You may have heard the phrase “SEO is dead” at some point. People start claiming the same thing every time search engines modify their algorithms and how they index and rank websites. Although SEO (Search Engine Optimization) has evolved significantly over the past two decades, it’s still very much alive. To improve SEO, you need to take several actions.
Therefore, read on to learn how to improve SEO in 2023 and which strategies will still be effective. We’re about to examine several on- and off-site elements that will increase your web visibility.
Take Care of Technical Issues On Your Site to Boost SEO
Make sure your website complies with all technical requirements. This is still the first and most crucial SEO ranking factor. This entails making sure your website loads quickly and minifies code. Additionally, you must make sure that your site has an SSL certificate installed and that you utilise canonical URLs.
In addition to the text-to-code ratio, a responsive and mobile-friendly website and clear and straightforward navigation are factors that search engines consider when ranking websites on the search engine results pages. Make sure your website has a sitemap that both people and search engines can utilise, and optimise your photos by utilising smaller images and including alt text in each one you use. In addition, don’t forget to include internal links and remove broken links within your blog post and website.
Online, you may find a variety of tools for local SEO audits. While they can’t replace a professional SEO specialist, they can offer you a general idea of what has to be improved for on-page SEO.
Use the Right Keywords
Although keywords and keyword research have always been crucial components of local SEO strategies, they now have even more important as search engines rank websites based on quality and relevance ratings.
Use terms and phrases directly relevant to what you do or offer and ensure they are aimed at customers at all stages of the purchasing process. When people search for businesses or goods similar to yours, they will be more likely to find you if your website has a decent balance of material that targets each of your main keywords.
Concentrate on “long-tail” keywords that are highly pertinent to the clients you are most likely to sell to. Therefore, you should concentrate on keywords and phrases like “best SEO agency in Kuala Lumpur” rather than just targeting “SEO agency.” Your local Kuala Lumpur SEO will benefit from focusing on Kuala Lumpur or particular suburbs.
Read More: Keyword Research for SEO
Create Great Content
The adage “content is king” has been used by digital marketers for many years. It’s still entirely valid. Finding out how to improve local SEO only makes sense if visitors to your site are so impressed by the information that they conclude you are the subject matter expert they have been searching for and request a quote.
You will start to rank organically when you produce excellent content centred on your goal keywords, which means you will spend less on paid advertising. Because if you rely on search engine traffic, it will all stop working as soon as you turn off paid advertisements. However, if your website is known as an expert in your field, you’ll continually score well on search engines. Because you have great content to link to, other SEO strategies like link building and social media marketing are also made more straightforward by outstanding range.
Making text-based material the mainstay of your content strategy is crucial since search engine crawlers “read” the information on your website. To add interest and entice visitors seeking clear communication, you may also employ additional content kinds like slideshows and movies. Other excellent methods to utilise content to improve SEO include writing longer articles and creating “content silos,” which are collections of linked pieces focusing on the exact keywords.
Link Building
You’ve likely heard that generating links will hurt your SEO and that search engines will penalise you.
That’s not accurate.
Ensuring that Internet users initially find the highest quality material is the ultimate objective of all the modifications that search engines have undergone over the years. Therefore, the battle is already half-won if you produce quality content.
Search engines certainly penalise websites that purchase many low-quality links or employ other unethical link-building techniques, but they also take your website’s and its content’s popularity into account. Links are one way they do this, and the more reputable sites link back to you, the more authority your site will have.
Getting the correct kinds of links is a crucial step in the process of improving local SEO. Link building is not dead. However, it would be best to concentrate on obtaining the correct connections from reputable websites. Without a doubt, quality is much more important than quantity.
Google My Business
You may declare your business using the “My Business” options on search engines like Google. A Google account is required to log in and search for your company. You should wait to notice it since you just added it, but you may also claim it if you do.
Fill out all the forms and pages with information about your company. Verification will be the last step in the registration procedure, which often entails having a code delivered to your place of business. This enables search engines to confirm the legitimacy of each listing.
You just input the code once it comes to finish the verification procedure.
When you register your company with search engines, you appear on their maps and allow your clients to leave online reviews. According to research, businesses that rank better in search engine reviews receive more traffic. Therefore, be careful to provide outstanding service and garner positive ratings.
