence of the text
• Optimal text length is not less than 300 words
• Studies suggest that keyphrase density should be between 0.5 and
3% of text (AKA don’t overdo it!)

26. Keyphrase in Images
• HTML allows you to add an alt tag to your image, a perfect place
to add your keyword
– <img src=“SEO.jpg” alt=“powers of SEO”>
• You can use your keyphrase in the title attribute as well
– <img src=“SEO.jpg” alt=“powers of SEO” title=“powers of SEO”>

27. Links
• Use outbound links (related content on other sites)
– Links to high quality conent that substantiates yours helps search engines
assign high relevance
– Holistic SEO (linking to content when it makes sense) benefits users and
search engines
• …are revealed in this official <a href=“http:..consumerreports.com”>report</a>

28. Links
• Use internal links (related content on the same site)
– Making your content findable helps search engines do their job
– It’s an opportunity to lead search engines to your most important content
• …find out more in our latest <a href=“landingPage.com”>ebook</a>

29. Conerstone Content
• Most important content on your site (with most popular
keywords)
• Less important but related content on your site should link to it
• It should be lengthy but readable:
– Consider your audience and visitors of your site
– Research says that words with 4 or more syllables are considered hard to
read online
– Sentences longer than 20 words are too long and hard to read online
– Paragraphs should be no longer than 7 or 8 sentences
– Alternate between long and short paragraphs

30. Appealing to the Eye
• Make your site readable and pleasing to the eye
• Use clean typeface and stay consistent throughout
• Font-size should be 16px
• Line height should be 1.5 for readability
• Studies show that optimal line length is between 50 and 75
characters (10-15 words)
• Use plenty of headings
• Make good use of images to break up text

31. Site Structure
• Structuring your website is crucial for both its usability and
findability.
• Having a clear site structure also leads to a better understanding
of your site by Google, helping ranking results

32. • Here’s an example of a bad website structure:

33. • Here’s an example of a good website structure:

34. Importance for Usability
• The structure of your website has a significant impact on the
experience of the user
• If visitors can’t find the products and information they’re looking
for, it’s not very likely they’ll become regular visitors or customers.

35. Importance for SEO
• Vastly raises your chances of ranking high with search engines
• It helps Google ‘understand’ your site
• It prevents you from competing with yourself
• It deals with changes on your website

36. How to Setup your Site Structure
• The ideal site structure looks something like:
– Homepage
– Categories (or sections)
– Subcategories (only for larger sites)
– Individual pages and posts

37. Navigation
• In addition to having a well-structured homepage, it’s also
important to create a clear navigation path on your site.
• Your site-wide navigation consists of two main elements: the
menu and the breadcrumbs.

38. The Menu
• The website menu is the most common aid for navigation on your
website and you want to make the best possible use of it.
• Visitors use your menu to find things on your website. It helps
them understand the structure of your website.
• That’s why the main categories on your site should all have a place
in the menu on your homepage.

39. Breadcrumbs
• Breadcrumbs are clickable links that are usually visible at the top
of a page or post.
• Breadcrumbs reflect the structure of your site. They help visitors
determine where they are on your site.

40. • Take a look at eBay’s landing page:

41. Maintaining your Site Structure
• Evaluate your menu
• Clean up outdated content
• Avoid keyword cannibalization

42. THANK YOU!