This document provides an in-depth guide to on-page SEO best practices for 2023. It covers optimizing title tags, meta descriptions, header tags, images, URL structure, and internal linking. For each element, it outlines best practices such as including focus keywords and unique, compelling content. It also warns against common mistakes like keyword stuffing. The goal is to enhance a website's visibility, drive organic traffic, and provide a better user experience through following these on-page SEO fundamentals.

1. The Ultimate Guide to
On-Page SEO in 2023
Dive deep into the world of on-page SEO with our comprehensive guide. Learn about
optimising title tags, crafting compelling meta descriptions, utilising header tags
effectively, enhancing images for SEO, and more. Discover best practices and common
pitfalls to avoid, ensuring your website ranks high and attracts quality traffic.
Introduction
In the ever-evolving landscape of digital marketing, Search Engine Optimisation (SEO)
remains a cornerstone of success. On-page SEO, in particular, plays a crucial role in
ensuring your website is search engine-friendly and ranks well for relevant queries. In
this guide, we will explore the key elements of on-page SEO, providing examples, best
practices, and highlighting common mistakes to steer clear of in 2023.

2. 1. Title Tags
Title tags hold paramount importance in on-page SEO, serving as the initial point of
interaction between your website and potential visitors in the search engine results
pages (SERPs). They are essentially the headline of your webpage, providing users and
search engines with a succinct summary of the content that lies within.
Best Practices:
Length: Aim to keep your title tags within the 50-60 character range. This ensures that
your title displays properly in the SERPs without being cut off, providing a clean and
user-friendly appearance.
Keyword Placement: Place your primary target keyword towards the beginning of the
title tag. Search engines give more weight to the words at the start, and it also ensures
visibility to users, even if the title is truncated in the SERPs.
Uniqueness: Ensure each page on your website has a unique title tag. This helps search
engines understand that each page offers distinct content, improving your site’s overall
SEO.
Brand Mention: If space permits, include your brand name towards the end of the title
tag. This can enhance brand recognition and trust, especially if your brand is
well-known.

3. Compelling Language: Use action-oriented and emotive language to make your title tags
compelling. Your goal is to capture the user’s attention and encourage them to click
through to your page.
Relevance: Ensure your title tag accurately reflects the content of the page. Misleading
titles can lead to high bounce rates, which can negatively impact your SEO.
Common Mistakes:
Keyword Stuffing: Avoid cramming multiple keywords into your title tag in an unnatural
way. This practice, known as keyword stuffing, can lead to penalties from search
engines and create a poor user experience.
Generic Titles: Steer clear of vague and generic titles. Instead, be specific and clear
about the content of the page. Generic titles like “Home Page” or “Product Page” don’t
provide any information about the content to users or search engines.
Duplication: Avoid using the same title tag across multiple pages. Duplicate title tags can
confuse search engines and dilute the ranking power of your pages.
Ignoring Click-Through Rate (CTR): Remember that the ultimate goal of your title tag is
to drive clicks from the SERPs. Even if you rank well, if your title tag isn’t compelling,
users may choose to click on a different result.
By adhering to these best practices and avoiding common pitfalls, your title tags can
significantly contribute to your on-page SEO efforts, driving traffic and improving your
site’s visibility in search engine results.
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2. Meta Descriptions

4. Meta descriptions play a crucial role in on-page SEO, acting as a brief yet compelling
summary of your page’s content. Positioned beneath the title tag in the search engine
results pages (SERPs), they provide potential visitors with insight into what your page
has to offer and why they should click through.
Best Practices:
Length: Aim to craft your meta descriptions within a 155-160 character limit. This
ensures that your entire message is visible in the SERPs, preventing it from being cut off
and potentially losing its impact.
Focus Keyword: Integrate your primary keyword naturally within the meta description.
This not only helps search engines understand the relevance of your page but also
highlights the keyword in bold when it matches a user’s search query, drawing additional
attention to your listing.
Unique Content: Ensure that each page on your website has a unique meta description.
This reinforces the uniqueness of each page’s content, providing clear and distinct value
to users and search engines.

5. Call-to-Action (CTA): Include a compelling call-to-action, encouraging users to click
through to your page. Phrases like “Learn more”, “Discover how”, or “Try for free” can
create a sense of urgency and curiosity.
Value Proposition: Clearly articulate the value or benefit that the user will gain from
visiting your page. What makes your content, product, or service stand out? Use this
space to sell your page’s unique value.
Readability: Ensure that your meta description reads naturally and fluently. Avoid
overcomplicating the language and focus on creating a user-friendly snippet that clearly
conveys the page’s content.
Common Mistakes:
Duplicate Descriptions: Avoid using the same meta description across multiple pages.
Duplicate descriptions can lead to confusion for both users and search engines, diluting
the perceived value of your content.
Keyword Stuffing: Resist the temptation to overload your meta description with
keywords. Not only does this create a poor user experience, but it can also result in
search engines perceiving your page as spammy.
Vague Descriptions: Steer clear of generic and vague descriptions. Be specific and
relevant, providing a clear preview of what the user can expect upon clicking through to
your page.
Neglecting Conversion Potential: Remember that your meta description is an opportunity
to convert a searcher into a visitor. Don’t underestimate the power of this small snippet
of text; use it to its full advantage to drive clicks and traffic.
By adhering to these best practices and avoiding common pitfalls, your meta
descriptions can serve as powerful tools in your on-page SEO arsenal, enhancing
visibility, driving clicks, and contributing to the overall success of your SEO strategy.
3. Header Tags (H1, H2, H3, etc.)

