Search engine optimization (SEO) is one of the most important tools you can use to get more eyes on your business blog. By strategically placing thoughtfully chosen keywords in your blog posts, you can increase the chances of your web content appearing in search engine results. The higher it appears in those searches, the more likely your blog will be clicked on and read by qualified readers, and that’s the goal, isn’t it? Read on to find out how to use SEO to improve your blog’s visibility, increase organic traffic, and attract more readers.
For more help with SEO, download our free SEO Pocket Guide.
Do Your Keyword Research
Be sure you take the time to do keyword research before you sit down to write your blog post. You can start with a blog topic idea, and then do keyword research based on words or phrases associated with that topic. Or you can do some keyword research about words and phrases associated with your brand, industry, product, or service and use those highly qualified keywords to germinate new blog ideas. Either way, keyword research should be done for every blog post that you publish to increase the post’s visibility.
Keyword Research Tools
Use keyword planner tools like Google Adwords to determine what people are searching for in relation to your blog post’s topic. It will also show you how much competition you have for those search phrases so you can gauge the likelihood that your blog will rank high in search results. In general, it’s better to use keywords or phrases with less competition than those with high search volume, as you’ll have an easier time ranking in the search results for those terms.
Tools like SEMrush can help you select good keywords by showing gaps in the information available on the web so you can fill those gaps with high-quality content.
Place Keywords Appropriately Optimize Your Content for SEO
Once you have a list of keywords that you’re optimizing for, write the blog post with these keywords in mind. The keywords should appear in the title, URL, metadata, opening paragraph, heading, and as many times as possible within the body of the blog without sounding robotic or awkward for your readers.
Write Evergreen Content
Blog posts shared through social media, email newsletters, and other distribution channels will see the majority of its traffic within a few days of the post being shared. But blogs that rank high on search engines can continue to bring in regular traffic to your blog and website for weeks, months, and even years to come. So be sure that SEO optimized blogs are “evergreen,” meaning that the topic will be relevant for months or years to come.
The Longer the Better
Search engines prefer sources that have rich, relevant, unique content and the more rich, relevant, unique content you have in your blog post, the better. Plus, you’ll have more space to sprinkle in your highly qualified keywords. You’ll want to test blog post word count to see what works best for your readers. There is no perfect rule of thumb when it comes to blog post length, but if you’re optimizing a blog for search, longer will be better.
Keep it Fresh
It’s important to track long-term traffic to your blog posts. If you see that a post gets regular organic traffic from search engines, be sure to revisit that blog regularly to make sure that the content is up-to-date and fresh.
Have a Link Strategy
Another thing that can increase your blog posts’ rankings on search results is a link to your website from another reputable website. The more links to your website that live on other websites across the web (also known as backlinks), the more reputable your site becomes for Google, and the higher your pages and posts will appear in search results. It also helps to have links on your own website or blog that link to other reputable websites. This back and forth linking is called a link strategy.
End with a Call to Action
If your blog post brings in a new customer through SEO who has never heard of your company, you want to continue engaging with them so they get to know your brand, business, product, or service better and will eventually convert to a customer. Make sure that every blog post you publish ends with a clear call to action that makes sense for the content and the customer’s stage.
Do you want to offer them related blog posts to click on? Does it make sense to send them to a product page to find out about your offerings? Or do you think they’re ready to provide their email address to subscribe to your blog or email newsletter? Now that you’ve got them, you don’t want to lose them by having them click off the page never to return again. Looking for more ways to improve your SEO? Download our free SEO pocket guide below:
