How SEO Works: On-Page vs Off-Page Strategies for Growing Your Web Traffic

The most successful digital marketing strategies include a heavy focus on search engine optimization or SEO. SEO leads generated through search engine results pages boast a 14.6% close rate versus a rate of only 1.7% for outbound attempts like print ads.

So should you spend more time developing your website’s on page SEO or the off page SEO? Once you understand the basics of how SEO works, you’ll see both of these contribute in important, but in different ways. Learn more about on-page versus off-page SEO below.

 

What is On-Page SEO?

On-page SEO refers to optimizing certain parts of a website to affect where the site appears in search engine rankings. The website owner, or a hired SEO expert, has direct control over all these elements on the web page.

Great on page optimization allows search engines to easily index the pages on your site and understand exactly what your website is all about. This helps the search engine to rank you higher and for the appropriate searches.

Some elements included in on-page SEO are the following:

 

Keywords

Keywords form the backbone of your on-page SEO strategy. They are the specific search terms potential customers use to find websites and information regarding your industry.

In the past, you could use the same keywords multiple times throughout a page to boost rankings (known as keyword stuffing). Search engines now frown upon this practice and require you to use them only when relevant.

Keywords should appear naturally in the content on your website.

 

Meta Descriptions

Have you noticed that on most search engine results pages every result comes with a small blurb underneath describing the page?

That is the meta description and it plays a key role in getting a potential customer to click as well as informing search engines of what the page contains.

Be sure to include your primary keyword in the meta description.

 

Headings (H1)

The headings on your webpage, as the largest bit of text, should be eye-catching and draw in the reader. It’s vital that the main heading tag, H1, always contains at least one keyword. Search engine algorithms focus on headings when ranking your page.

 

Structure of URL

The structure of your website’s URL also plays a big role in SEO on the page. Avoid including random numbers or words and keep it clean and direct. Remember to include your primary keyword in the URL as well.

 

Image Alt Text

Noticing a trend? Keyword placement in these various elements is vital to successful on-page SEO and your images are no different.

When you upload an image, it comes with an option to include alt text. The alt text tells the search engine what is featured in the image. This is a perfect opportunity to use your primary keyword again.

 

Page Loading Speed

It’s no longer the 1990s and no one is willing to wait even 5 seconds for a web page to load. Nowadays, 39% of users abandon a page if it takes too long to load while another 44% will switch devices before giving up.

Search engines factor in the loading speed of your pages when ranking your website. They want to help searchers find the best content as fast as possible. If you cannot deliver that quickly, it will negatively impact your SEO services strategy.

 

Internal Links

Keep users engaged longer by including internal links on your pages and in your posts. Connecting one type of content on your page to another relevant one means more time spent on your website as a whole. It also helps search engines crawling your site so they see you as trustworthy.

 

Content Marketing in SEO

Finally, above all else, you must offer relevant, valuable content on every page of your site. If certain keywords lead a searcher to your page, it must satisfy their intent. This encourages search engines to rank you higher and earns you more organic traffic.

 

What is Off Page SEO?

Off-page SEO significantly differs from SEO on the page. They both affect your rankings with search engines in vastly different ways. You will have less control over your site’s off-page SEO than the on-page SEO.

The two main off-page SEO elements that search engines factor in when ranking your site include:

 

Domain Authority

Off-page SEO focuses more on solidifying the authority of your website’s domain rather than making it easier for search engines to find it. Domain authority tells search engines how much to trust the pages on your website.

To establish domain authority, a search engine looks at how long you’ve had your domain. The longer the time, the better your ranking. Same goes for referring domains; the more sites referring to your page, the higher your ranking.

Search engines also take into account the past history of the domain. If the previous owner did not comply with SEO best practices, the search engine will consider this even if you did not own the site back then.

 

Backlinks

The single most important off-page SEO element ranking factor is the number of other websites linking to your website, known as backlinks. Backlinks from trusted, high-authority websites help your page while links from untrustworthy sites hurt your ranking.

If you write great, relevant content, it is easier to obtain natural backlinks. You may still need to put in some extra effort to get even more backlinks.

People obtain backlinks by joining directory and review websites, sharing guest blogs on industry websites, and reaching out to fellow bloggers and influencers.

Is that it? Just two factors, well no, infact they are many off-page factors that can effect your seo rankings, have a look at this detialed guide from digital influencer Shane Barker.