6. Header tags play a pivotal role in structuring content on a webpage, enhancing both
readability for users and crawlability for search engines. They create a hierarchical
structure of information, making it easier to navigate and understand the content
presented.
Best Practices:
H1 Tag: Ensure that each page on your website has one, and only one, H1 tag. This
should be used for the main title of the page and should encapsulate the primary topic or
focus. The H1 tag holds significant weight in SEO, so make sure it is descriptive and
includes the main keyword for the page.
Subheadings (H2, H3, etc.): Utilise H2 tags for main subheadings that divide your
content into major sections. Further break down these sections with H3 tags for

7. sub-subheadings, and so on. This creates a clear and logical structure, making your
content more digestible.
Keyword Integration: Include relevant keywords in your header tags where they naturally
fit. This helps search engines understand the context and relevance of your content.
However, ensure that the inclusion of keywords does not compromise the readability or
natural flow of the headings.
Conciseness and Clarity: Keep your header tags concise and to the point, clearly
reflecting the content that follows. Users should be able to scan the headings and gain a
good understanding of the content structure and main points covered.
Consistency: Maintain a consistent style and format for your header tags throughout
your website. This creates a cohesive user experience and reinforces the content
structure.
Common Mistakes:
Skipping Header Levels: Avoid jumping from one header level to a significantly lower
level (e.g., from H1 directly to H3). Follow a sequential and hierarchical order to maintain
a clear structure.
Overuse of Header Tags: Do not overuse header tags within your content. Use them to
structure and divide the content naturally, rather than attempting to force them into the
text.
Ignoring Header Tags: Some content creators neglect the importance of header tags,
resulting in large blocks of text without clear division. This can lead to a poor user
experience and make it harder for search engines to understand the content.
Styling Over Structure: Avoid using header tags purely for styling purposes. The primary
function of header tags is to structure content, and their use should reflect the hierarchy
of information on the page.
By following these best practices and avoiding common mistakes, you can effectively
use header tags to enhance the structure and SEO of your content, leading to a better
user experience and improved search engine rankings.

8. 4. Image Optimisation
Optimising images is a crucial aspect of on-page SEO, ensuring that they contribute
positively to page load times, user experience, and search engine rankings. Properly
optimised images can enhance the visual appeal of your website, keep users engaged,
and provide additional context to search engines.
Best Practices:
Descriptive File Names: Choose clear and descriptive file names for your images. This
helps search engines understand the content of the image and its relevance to the page.
Incorporate relevant keywords where appropriate, but ensure it naturally describes the
image.
Alt Text: Always include descriptive alt text for your images. Alt text provides a textual
description of the image, which is used by screen readers for visually impaired users and
displayed when an image fails to load. It also helps search engines understand the
content of the image, contributing to image SEO.

9. Image Compression: Compress your images to reduce their file size, ensuring faster
page load times without compromising quality. There are various tools and plugins
available that can automate this process.
Image Dimensions: Resize your images to the appropriate dimensions before uploading
them to your website. Uploading excessively large images and relying on CSS to resize
them can lead to unnecessary increases in page load time.
Responsive Images: Ensure your images are responsive and display correctly across all
devices. Utilise the ‘srcset’ attribute to provide multiple image sizes, allowing the browser
to select the most appropriate size based on the user’s device.
Image Format: Choose the right image format. Formats like JPEG are generally best for
photographs, while PNG is preferable for images with transparency. WebP is a newer
format that provides excellent compression and quality.
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Common Mistakes:
Overly Large Images: Avoid using images with unnecessarily large file sizes, as they can
significantly slow down page load times, negatively impacting user experience and SEO.
Neglecting SEO: Images can contribute to your website’s SEO, so don’t neglect them.
Ensure all images are optimised and contribute positively to your on-page SEO efforts.
Missing Alt Text: Failing to provide alt text for images is a common mistake. Alt text is
crucial for accessibility and provides additional context to search engines, enhancing
your image SEO.
Inconsistent Image Sizes: Using inconsistent image sizes across your website can lead
to a disjointed user experience. Ensure images are consistently sized and styled.
By following these best practices and avoiding common mistakes, you can ensure that
your images are optimised for both users and search engines, contributing to improved
page load times, enhanced user experience, and better on-page SEO.

