The document provides tips for reducing anxiety around SEO best practices. It recommends including meta descriptions of 150-160 characters that are unique beyond the first sentence. Images should be relevant and have descriptive alt text rather than keyword stuffed text. Flesch Reading Ease scores should be lower but consider audience education level. Keywords in URLs, subheadings, and 5 times in 314 words are recommended but variations are okay. Content length of 300+ words is best for SEO.

1. Stop the Green Light
Panic: Reducing Your
SEO Anxiety

2. The Page of Doom

3. Meta Descriptions
• Absolutely necessary
• 150-160 characters (w/spaces)
• Don’t just use your first sentence, write
something unique.
• Primary keyword is best, but don’t angst
over not getting it in proper.

4. The Page of Doom

5. Images
• Very beneficial, but only when they are
relevant.
• Make sure you are using alt tags that are
descriptive of the image.
• DO NOT USE ALT TAGS AS KEYWORD
STUFFING OPPORTUNITIES
• Ideally the image is related to your
keyword and therefore it will be natural to
have it in the alt

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7. Flesch Reading Ease
• The Flesch readability score uses the
sentence length (number of words per
sentence) and the number of syllables per
word in an equation to calculate the
reading ease.
• Lower is better, but consider the education
level of your target audience.
• Adjust based on readership and the content
you are presenting, not this metric.

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9. Keyword in URL
• Very important
• Use WordPress’ automatic slug generator
and editing tools to your advantage.

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11. Outbound Links
• Beneficial, but not critical for all sites.
• Outbound links basically give your site more
credit as a reputable source.
• If your page doesn’t lend itself naturally to
outbound links, don’t force it.
• If you use outbound links, make sure the
destination is reputable (i.e. no
malware/spam sites, .edu or .gov are best)

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13. Keyword in Sub-heads
• Very beneficial
• H2s are your friend, use them!
• Not all sub-heads need the keyword/phrase
if it doesn’t make sense or is too repetitive.

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15. Keyword Density
• 5x keyword in 314 words is overkill.
• Shoot for at least once in the sub-heads
and 1-2 times in copy this short.
• Try variations of your focus keyword rather
than repetition:
Focus: best 90s songs
Variations: best songs of the 90s, best songs
from the 90s, top 90s songs

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17. Page Title Length
• Listen to Yoast

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19. Keyword Use in Title
• Listen to Yoast
• Try to get it in the front, but if it doesn’t
read properly, forget this “rule”

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21. Content Length
• 300 words is the barest minimum.
• Short content can be appropriate for things
like short lead-ins to on-page video.
• A ‘short’ blog should be 500-600 words.

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23. Unique Focus Keyword
• Good for sites with a little content, but
when you start building up a big blog roll,
you’ll need to reuse some keywords.
• Duplicate keywords when they are ones you
really want to focus on and speak to your
core site purpose.

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25. First Paragraph
• Absolutely necessary
• If you’re not putting your focus keyword in
your first paragraph – your first sentence
even – why is it your focus?

26. What are your SEO frustrations?
Lisa Melegari
Calico Content
www.calicocontent.com
@calicowebcont