 

 

Is On-Page SEO or Off-Page SEO More Important?

The biggest difference between on-page and off-page SEO lies in the name, but which one is more important in the long run? Honestly, both.

You cannot successfully optimize your website without focusing on both on-page and off-page SEO. It would be like trying to build a house with only a foundation or a roof when you truly need both.

 

How SEO Works to Increase Traffic to Your Website

Now, you should understand both on-page and off-page SEO and how SEO works to increase the number of hits on your website. You must dedicate enough time to learn how to do these things correctly or they can negatively impact your site’s ranking rather than helping it.

Worried you do not have enough time to do proper SEO? Partner up with an SEO digital marketing company to take the burden off your shoulders so you can focus on the parts of your business you know best. Contact  us to find Chatham-Kent seo specialist for start attracting more traffic to your website quickly and naturally !

 

 

10+ Things You Need to Do After Launching a WordPress Website

10 Things Every Business Owner Should Do After Launching a WordPress Website

 

The day has finally come. After weeks, or even months of meticulous setting up, picking the right theme and tweaking it just right, with crashing servers, unexpected bugs, troubleshooting, testing and resetting everything again – your website is finally live! Yay! Or you decided to hire an expert website design firm and are pleased with the results, but don’t get comfortable just yet!

 

You have put so much effort into this website, so now that it is finally launched, you can pat yourself on the back, pour yourself a drink and take a deep sigh of relief. Or can you? Well, you can, but only for a minute, as there is still so much to do in order for your website to do exactly what you want it to do and what you created it for in the first place.

 

In fact, it’s after the launch that the actual work really starts. Your website may appear nice and ready to go, but if you really want to set it up for success, there are a few things you need to take care of right after the launch.

 

1. Change Basic Website Info

The first thing you do when you have a child is give him or her a name, right? It’s similar with your website. It needs to have a proper name (title) that will encompass the essence of your blog, business or portfolio; a catchy tagline and a properly set time zone. All these can be set rather quickly in your wp-admin, under Settings>General.

 

In addition, we also recommend you immediately set your website’s favicon (Appearance>Customize>Site Identity>Site Icon) and change the permalink structure to something that is simple, friendly and reflective of your actual content. To customize your permalink, go to Settings>Permalinks and choose among the options there. We recommend going for Post name, but the choice is entirely yours, of course.

 

2. Check Your Search Engine Visibility

Even though WordPress usually sets up the visibility of your website upon install, it’s always a good idea to double-check if your website is visible to search engines. Otherwise, run the risk of remaining invisible and that’s pretty much a death sentence for your website.

 

To check if everything is in order, log in to your wp-admin, click on Settings and select Reading. Look where it says Search Engine Visibility and make sure the box saying “Discourage search engines from indexing this site” is unchecked.

 

3. Set Up Your Backups

Another important precautionary measure, setting up backups keeps you safe in case something goes awry. It prevents you from losing precious data and allows for a speedy recovery after unforeseen disasters. Seriously, this cannot be stressed enough. Backup is essential and you have to take care of it right away.

 

There are several options here. Some hosting companies offer some degree of backup services but, unfortunately, those are not always a given.  In fact, most experts will recommend you take care of your backups on your own.

 

Remote storage services like Dropbox and Google Drive are also an option. However, your best bet is probably to use one of the excellent backup plugins available on the market. Pick an affordable, yet reliable one with good reviews and preferably automatic backup schedules.

 

4. Set Up Analytics

There are different ways you can analyze your site traffic, but, to be perfectly honest, nothing beats Google Analytics in terms of complexity, depth and ease of use.

 

In order to integrate your website with Google Analytics, you’re going to have to embed a little line of code in your backend and to tweak a few settings. It’s not too difficult and Google offers excellent step-by-step tutorials so you can do it on your own.

 

Alternatively, you can download and install one of the Google Analytics plugins for WordPress (good thing there are plugins for everything these days!), such as MonsterInsights, which is among the most popular plugins of this sort.

 

After you have configured Google Analytics, make sure to set some time aside each day to look at the data. Where are your visitors coming from, how long do they stay and what they search for are just some of the metrics that will help you understand your audience and optimize your website accordingly.

