On-page SEO, aka optimizing your web pages for search engine crawlers to find and rank them higher in search results, is one of the most important factors that will get you more organic website traffic. If done right, it can be an incredibly effective strategy to help your website rank well—which leads to more visitors. Here is how it is done.
1. Treat Every Page On Your Website As A “Landing Page”
The first step to on-page SEO is to understand that every page on your website should be treated as a “landing page”, the same way Google treats it. Every web page should have one main topic and focus on providing targeted information related to what you are trying to rank for—i.e., the keyword you are targeting for this particular page. For each web page of content that you create, ensure that they contain the main keyword/target phrase at least once in the article body (and preferably within the title tag too)—e.g., if your business sells hats online, you would want to include keywords like, “online hat shop” and phrases like “buy hats online” on this page. You can use on-page SEO services from Stellar SEO and see how to improve what you have already done with your brand. The next step is to ensure that your content as a whole covers the topic you are trying to rank for. What we recommend doing with most web pages is to make sure they contain the main target keyword at least once in the first paragraph of text (often referred to as the ‘Natural Title Tag’), and again within 50 words or so—and then use variations of it throughout the rest of your text.
2. Add High Quality, Relevant Images
An additional way to help your website rank is to ensure that you are using images that are related to the topic you are trying to rank for. For example, if your website is about “historic homes”, then high quality images that describe “historic homes” or have historic homes in them help tell Google what your content is about. These photos should come from reputable sources specifically relating to the topic of your website, and not randomly pulled from other sites on the web. Images can be a powerful marketing tool when used correctly, and engaging with them will help you create more interest in what you’re trying to sell. It is always best to make sure the images you use on your website come from reputable sources (like Unsplash) and are relevant to the page you want to rank for. If they don’t, Google will likely not rank your site as highly as it could if this was done properly. But, if you are using images that do not come from a reputable source, or are not relevant to the page itself, it can be an easy way for Google to drop your ranking.
3. Internal Linking Provides Context to Your Content
Another way to improve your on-page SEO is through internal linking. When using internal linking, you are essentially directing traffic within your website by pointing out content that you deem relevant (or that fits with what the page you’re trying to rank for). Internal links help provide context to your web pages and show Google that there is more information or resources they can learn about related topics on your website. It also helps drive users into other parts of your website where they can learn more about what you have to offer, making it a win-win situation for everyone involved. If done correctly, this technique can be used as a great way to “link juice” between web pages on your own site—which will help Google understand how each page on your site is related to each other. Similar to internal linking, crosslinking also helps provide context about what you are trying to rank for by directing users within your website. What crosslinking does is create a network between pages of relevant content by telling Google that these two web pages are linked together through some commonality between them.
4. Build Authority of Your Website
The next thing you need to look at is the authority of your website. This is important because it shows Google that you have a lot of trust and authority in your given industry. In order to build the authority of your website, you need to make sure it looks as professional as possible—which starts with looking at its overall performance from an SEO standpoint. There are a number of ways you can do this by looking at everything from page speed to loading speed. Another thing that is critical to understand about authority and relevancy is the fact that it often starts with your domain registration. If your website addresses look as though they were purchased on a domain reseller site, then Google will more than likely weigh those results lower because of their lack of trust in them. In addition to how relevant your content is, the overall performance of your website also helps signal to Google how quickly it responds, and the global availability (i.e., if users outside the US or UK can access it).
5. Schema Markup Can Help Your Rankings
Schema markup is a way for you to mark up your website content in a way that Google can understand more easily. This will help your website rank higher on results pages because it shows Google how your webpages are structured and what types of information they contain (i.e., who published the page, contact details, etc.). It is done using microdata which tells search engines what certain parts of content mean; for example what an author of a blog post looks like, where the “latest posts” feed of a site is located or even basic event information like dates and locations. This can be useful in both identifying your own website’s structure, and determining whether you should mark up certain content on other sites that you want to get indexed by Google (and likely ranked better).
On-page SEO is a very important factor in the overall performance of your website. Without it, you are leaving Google with little to no information about what your website means. If done correctly, on-page optimization can help you get more traffic quickly. So, if you want your website to rank well, then you need to make sure that you know what on-page SEO is and how best to optimize it.
