Have you ever wondered how to rank website on Google first page? Well, the hidden key is on-page SEO. On-page SEO is a type of optimization that deals with the ranking of individual pages on a website. Its main purpose is to refine the webpages by making them accurate and easy for both the users and the search engines. The whole website can only be optimized when each individual webpage is ranked high.
This type of optimization highly depends on you as a website owner or an SEO expert. You can set up the theme for a page and get to determine the type of audience for that page. You also can easily decide on the required keywords for a topic. Below is a complete set of on-page SEO guidelines.
What exactly is ON-Page SEO?
On-page optimization is a way to make your webpage better so it shows up higher on Google and brings in the right people. It involves tweaking both the content and the underlying code of the webpage. SEO (Search Engine Optimization) can seem complicated at first, but a good way to grasp it is by breaking it down into simpler ideas that you might already know.
Importance of On-Page SEO
On-page SEO guides a search engine about how a certain website is valuable for an audience. It makes a site easy to understand for the crawlers. Developing a website is not the only requirement to appear on top of the SERP (Search Engine Results Page). Optimization is always the key to get ranked.
The alterations made during On-Page optimization are visible to the audience on a page of a website. This is the reason it is called on-page optimization. All of its factors totally depend on the website owner. First, have a glimpse of the mechanism of search engines.
Working of Search Engines
Search engines simply function as answering machines. They track down, comprehend, and systematically arrange the web content to provide the most precise answers to the queries of the users. All this is done in three major steps;
Crawling: Search engines analyze many pages on the web to come up with the most authentic material for the queries. This process is called crawling and is carried out by programs called crawlers. They steer through the internet; go through links to explore millions of pages.
Indexing: The compiled data is then sorted out and arranged in a vast database called an index. When a page comes in the index, it’s under consideration to be featured as an answer to some related search.
Ranking: The search engine’s algorithm knows how to rank on google first page by analyzing the quality and relevance of the content. The more connected a webpage is to the query, the higher it will be ranked on the SERP.
Google’s algorithm keeps on updating in order to provide its users with a better experience than before. This leads to changes in the criteria for ranking in Google’s SERPs, and ultimately webmasters need to optimize their sites now and then.
On-Page SEO Optimization Guide
Now that the mechanism of search engines is clarified a little, it wouldn’t be hard to understand why we need to optimize different features of a webpage. It is required to make the content on the page understandable and relevant to the crawlers so that our work gets indexed and finally ranked.
All the factors of on-page optimization are related to any of the following three main types:
Content Factors
This category mainly focuses on finding relevant keywords and then using them correctly in the theme. Adding graphics to your content is highly influential.
Finding Relevant Keywords
The initial move in the formation of a valuable content is to select related keywords. Look up words on Google and see what comes up for the ranking sites. There are many websites for finding relevant keywords, like Google Keyword Planner, Moz, or Semrush, etc. You can find multiple online resources to learn how to do keyword research.
While finding the keywords, make yourself familiar with the customer’s search intend. Create content according to the stage of the customer’s buying process. This part of the process is absolutely essential.
After all the above stages, create the content for your webpage. Or refine it if you are reviewing your webpage for on-page optimization.
Visual Material
Pictures, videos, or any kind of graphic content are really important factors in on-page optimization. A website page can become highly attractive if a fraction of its content is a few relevant photos, short videos, or flowcharts etc. A with some engaging graphics can be understood easily by the visitors. It is important to note that visual material also needs to be optimized.
HTML Factors
These are basically all those factors your source code includes. Source code is a set of instructions that is written in a programming language. It is readable by humans. Programmers write and edit source code in order to develop some software.
Title Tags
These are also among the essential SEO factors. Title tags help in providing the relevant pages to both the customers and the web crawlers. Make sure to use the primary keyword in the page title. This increases the chances of ranking your webpage high.
Body Tags
These align your webpage content. And help in identifying which section of the content is relevant to the search intent.
Meta Descriptions
The meta description is like a hidden message in the code that doesn’t impact how high your webpage ranks, but it does affect whether people click on it. When you search for something on Google, that gray text you see is the meta description. In the SERPs, the text under the title and URL of a webpage is basically a meta description.
If you don’t have one, Google might grab some info from your page. You can make sure your own message shows up by writing a short, clear description of your content or page.
Image Alt-text
For pictures, image alt-text is similar to SEO. It makes search engines understand the purpose of an image in the content of a webpage. Customers might be visiting your website via your page photos. This is the reason alt-text should be added.
Site Architecture Factors
Site architecture factors are involved in the formation of a website. These include the structural layout and order of a site’s content, pages, and navigation. Site architecture is responsible for a website’s user-friendly structure. A well-structured website is responsible for an efficient user experience. It facilitates navigation and supports the site’s optimization.
Page URLs
The URLs of a webpage must be easy to understand. This provides convenience to the visitors and the search engines. Page URLs also play a crucial role in the hierarchy of a website.
Internal Linking
The hyperlinks of other relevant pages of the same website are basically internal links. These links help visitors reach different pages of your site. This ultimately validates that your website is useful for the visitors. The web crawlers also spend more time on your webpages. The pages may get into the indexed pages database. This way the search engines learn more and more about your site content. The chances of getting ranked on SERPs are increased.
Page Title
The most crucial factor for on-page SEO is the page title. This is because it not only shows up on the browser tab but also acts as the title in Google search results, serving as the clickable link to your page.
The page title significantly affects how many people click on your page and forms their first opinions about your website. Unlike being visible on the webpage itself, the page title is now displayed on the browser tab.
Call to Action
Make sure your webpage includes easy-to-understand prompts for visitors, offering them relevant deals. The content’s context is solid, sending a clear message of importance to both people and search engines.
Focus on creating clear calls to action and maintaining strong context in your content. This ensures relevance that is easily understood by both visitors and search engines.
Avoid These On-Page SEO Mistakes
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Keyword Stuffing
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Hidden Text
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Repetitive Anchor Text
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Cloaking
Optimize Your Content with Natural Language Processing:
Utilize technology to better understand users’ search intentions and enhance your on-page SEO strategy. Making a small adjustment to your on-page relevancy factors can have a significant impact on organic traffic.
Takeaway
In the whole optimizing process, on-page SEO is undoubtedly essential. It can either develop or ruin your website. Also, it can drive a heavy and organic traffic to a site or webpage. Optimizing multiple things on each page of a website is not easy, it is a complex operation. Well-known SEO on-page strategy is to optimize tags, descriptions, page content, and URLs etc.
Make sure most of the webpages of your website are gone through on-page optimization are ranked high on the SERP, to boost up the ranking of the whole website. So, get ready, make those changes, and watch your website become the internet’s new favorite!