SEO for beginners: Kasia gives you 5 tips to rank better on Google

For many business owners and marketers, SEO can seem overwhelming. There are so many factors and techniques to consider. Because we have to start somewhere, I'm sharing some basic rules to satisfy the bots of search engines like Google and Bing:

 1. Test your usability

Both users and search engines penalize websites that don't work flawlessly or load slowly. Make sure your website works smoothly on every platform (desktop and mobile).

Tip: use Google Search Console and Google PageSpeed Insights. Here you will find valuable information about the usability of your website.

2. Research your keywords

As a jeweler, it's important to know whether people are searching on "watches" or "timepieces. If you open a webshop with diaper cakes, you need to know whether to use 'diaper cake' or 'diaper cake' in your texts.

There are many tools and websites that can help you with "keyword research. For example:

1. Google Trends (free)
2. Google Keyword Planner (free)
3. SEMrush (paid)
4. Ahrefs (paying)
5. Moz (paying)
6. SERPstat (paid)
7. SE Ranking (paid)

Note! Overuse of keywords ("keyword stuffing") can lead to lower rankings and even a search engine "penalty. So always make sure your text looks natural and reads well.

3. Provide quality content in the right form

Once you have your keywords mapped out, it is of course still crucial - taking into account your target audience - to create quality and unique content.

In doing so, it is important that you definitely do not forget certain website elements:

• Headers: H1 (title), H2 (subtitle), H3, H4, etc.
• Meta description tag: brief description of your website?
• Hyperlinks: provide sufficient internal as well as external references/links.

Tip: Want advice on how to apply the above correctly? Then use popular website plug-ins like Yoast SEO or Rank Math To be guided through this - step by step.

4. Gather as many valuable backlinks as possible

Backlinks are links from other websites to your website. Any high-quality backlink has a positive effect on your SEO. Search engines prefer websites with many backlinks because this can mean that the website is popular and the content is interesting. Therefore, try to get a reference to your site whenever possible.

Preferably from websites with high Domain Authority and good Trust Flow. A good way to gather backlinks is to write guest blogs. In exchange for an article, you can then ask for a referral to your website.

Tip: In doing so, do make sure to include a do-follow link. A piece of HTML code by which you indicate to the search engine that it is okay to index the referring website.

5. Ensure consistency

Improving your SEO is an ongoing process. You don't just appear in first place in Google by yourself. This means publishing new content regularly, updating existing articles, re-monitoring keywords and continuing to apply technical optimizations.

I hereby wish you every success!