5 Inevitable Practices That Help Your Site to Stay On Top of Search Results

The internet is such a huge arena that in order for your website to stand a chance of getting noticed, you have to employ several SEO practices. The most difficult part of this is knowing what works and what doesn’t when SEO keeps changing.

However, regardless of the data collected by search engines and algorithms that shift here, there and everywhere, at least there at five specific SEO practices you can use that will always keep your websites showing up in search results.

1. Google My Business Is Your Best Friend

Although many consider Google My Business a directory, it is a vital tool for businesses of all kinds. But in order to truly benefit from the SEO activity, you can earn from this, you must claim your business and optimize it as soon as you get your business listing verified.

Just follow the directions on Google My Business and you’ll be able to unlock all sorts of tracking tools and marketing extras that will keep your business on top of the list and in front of people using their handheld devices seeking the kinds of products or services you provide.

2. Metas And Tags Still Mean Something

If you’ve ever clicked on a search engine result because the description you read was what got you interested, then you’ll understand the importance of good quality title and meta description tags. Because these are what are displayed in search results, you can basically use them as a miniature promotional tool to advertise what it is your website offers.

It may take a few tries to get the right wording but once you do, you’ll see activity simply because you’ve created enough content to tease viewers of the search results to the point where they will click to learn more.

3. Keywords Are Well, Key To Success

Because the sea of websites online is so vast, you need to be able to get out from under all the others and also stand out from your competition. One of the best ways to do this is through the creative and strategic use of keywords.

Your niche-specific keywords should draw you traffic and push your web pages up to the rankings so that your website gets the attention it deserves. There are many different keyword research tools online. These tools allow you to explore options that are based on the terms used by people online looking for your products.

4. Keep In Mind That Reviews Matter

Online reviews from customers are starting to carry a lot more weight than they used to. In fact, stats show that more and more people are trusting online reviews as a legitimate forum with positives and negatives that can assist in the decision making process when planning a purchase of any kind.

By promoting both your Facebook page and Google My Business listing for online reviews, these will show up when a user conducts a search for your business. In other words, reviews assist in increasing the size of your online footprint which comes from SEO.

5. Never Underestimate the Power of A Backlink

There was a time when too many backlinks or poor quality backlinks were likened to the kiss of death. Yes, you still need to be careful to link with sites that are niche-related to what you are selling or promoting, but there really is no better way to pull your website up the rankings than with top quality backlinks.

A powerful backlinking strategy will do wonders for your website traffic totals. There are a number of great backlink checker tools online that can help you sort out the good from the bad so you can hone that part of your SEO strategy to feature the best ones.

Bonus Tip 1 – Online Directories Are Also Huge

Just because you’ve gone ahead and claimed your business at Google My Business doesn’t mean you don’t have to worry now that Google is going to feed you some traffic. There are several other online sources you should be exploring.

They range from local (Chamber of Commerce and municipal websites) to regional (association, special qualification and trades websites) to national and international (all other online directories). Each of these offer listings where you can include your website. For SEO purposes, online directories are a smart and effective investment.

Bonus Tip 2 – Be Sure To Use Local Structured Data Markup

If you are into coding when you include structured data markup you are giving search engines a lot more information about your business. That can include details on what you sell, the services you provide, the online reviews that have been posted about your business and so much more.

When you use this type of markup in the code of your website you stand a good chance at drawing more attention than your local or regional competition. And Google prefers websites that do this as it helps their spiders to better determine what your website content is about.

There Is No Magic Bullet

As noted above, SEO continues to evolve in an effort to keep up with the changes in how search engines track and collect data on websites. One thing is for sure, there will never be a one-size-fits-all solution that will cover everything in a single step.

However, if you incorporate the handful of tips contained above, you will be able to get your website noticed and traffic flowing to it. After all, that is the main goal of each and every person with a business website online. But if the search engines don’t see it, you’ll have about as much activity as you would if your business had an unlisted phone number.

Use these tips and see your business succeed with an online presence that gets noticed by search engines which will, in turn, help online users notice it as well.

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