 

5. Set up SEO

Just because you have a website, it doesn’t mean you’ll automatically have traffic. This is something you need to work on, and you need to work on it hard. Thankfully, SEO (Search Engine Optimization) is easier than ever these days, with plenty of useful tools, plugins, tutorials, ready-made strategies, and so on.

 

SEO basically means organizing your website in a way that will make it attractive to Google. With a properly optimized site, the world’s most popular search engine will boost your website higher up in the search engine result pages, helping you get more traffic and, ultimately, do better business.

 

 

One of the many amazing things about WordPress is that is basically SEO-ready as it is. Still, there are plenty of things you can do to make things even better in the SEO department. For instance, there is the Yoast SEO plugin that is very helpful and intuitive and that many believe is the best SEO tool on the market.

 

6. Optimize the Speed

People hate slow websites. If your website doesn’t load quickly enough, your visitors will simply leave. That’s a cold, hard, study-proven fact that you definitely have to take into account and do something about it. Site speed depends on a number of factors and some of them are beyond your reach, but there are still some things you can do to make it run faster.

 

For one, you can – and should – activate caching. In simple terms, what caching does is serve ready-made HTML versions of your website. This way, WordPress doesn’t have to make these on its own each time someone accesses your website, which results in much better overall performance. This sounds like (and it is!) a complicated process but there are several amazing WordPress caching plugins coming to the rescue to help you optimize your site’s overall performance.

 

Another thing to consider here are CDN (Content Delivery Network) services. These store your site content on a server network with locations all over the world so that users can be served from the nearest location. Logically, this results in higher speeds and does wonders for your traffic and conversions.

 

7. Set Up Security

WordPress is pretty secure as it is, which is just one of the things that make it the world’s most popular blogging platform. Still, there is no such thing as “too much security”, so we recommend you consider some strategies and best practices to protect yourself and your users from potential disasters.

 

First of all, revisit your password and make sure it’s strong enough, otherwise, you’ll need to change it. You may also want to consider providing an extra layer of security by password-protecting your wp-admin. Next, make sure all your updates are good and installed.

 

In addition, if you want to be extra-safe, you can opt for one of the WordPress security services that come with malware detection and cleanup, sometimes even with website firewalls.

 

8. Add a Contact Form

It is essential for your users to be able to get in touch with you. Not having a clean, nice-looking contact form that’s easy to locate and fill will make you (and your website) seem unprofessional, even shady. You want to come off as friendly, outgoing and helpful, and that’s why you need a properly implemented contact form.

 

Surprisingly, WordPress does not come with an out-of-the-box contact form so you’ll have to add one by yourself. This shouldn’t be difficult with so many ready-made contact forms you can easily download, install and customize to your liking. Adding a contact form is the first step to conversions but there are many more. Have a look at this ultimate guide of website design tips for increasing conversions from the top industry experts.

 

Also, consider adding more than one email signup. Your goal should always be to gather as many visitor emails as you can, so you want to prompt them with subscription forms peppered here and there across your website. Just don’t overdo it, though, and make sure you have some goodies to offer in return for a subscription (e-books, media files, deals, coupons…).

 

9. Set Up Your Front and Blog Pages

Being created primarily as a blogging platform, WordPress prioritizes blog posts and that’s why it shows the most recent blog posts as your homepage by default.

 

However, as it grew bigger, WordPress is today used for so much more than just blogging. It’s also widely used for business and portfolio websites, where it doesn’t make much sense to display blog posts as the first thing a visitor will see on the site.

 

Even classic blog websites don’t like this anymore, as they prefer having custom layouts as their front page. After all, it’s the first impressions that count the most, right?

 

 

What you need to do in this case is change the settings so that you have a WordPress static page as your homepage, which is really rather easy and quick to do.

 

10. Add Testimonials

This one is particularly important for business and portfolio websites. We all love reviews and ratings and we actually rely on them quite a lot in our decision-making. Hearing what someone else had to say about your product or service is a major incentive for your users.

 

Testimonials will do wonders for your website’s credibility and reputation, and make you look professional.

 

Many WordPress themes come with testimonials already activated by default, otherwise you can activate this feature by yourself in your wp-admin, by going to Settings>Writing>Content

 

Types and turning on the Testimonials. Pick the number of testimonials you want to display per page and add new ones just as you would add new posts (Testimonials>Add.)

 

11. Delete Default Content and Unused Themes

Your brand new WordPress website comes with some placeholder content that is there by default and that you have to delete manually. Specifically, this includes the “Hello World” sample blog post, a sample comment and a sample page.

