Downloaded 10 times
Uploaded byNate Plaunt
Seo 101
The document is an overview of Search Engine Optimization (SEO) principles and practices, discussing its importance in driving organic traffic, techniques for optimizing websites, and factors influencing search rankings. It covers both on-page and off-page SEO strategies, technical considerations, and tools for analysis and improvement. The content emphasizes the necessity of SEO for maintaining a competitive edge in the digital landscape.
More Related Content
Seo 101
- 1. | SEO 1011 SEO 101
- 2. | SEO 1012 Today’s Agenda: • Introduction • What to expect today • How search engines work • What is SEO? • Foundational SEO • On and off page basics
- 3. | SEO 1013 Nate Plaunt Sr. SEO Strategist @NatePlaunt bit.ly/1LoDdWN Today’s Presenters Taylor Pettis Sr. Marketing Manager @tpettis linkd.in/1dsZJAa
- 4. DOES SEARCH ENGINEOPTIMIZATION REALLY MATTER?
- 5. | SEO 1015 Organic Search is the #1 Driver of Website Traffic From a usage perspective, new studies have found that organic search drives 64% of all web traffic.
- 6. | SEO 1016 Search Engine Optimization FACT: 79% of search engine users say they always/frequently click on the natural search results.
- 7. | SEO 1017 A New Click Rate Study For Organic Results On average, 71.33% of searches resulted in a page one Google organic click. Page two and three get only 5.59% of the clicks. On the first page alone, the first 5 results account for 67.60% of all the clicks and the results from 6 to 10 account for only 3.73%. http://marketingland.com/new-click-rate-study-google-organic-results-102149 Page 1 = 71.33%
- 8. | SEO 1018 A New Click Rate Study For Organic Results Ads / Shopping Results Local / Map Results Organic Results 31% Click through 14% Click through
- 9. | SEO 1019 Does SEO Really Matter? YES! If you are not optimizing for search you are already behind your competition.
- 10. | SEO 10110 What to Expect: • A solid understanding of how search engines operate • Learn how to beat out your competition in the search engine results • Actionable tactics you can implement today • Tools to implement SEO
- 11. WHAT DID YOUSEARCH TODAY?
- 12. | SEO 10112 What Did You Search Today?
- 13. | SEO 10113 What Did You Search Today?
- 14.
- 15.
- 16. | SEO 10116 How Search Engines Work
- 17. | SEO 10117 • Over 200 “ranking factors” help to decide where your site ranks • Roughly 10,000 sub-factors • Fewer ranking factors in algorithm • Heavy reliance on social factors Search Engine Algorithm Key Components 1
- 18. | SEO 10118 Google’s Algorithm Key Components 1 Top 4 Components 1. Trust / Authority of the Host Domain 2. Popularity of the Specific Page 3. Anchor Text of External Links to the Page 4. On Page Keyword Usage According to 72 SEO’s Surveyed by Moz
- 19. | SEO 10119 U.S. Search Engine Market Share http://www.statista.com/statistics/267161/market-share-of-search-engines-in-the-united-states/ 64.2 % 20.2 % 12.7 % Everyone else 2.9 %
- 20. | SEO 10120 Not all results are organic Organic
- 21. | SEO 10121 What is SEO? Search engine optimization (SEO) is the process of affecting the visibility of a website or a web page in a search engine's "natural" or un-paid ("organic") search results. Source: Wikipedia
- 22. | SEO 10122 What is SEO? (Simplified) SEO is two things: 1. The practice of making your website as accessible as possible to search engines. 2. Ensuring your website is as useful and relevant as possible to your current and prospective customers.
- 23. SEARCH ENGINE OPTIMIZATION101 THE BASICS
- 24. | SEO 10124 SEO 101: Ensure your site is accessible to search engines. SEO 201: Ensure your site is relevant and useful to your visitors.