10. 5. URL Structure
A well-structured URL is crucial for both user experience and search engine
optimisation. It provides a clear indication of the page content and structure, making it
easier for users to navigate and for search engines to crawl and index your site.
Best Practices:
Brevity and Descriptiveness: Aim for URLs that are short, yet descriptive. Users and
search engines should be able to understand the content of the page just from the URL.
Avoid unnecessary words and focus on the key terms that describe the page.
Use of Hyphens: Separate words in URLs using hyphens rather than underscores.
Search engines like Google treat hyphens as space, but underscores are not treated as
space. For example, “blue-widgets” is interpreted as two words: “blue” and “widgets”,
whereas “blue_widgets” is interpreted as one word: “blue_widgets”.
Inclusion of Keywords: Include relevant keywords in your URLs, for example
https://www.firstpageseoagency.co.za. This can contribute to improved search engine
rankings and provide users with a clear indication of the page content.
Consistent Structure: Maintain a consistent URL structure across your website. This
helps users to predict the URL for a particular page and provides a cleaner and more
organised site architecture.

11. Lowercase Letters: Use lowercase letters in your URLs. URLs are case-sensitive, so
using lowercase letters avoids any confusion or issues with duplicate content.
Avoidance of Special Characters: Steer clear of using special characters in your URLs.
These can cause issues with browsers and are not SEO-friendly.
Use of HTTPS: Ensure your website is secure by using HTTPS rather than HTTP. This
encrypts data transferred between the user and the site, providing a secure browsing
experience.
Common Mistakes:
Lengthy URLs: Avoid using unnecessarily long URLs. These can be difficult for users to
read and remember, and can also be truncated in the search engine results pages.
Use of Underscores: Do not use underscores to separate words in URLs. Search
engines treat underscores as characters rather than space, which can impact how they
interpret the words in the URL.
Overuse of Keywords: Avoid stuffing URLs with multiple keywords. This can appear
spammy to search engines and users, and can negatively impact your site’s credibility.
Inconsistent URL Structures: Using inconsistent URL structures across your site can
lead to a confusing user experience and can make it more difficult for search engines to
crawl and index your site.
By adhering to these best practices and avoiding common mistakes, you can create
clean, descriptive, and SEO-friendly URLs that enhance user experience, improve
search engine rankings, and contribute to the overall success of your on-page SEO
strategy.
6. Internal Linking

12. Internal linking is a vital component of on-page SEO, serving to interconnect various
pages within your website. This not only aids in distributing page authority across your
site but also enhances user navigation, guiding visitors to relevant and valuable content.
Best Practices:
Descriptive Anchor Text: Utilise clear and descriptive anchor text for your internal links.
This text should give users and search engines an accurate indication of the content
they will find on the linked page. Avoid vague terms like “click here” and instead, use
relevant keywords that reflect the content of the destination page.
Relevance is Key: Ensure that you are linking to content that is genuinely relevant and
provides additional value to the user. This could be related articles, product pages, or
any other content that enhances the user’s understanding or experience of the current
page.
Link to High-Quality Pages: Prioritise linking to pages that are well-constructed, offer
valuable content, and have the potential to convert visitors. This not only improves the
user experience but also helps in distributing authority to key pages on your site.

13. Check for Broken Links: Regularly audit your website to ensure that all internal links are
working correctly and not leading to broken or non-existent pages. Broken links can
harm user experience and negatively impact your site’s SEO.
Natural Link Placement: Incorporate internal links naturally within your content. The links
should feel like a seamless part of the text, rather than being forcefully inserted.
Balanced Link Distribution: Aim for a balanced distribution of internal links across your
website, ensuring that no page is overloaded with links while others are neglected. This
helps in evenly distributing page authority and improving the overall SEO of your site.
Common Mistakes:
Over-Optimisation: Avoid using overly optimised anchor text for all your internal links.
This can appear manipulative to search engines and may result in penalties.
Excessive Internal Linking: While internal linking is beneficial, overdoing it can lead to a
cluttered and overwhelming user experience. Ensure that each link serves a purpose
and adds value.
Neglecting Link Opportunities: On the flip side, don’t miss out on opportunities to include
internal links. When relevant, guide users to additional content that might interest them.
Using Generic Anchor Text: Avoid using generic and non-descriptive anchor text like
“click here” or “read more”. These do not provide any context about the linked content
and can result in missed SEO opportunities.
By following these best practices and avoiding common pitfalls, you can leverage
internal linking to enhance user experience, improve site navigation, and boost your
on-page SEO, ultimately contributing to the success and visibility of your website.
Conclusion
Mastering on-page SEO is a continual process of optimisation and refinement. By paying
attention to these critical elements and adhering to best practices, you can enhance your
website’s visibility, drive organic traffic, and provide a better experience for your visitors.

14. Stay updated, stay ahead, and watch your website flourish in the SERPs in 2023 and
Speak to an SEO expert in South Africa for more guidance.
Source: https://www.digitalmarketspace.co.za/the-ultimate-guide-to-on-page-seo-in-2023