 

To delete the blog post, go to Posts>All Posts, hover over the “Hello World” post and click on Trash. For the sample page, navigate to Pages>All Pages, find the page and click on Trash. Finally, to delete the sample comment, go to Comments, located just below the Pages in the menu, and click on Trash.

 

In case you installed and tested a few themes before picking the one you will definitely go with, you need to delete them. This is important since even the unused themes can require updates and cause a bit of a mess. It might be a good idea, though, to keep one of the themes that you will use as a fallback theme in case of testing, troubleshooting and so on.

 

12. Promote Your Site

Now that you have a cool new website and everything it set just right, it’s time to focus your attention to promoting it across all available platforms. This topic deserves an article on its own, but let’s just mention social media and their role in improving the visibility of your website. Build your presence on Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, Tumblr, Twitter and make valuable connections with influencer marketing and everyone else who can help you promote your website.

Come up with a comprehensive social media strategy that will encompass paid ads and campaigns, and don’t forget about newsletters and email campaigning.

Let all your friends and acquaintances know about your fresh new website and ask them to share it on their platforms. The more people talk about your website, the better traffic you will get, simple as that. Also, consider adding social icons, widgets and/or feeds to your website.

 

Conclusion

This list of things to do after launching your WordPress website is far from complete. Like we said earlier, the real work only starts after the launch and it will definitely require some effort on your side.

 

We know what you’re thinking – it’s too much as it is, could there really be more to do? But don’t worry. As with everything in life, creating and managing a website on your own gets easier with time. You can always enlist the help of an Sarnia SEO Expert to get moving quickly. Just relax, be smart and try to have some fun with it.

9 Ways To Increase Influencer Marketing

How to Team Up with Influencers in your Industry

You have probably heard about influencer marketing. Seminars, webinars, live videos and different other platforms are concentrating on influencer marketing.

 

Influencers are people who have been able to garner a huge following online and excel in a specific industry. They might be celebrities or people who have built their name from their online activities.

 

Either way, influencer marketing can get your marketing efforts to the next level.

Most small business owners feel that this form of marketing is for large businesses. While not all businesses can afford this, influencer marketing should be on every marketer’s bucket list.

 

What if you become an influencer? It means you will market your business better. But how do you go about this?

 

Here are 9 Ways To Increase Influencer Marketing:

 

1. Produce Content in Repeatable Formats

What works best for you; videos, podcasts, infographics, blogposts or webinars? Knowing your strong suit will help you follow an influencer’s path.

 

Influencers are able to produce content throughout the day. This keeps their audience engaged and coming back for more. To someone else, it might seem easy creating such content but it not always easy.

 

Influencers are people who have tried out different methods and when they found one that works, they stuck with it. There is an influencer who will stick with videos, another on podcasts, and another on social media and others on blogposts. By establishing what works, they are able to use repeatable formats to create content.

 

There are influencers who produce content series. For their series to be successful, they have to follow specific tried and tested formats. This not only allows them to reach out to many people but also create their content on time.

 

2. Be Authentic, Be Yourself

If Oprah tried to be Obama, would you still follow her? Most probably, you will not.

By being authentic, influencers are able to build trust among their followers. They are honest about what they do and most of them are willing to show their lives step by step.

 

Establishing trust with your followers is one way of building a unique brand that people can associate with. You will build authority in your niche. A good example is Ric Dean, the brain behind PBNPilot. His old blog series gave him a large following online.

 

Besides him talking about his departure from ILD, he also talks about his time at the company. People trust him and recognize him as an industry expert.

 

Your followers understand that you are not perfect. They need to learn from your failures, if only you are open about them. You can leverage authenticity by being vulnerable in your content; tell it as it is.

 

3. Link Up with Influencers in Your Industry

Are there influencers in your industry that you like? Or, are there microinfluencers in your level that you can link with? I recently got quoted in an Expert Roundup where I talk about using outsourcing and delegation for these tasks or types of jobs.

 

Teaming up with an influencer in your industry will help propel your authority online. Collaboration between influencers is symbiotic; you are exposed to the influencers’ audience and you expose the influencer to your audience. While you might not have a huge following, having content or great products to offer will make you a suitable partner.