- 25. | SEO 10125 Technical and structural factors
- 26. | SEO 10126 Technical and structural factors • Goal: Ensure accessibility for Search Engines & Users • Foundation of your entire online presence, so it’s important to get it right • Search engines have very clear guidelines for webmasters to follow when building sites
- 27. | SEO 10127 What To Look For • Can your entire website be crawled? • Is your website indexed by the search engines? • Does your website have any errors? • Is your page load time too slow?
- 28. | SEO 10128 How You Can Do This • XML sitemap • Accurate robots.txt file • Google Search Console • Page speed optimization
- 29. | SEO 10129 What to Avoid Any unnecessary hurdle for the search engines • Flash • JavaScript • URL Parameters
- 30. | SEO 10130 Here’s What Humans See
- 31. | SEO 10131 Here’s What Search Engines See (not a glitch)
- 32. | SEO 10132 XML Sitemap The XML sitemap is a map of your website that enables search engines to efficiently crawl and index your site.
- 33. | SEO 10133 XML Sitemap Various tools can help you generate an accurate and up-to-date sitemap: • Screaming Frog Spider • CMS plugins like Yoast • Other web-based sitemap generators - www.xml-sitemaps.com
- 34. | SEO 10134 Robots.txt file The robots.txt file is a directive for all “bots” visiting your site. • It tells them what URLs to crawl or not crawl • Simple text file – can be created with notepad
- 35. | SEO 10135 Robots.txt file – *Pro Tip Use the Robots.txt testing tool in Google Search Console to troubleshoot errors in you file and to test individual URLs
- 36. | SEO 10136 Google Search Console Google Search Console (formerly Google Webmaster Tools) is a free resource with tons of valuable information available to all website owners. • https://www.google.com/webmasters/tools/home
- 37. | SEO 10137 Why Does Speed Matter? Last year, mobile search overtook desktop search. • The gap between mobile and desktop will widen • Fast page load speed is critical to optimizing for mobile • “Mobile-geddon”
- 38. | SEO 10138 Google PageSpeed Insights PageSpeed Insights is another free tool from Google that gives you a prioritized roadmap on how to fix speed issues on your site. • https://developers.google.com/speed/pagespeed/insights
- 39. | SEO 10139 On and Off Page Factors
- 40. | SEO 10140 On and Off Page Factors • Goal: Demonstrate Relevance and Authority • Search engines want to provide users with search results that are relevant to their query and authoritative in nature. • Building upon a sound technical structure, we make sure that search engines and users are able to fully understand what various pages on your website are about.
- 41. | SEO 10141 On-page SEO refers to factors that you can control directly on your website Examples of on-page factors are: • Metadata • Internal links • Content • Technical / Structural Off-page SEO refers to factors “out of your control” on other websites Examples of off-page factors are: • Inbound links • Social Media • Mentions • Local Directories On-Page vs. Off-Page SEO
- 42. | SEO 10142 What To Look For • Are your on page elements optimized? • What keywords are you ranking for? • Who is linking to you? • Who is linking to your competitors?
- 43. | SEO 10143 On Page SEO Elements • URL • Page Title • H1 heading • H2 headings • Meta Description • Page Copy • Alternative image text
- 44. | SEO 10144 On Page SEO Elements Page Title: Unique and descriptive URL: Descriptive and readable by both humans and search engines H1 Heading: Unique and descriptive H2 Headings: Sub-topics of the page Page Copy: Descriptive, unique, and keyword rich Alt Image Text: Descriptive and keyword rich
- 45. | SEO 10145 Page Title Good: Organic Result #1 Bad: Organic Result #245
- 46. | SEO 10146 URL structure Good: Organic Result #1 Bad: Organic Result #260
- 47. | SEO 10147 On Page SEO Elements Meta Descriptions
- 48. | SEO 10148 A Tale of Two Devices
- 49. | SEO 10149 A Tale of Two Devices
- 50. | SEO 10150 What Keywords Do You Rank For? Ground Rules: 1. Don’t “Google yourself” 2. Use a keyword tracking tool - SEM Rush (freemium) - Bright Local (paid)
- 51. | SEO 10151 What Keywords Do You Rank For?
