Did you know only 10% of pages receive traffic from Google? To add to that, only 5.29% of all pages receive 10 visits per month or fewer.
That means you’re likely to get ignored by users; your chances of being ignored are even greater if you don’t use SEO the right way.
A good SEO strategy will not only make you rank higher but bring in valuable traffic to your website. This can help you achieve your goals – but only if you know how to do it right.
What makes a good SEO strategy? Keep on reading to learn how to create one.
How to Create an SEO Strategy
1. Define Your SEO Goals
Before launching any SEO strategy, you must first define your goals. After all, how would you know what to measure once the results are in? Goals are important when analyzing your metrics to see whether you’re successful or not.
Ask yourself, what do you want to achieve with your SEO strategy?
Do you want to increase traffic to your site? Do you want to grow your market in a specific audience segment? Do you want to decrease your bounce rate?
This is where you would start knowing what steps to take to reach your specific goals. For instance, you might have to start a blog and publish good content to increase web traffic.
Once you have goals, you’ll have a better understanding of how to track your SEO progress.
2. Audit Your Website
This step involves analyzing your website through the eyes of SEO. It gives you a thorough review of the state of SEO in your website.
As such, it’s not something you can do on your own unless you’re a professional. You’ll have to talk with SEO companies for this step.
We’ll give you an idea of what happens in this step, though. For the most part, an SEO company will look at your website’s content, performance, mobility, social media, technical aspects, and other parts to check its SEO.
They will look through every page and every part of your website to identify SEO issues. Once they’re identified, it’s up to you to figure out how to fix them.
Knowing these issues will give you a good starting point for SEO planning. You’ll also get an idea of what it would take to reach your goals.
3. Identify Your Target Audience
Next, figure out your target audience. Create a persona based on their age, gender, location, education, and more. What we’re trying to do here is get an idea of their internet behavior and their pain points.
Knowing how they use the internet is important for optimizing your website and using keywords.
What keywords do they use when searching? What device do they use more to access the internet? How often do they go online? Getting this kind of information will help you formulate better content targeted for them.
You also have to know their pain points. What do they need? How can you meet those needs? This will help you create a good content strategy. By knowing what they want, you’ll know what to give them, too.
You’ll also be able to use more targeted keywords. You can dismiss the keywords that the general population use and instead use specific ones that appeal to your specific audience and their problems.
4. Create a Keyword Plan
Speaking of, we’re now in the keywords part of SEO strategies. Everything up to this point is preparation for this step, which is the backbone of every SEO strategy.
You can start by identifying keywords related to your niche and industry. Alternatively, you can think of related topics and list keywords from there. Think of what keywords they should use to reach your content and website.
You’ll likely end up with general keywords at this point but go further. If you stop here, you’ll be competing with big websites that are already using these keywords. You’ll find it harder to rank for these, and you might not even need to appeal to the general population, anyway.
Using long-tail keywords might be better for your strategy. These are more specific keywords – something like, “SEO for small business New York” instead of “SEO.” You cast a smaller net, but you catch more valuable fish.
You can find long-tail keywords by using SEO tools or keyword research tools. You will also find a lot of other
valuable resources online for your research needs.
These will give your ideas of other related keywords you might be able to use. Some can even give you in-depth data like the competitiveness of the keyword, price, and so on.
You can also do it in an old-school way. Enter your keyword in Google’s search bar and then look at the autocomplete suggestions. These are what people are commonly searching for.
Remember that your keywords must be what people are actually using.
5. Prepare for Continuous Work on Your SEO Strategy
Working on your SEO strategy doesn’t end. There’s always a new trend you must follow and new adjustments that will render your current strategy useless. What’s effective today will no longer work a couple of years from now, so you must keep your eyes peeled for updates on the search algorithm.
Furthermore, content creation – a huge part of SEO – isn’t a one-time deal. You have to publish new content on a regular schedule. It’s important for getting continuous traffic and loyal customers.
It also builds your brand authority as you continue to talk about important topics in your industry. More people will trust you, you increase your brand awareness, and you improve your conversion rates as a result.
While we’re on the subject, your content must always be of high-quality. It should be informative, entertaining, or both. It’s not only an avenue for you to use keywords; it must provide value to the readers.
Get Help from SEO Experts
There’s a lot to learn before you can create an effective SEO strategy. You have to learn a lot during the campaign, too, for analyzing what works and what doesn’t.
It can be a bit overwhelming for beginners, so it might be better to get help from an SEO company instead. Fortunately, we’ve got all the tips and tricks you need. Don’t hesitate to dig into our library of guides to learn more!