 

Both parties must be committed to the partnership to spread the word far. It might be a video that you do together, or a blot that you either author, or a guide that has both your names. If you cannot collaborate with an influencer, do guest posts on the influencer’s platform.

 

4. Leverage the Power of Social Media

Influencers have established their presence on different social media platforms. It allows them to reach more people from these platforms and direct them to their content on their websites or their preferred platform. On most websites’ homepage, you might have seen social media buttons with the tag ‘keep in touch with me’.

 

With an influencer, it is not always about concepts you teach but how you teach them. You might not have to create content for each of these platforms since you can repurpose. You can use your Facebook videos on YouTube and use clips from these videos on Instagram.

 

The followers on these channels might be the same but you have to tailor the content for the specific channel. Most people are on social media to have fun. Therefore, you need to create concise and entertaining content; longer content should be on your website only.

 

5. Use Q&A Forums

Questions and answers are part of influencers’ golden strategies. They use questions to test new products on the market, to get the feeling of their followers and to keep followers engaged. If you want to create relationships with your audience, use questions.

 

Questions will break barriers between you and your audience. During question and answer sessions, you are able to give instant and authentic answers. Followers get insight into your business and personal live.

 

Asking questions on social media and other platforms does not require a lot of effort. Even though the sessions do not need much effort, you need to make them interesting.

 

When your followers feel heard, they will be more receptive to your business. They will market for you and your follower numbers will grow. Building a community of followers will make your mission easy, your brand stronger and your conversion rates higher.

 

6. Consider Reviews

Reviews matter; whether negative or positive. Besides helping put your business in front of a new audience, they help you get a clear picture of how your audience feels about your business.

 

Negative reviews show you your business weaknesses; they help you improve. When responding to negative reviews, you should remain positive. Promise your audience that their complaints are being looked at and really look at them. After the issue has been rectified, reach out back to the customer who wrote a negative review and inform them.

 

Positive reviews market you. Even then, you need to respond to them. When responding to them, you can inform the happy customers of new developments of other products you offer.

 

Reviews, whether malicious or true, are always believed by consumers. When offering services, or selling products, you should ask consumers to leave reviews on your site.

 

This is what influencers, especially in the SaaS industry are doing.

 

7. Watch Different Influencers

How does your influencer plan their content? How often do they post? What makes you want to follow them? How are they different?

 

By following influencers on different platforms, you are able to copy their strategies and implement them for your own benefits. Besides their originality, there are other tricks these influencers use to grab the attention of followers.

 

Different influencers have different strategies but there is always a thing that makes them unique. It is through analyzing the day to day activities of different influencers that you are able to carve your own strategy.

 

Most influencers create a buzz about their next post or their upcoming product; something that gets you waiting. This is a trick that you can implement.

 

8. Consistency Matters

Are you following an influencer? Follow them consistently until you get what you are looking for. Learn the different ways of growing your business to influencer level.

 

You cannot engage your followers the right way if you cannot produce consistent content. Most influencers have a posting schedule; once a week, twice a week or thrice a week – whatever works. By strictly following a set schedule, your followers trust you.

 

They will be there waiting for you to post content. If you cannot create content daily, do not make any promises. Creating content every day does not pay if you deliver shoddy work.

 

How is your schedule? How many posts can your week accommodate? Setting realistic expectations lets you establish authority and impress your customers.

 

9. Consider Micro-Influencers

Is your business big enough to link with DJ Khaled? Maybe not, but there are other influencers you can reach out to.

 

Microinfluencers have a few thousand followers; they are on the rising path. They are learning and building to be on top. These are people to learn from especially if your business is a startup.

 

Microinfluencers are not celebrities which mean they are more reachable. You can work with them better than you can with celebrities. Piggyback on their growing influence to promote both your businesses and rise to the top.

 

Using Influencer Marketing for Your Brand

There is a lot to learn from influencers. The best way to do it is to watch them go about their day to day activities. Most influencers have failed at one time in their marketing but they have bounced back up. You will fail when trying to implement different strategies.

 

Learn from these failures. There are numerous benefits of being an influencer. First off, the large audience you garner converts to customers. You can direct them to your website, make them subscribers and grow your sales.

 

Using an influencer to market your business may cost you thousands of dollars; something your business might not afford. Instead of budgeting for influencer marketing, learn from influencers and become one yourself with London ON seo specialist While it takes time, it is all worth it after all.