- 52. | SEO 10152 Off Page SEO Elements • Backlinks • Link anchor text • Citations or Mentions
- 53. | SEO 10153 Internal vs. External Links (Backlinks) • Two types of links: Internal and External. • Internal links refer to links within your site, such as navigation links. • External links refer to links outside of your site, such as a link from Wikipedia. • Both are very useful, but for different reasons.
- 54. | SEO 10154 How do Backlinks Help? • Backlinks act as “votes” for pages on your site. • Generally speaking, the more links you have from authoritative sources, the more your site is trusted, and the better your pages will rank. YourWebsite.com NewsSite.com ProductSite.com IndustryBlog.com ShadySite.com
- 55. | SEO 10155 Link Anchor Text The words used in the anchor text of a link to your site helps search engines understand what that page is about. So, if your site is about “Cats” the anchor text cats would be preferable over click here.
- 56. | SEO 10156 Who is linking to you? Conduct a backlink audit: • Open your Google Search Console • Navigate to the “Links to Your Site” section • Check out who links the most and to what content • *Pro Tip: this will help
- 57. | SEO 10157 Who is linking to your competitors? Conduct a competitive link analysis: 1. Use Open Site Explorer - https://moz.com/researchtools/ose 2. Enter your competitor’s site into the search bar 3. Dig through their backlink profile 4. *Pro Tip: Identify where you can acquire some of the same links!
- 58. | SEO 10158 Citations Citations are essentially a mention of your brand on another site like a listing directory. • Yelp • Yellow Pages • City Search
- 59. | SEO 10159 Citations It is important that these listings maintain consistency and accuracy. • Name • Address • Phone Number *Check up on your listings using Moz Local - moz.com/local
- 60.
- 61. | SEO 10161 1. If done right, SEO is a distinct competitive advantage 2. Get the foundation right 3. Optimize your pages 4. Optimize your off page presence 5. Move up the pyramid… Review
- 62. | SEO 10162 SEO 101: Ensure your site is accessible to search engines. SEO 201: Ensure your site is relevant and useful to your visitors.
- 63. | SEO 10163 Measurement and Improvement
- 64. | SEO 10164 Questions?
- 65. | SEO 10165 1. Google Search Console 2. Google PageSpeed Insights 3. Screaming Frog SEO Spider 4. Yoast plugin for WordPress 5. XML Sitemap Generator 6. SEM Rush 7. Bright Local 8. Open Site Explorer 9. Moz Local Appendix – Tools Mentioned
Editor's Notes
- #13 This is a familiar image that most of us see everyday. When you type a search query into Google, how do those results come so fast? More importantly, what came up when you searched today?
- #14 Search engines do not crawl the web in real time, they categorize web pages in their index for easy retrieval
- #15 Like a library of all known information on the web
- #16 And instead of walking in, all you have to do is type
- #17 How do they do this…a mathematical algorithm (next slide)
- #18 Search engines use a mathematical algorithm to serve up search results for any given query. They have to, because any given day, 15% of all searches have never been searched before That means that of the 3.5 billion queries that happen on Google, 525 million of them are brand new. There are over x factors that influence the algorithm, but let’s focus on the top ones…. Keep in mind that it is always changing….
- #19 There are over x factors that influence the algorithm, but let’s focus on the top ones…. Keep in mind that it is always changing….
- #20 Data as of April 2015 Everyone else: AOL, Ask Jeeves
- #21 Organic results compete with paid and image results Organic results are typically more trusted than ads That’s why the top organic results are so valuable
- #30 In this step we’re really looking at making your site accessible Here are some things to avoid What happens when you have unnecessary road blocks for search engines?
- #41 Search engines want to stay in business – to do so they need people coming back. To be people coming back they need to provide the best answers to questions.
- #55 A shady link may be one that looks completely unnatural or comes from a totally unrelated site Search engines have filters that take the quality of links into account and tend to serve up pages with a trusted backlink profile Too many shady links can result in a penalty from Google so it’s best to just build links organically from providing the best content