SEO and YOU

The question The Squirrel gets most often is “How do I design my posts, page, or site for search engine optimization (SEO)?”

Well, I’ve got some simple SEO tips for you.

For starters, there are a few very basic posts on this site that you might want to read first: One is about the new Google search and how it may affect keyword searching, and another about Google Analytics basics. There is also one on the importance of using Pretty URLs. All of these will help with search engine optimization and finding the right keywords.

In a recent blogging class, they went over some good, basic SEO tips. Since you probably weren’t there in the class, I’ll share those tips with you.

SEO Basics

First up, if you’re familiar with Analytics, (or a similar product), you’re off to a good start. Note the keywords people use to find your site and ask yourself, ‘What do the words say about the demographic of the traffic finding me? Are those the words I want them to use to find me? ‘ If so, great. If not, then work on incorporating the better, more desirable, keywords words into your posts and pages.

[If you have a blog and want to be found on the web (for purpose of sales or notoriety) - only use WordPress.org, not .com. But you must be self-hosted and have your own domain name. Use WordPress for your website, too, for ease of updating. If you have a very large and complicated site (lots of detailed and complicated forms, community pages, etc), WP may not work for the website, but you can still use it for the blog portion.]

Post titles should reflect the keywords or phrases someone might use to find your site (we did not do that for this title just because we prefer catchy titles . Titles in the forms of questions, or hot topics in your niche are great. You can use the new Google search, and the Keywords Tool, to get an idea of what similar words people are searching.

Post titles should always be in H1. The keywords used in the title should also be repeated throughout the post: In the first paragraph or subtitle, as a bolded paragraph or section sub-sub heading (if appropriate), and again in the last third of the post or page. Posts should be between 300-750 words. The more often you post, the more Google likes it and is likely to consider you an authority.

Designing a website for SEO is a much bigger animal than I can tell you about here, much less in any one sitting. In a nutshell, the above paragraph generally applies to pages in your website.

Don’t want to do it yourself? I’d be happy to help! No problem if you aren’t in northern California, I work virtually so location isn’t an issue. Contact me at marketingsquirrel (at) gmail (dot) com for assistance.