Read More: Ways to Claim Your Business Profile on Google
Use effective titles and headings
Although most people may use the phrases interchangeably, titles and headers are fundamentally different from other elements like meta description and take up separate spaces in the code of your web pages.
Each HTML document you produce has the title inserted in the head element, which also contains the metadata for each web page. This includes details like the page’s language and scripts for your analytics tools and the document’s title.
The title, positioned between the <title></title> tags, provides Google with the most comprehensive explanation of the page’s topic. Additionally, it appears in the search engine results.
Well-written titles accomplish two crucial things.
Specify the primary term you want to rank for.
Good titles should be one of your very first considerations when developing content because they are essential to SEO best practices. Google will replace your web pages in the search results with content that receives more clicks if your sites are indexed by search engines and rank but receive few hits.
Read More: Title Tags in SEO
Headings carry a lot of weight since they help Google understand the page’s purpose and how your pages are organised. For instance, if you include a secondary keyword in your subheadings, Google will know that you are approaching the issue from other sides and covering more aspects besides the main one.
Optimise all images
Make careful to optimise photos for the most petite feasible file sizes if you want your sites to load as soon as possible. Find out which images on your site could be causing it to load slowly by using Google Lighthouse to scan it.
Making it a best practice to develop your images, so they seem as excellent as possible at the smallest size feasible can help you avoid having to lower many image sizes later on.
Because Google considers user experience when determining search rankings if your website loads slowly but a competitor’s page that includes the same content loads rapidly, especially on mobile, Google will prioritise giving visitors access to the competitor’s page.
It’s also important to consider accessibility. Many users will use screen reader technology to help them navigate the web, and you want to tell Google and the other search engines that you support them. Therefore, your image can appear on Google Images.
So do what you can to limit the file size of your images and build in solid alt text (the text that describes what the photo is in case the picture can’t be rendered) so the visual media you do choose supports your overall SEO strength.
Read More: Image Optimization in SEO
Optimise page speed
Each HTML document loads its <head> section before a page’s viewable parts. As a result, the code in this part has to be as concise as feasible.
Sadly, the head gets ignored over time because this page area needs to be more apparent to stakeholders on a site. Multiple scripts for user activity tools like Google Analytics are frequently left in the code, delaying download speeds.
Use Core Web Vitals from Google’s Lighthouse test to determine what may be done to improve page speeds if interested. Along with pictures, this tool displays everything increasing the load time. It can tell you: “Hey, here are the seven items loading slowly.” It can offer information at a granular level. Using this knowledge, you may choose what is necessary for your internal needs and what can be skipped.
Every tenth of a second count, even when you don’t need to remove a lot of code. Site administrators that have sites with a lot of material should seize any chance to give Google and the user as much stuff as they can as soon as feasible. Ensuring your text is visible before your web font is loaded is brilliant.
You may use lazy loading to present less important search-critical material like photos and videos after the text on your page.
Be Consistent
Aiming for consistency is the final response we have to the topic of how to improve SEO. Being effective in SEO takes time and effort. Search engines will locate your site and recognise it as an authoritative resource if you build an excellent website, target the proper search phrases, and continually provide excellent helpful material.
When that occurs, your website will transform into your finest sales tool, feeding high-quality leads to your sales staff nonstop.
A solid SEO strategy takes time to implement, but once you do, you can be confident that it will be successful as long as you maintain it. So avoid using gimmicks and trickery. Develop the most excellent website and spread your expertise to the world. Establish and claim a profile on social media, and reply as soon as you are approached online.
Make It Easy With iMarketing
Finding out how to improve SEO occasionally seems like learning a new language, and in some ways, that is indeed the case. However, there are no tricks or magic involved. Simply the same time-tested methods that are effective.
However, many business owners discover that they need more time to figure it out. This can indicate that you should work with a pro to jump-start your ascent to the top of the search engine results page.
If you require assistance, our SEO Malaysia team would be happy to be the team that improves your digital marketing and advances your local SEO. Get in touch with us to discuss how we can increase both your visibility on Google’s search results and the user value of your website.