Organic SEO is still very much alive although it’s not as simple as it used to be and results are not as readily obtained. In light of that let’s re-affirm the most effective SEO techniques which have stood the test of time; techniques you can use yourself right now.
Keyword Analysis
This step is very easily over-looked as most marketers, webmasters or business owners already have preconceived ideas of their keywords and how users search, therefore they never think to research and discover all possible niches and keyword phrases. This is vital for finding the three or four-word keyword phrases, which small businesses will find it easiest to rank well in (as two-word phrases have very high competition). Too often, unbeknownst to them, businesses focus on one or two word phrases which immediately puts them at a loss.
Keyword analysis should be the very first step you take before you do any other SEO activities. To do this you will need to use web-based software:
https://freekeywords.wordtracker.com/sign_in/
http://advertise.bingads.microsoft.com/en-us/bing-ads-intelligence
http://adwords.google.com/keywordplanner
Write Content
Write pages based on the data from your keyword research. This will tell you generally what web pages your website should have.
It is vital to ensure that the keyword phrases you choose during your analysis are relevant to your business, and not too varied, they should be focused, relevant and natural.
Each page should have at least five hundred words and be devoted to one single topic or keyword phrase. Don’t jumble them all together in one big page.
Avoid being spammy. If you have two keyword phrases like:
1) retaining wall landscape
2) retaining wall landscaping
Do NOT make separate pages for each of these keyword phrases, and treat them as two different things, as they are essentially the same thing. It looks odd to the user and if you do too much of it, Google may devalue your page.
Another example of two phrases which should NOT be two separate pages, but should be one page (utilizing both phrases):
1) retaining wall rock
2) retaining wall rocks
What Kind of Content?
As described above not only must your content be relevant and non-spammy but it must be VALUABLE, interesting and unique. Some SEO’s would argue with that saying such is irrelevant as Google cares not whether your content is interesting or compelling. While this is true, it is short-sighted. The age old adage ‘Content is King’, doesn’t refer to search engines and keywords. It refers to the power that valuable content has. Valuable and interesting content promotes itself, encourages people to link to it, and tell the world about it, creating considerable momentum. It is for that reason that we avoid writing SEO-oriented, bland, robotic content.
When you couple interesting, valuable content with properly researched SEO search terms you have then created the best of both worlds.
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