What is SEO Writing
SEO Writing: How to Optimize Content for Search Engines
If you are new to the world of search marketing and are contemplating how to optimize your content or start a blog, there are a few basic things you need to learn. The most important would definitely be SEO which would enable you to optimize content for search engines. It goes without saying that this marketing tool is a must in today’s competitive world and mastering it can only help you!
So, read on to find out all about SEO writing and optimizing content for search engines. But, before you do, make sure to check out these Free SEO Tools first that will definitely be useful.
What is SEO?
For starters, in order to get the idea of SEO writing, let’s explain SEO first. It is the acronym for Search Engine Optimization which popularity increased in recent years. It involves making webpages that are highly attractive to different search engines for boosting website traffic. It is important to say that search engines use a number of factors to rank pages and websites and one of them is SEO writing.
What Is SEO Writing?
So, SEO writing is a term for creating meaningful content while using targeted keywords and phrases for the purpose of driving traffic to your website content. Moreover, specific SEO writing makes it easier for search engines to rank your page or website. All of this leads to creating smart and targeted content and increasing your website visibility. The thing with SEO writing is that you ought to be creative and offer interesting content and use all the right SEO tools to promote your content in the right way.
Basics of SEO Writing
The best way to use SEO writing in the right way is to get to know its basics. So, here are a couple of things you need to master first in order to get going with this amazing technique:
- Focus on finding keywords — it all starts with finding the main keyword for your content. Try to think of it as the most important word that describes your article topic. After you do that, type the keyword in any keyword tool (there are many) like the SEO Book keyword tool or simply Google’s Keyword tool.
- After you’ve found your main keyword on any of the tools, take a look at the number of searches for that same keyword. This might give you a good idea of how popular your keyword is.
- The next thing to do is to look at that number once again. If the number of searches for your keyword is too high, that’s a red flag right there. It basically means that there is much content evolving your keyword which might make it hard for you to rank it well. So, it might be wiser to choose another similar keyword that has fewer searches as it will enable you to rank better since you won’t have that many competitors promoting the same keyword.
- Lastly, and especially if you’ve changed your initial keyword, you’ll love what comes next. And, it’s the power of keyword tools. They can tremendously help you find similar variations of keywords that you can use. This way, you’ll be able to spread your keywords and keyword phrases nicely throughout the article and avoid a popularly so-called “keyword stuffing”. It’s important to note that search engines can penalize you for “keyword stuffing”. This is important for you to know!
- Re-assess and analyze the content. Constantly analyzing content is very important and you can do it by measuring links, comments, page views, number of shares on social media platforms (tweets on Twitter and comments on Facebook). Also, do not forget to always re-assess conversion rates.
— Analysis can be done in several ways. The first is to look for patterns and follow your audiences’ preferences. If you notice that they like certain topics, keywords, or videos more, focus on them and smartly place them more than other content.
— The second thing you should always do is update your older SEO content. Again, whenever you notice that a certain keyword or a keyword phrase catches the attention of your audience, go back to your older content and re-optimize it with that exact keyword. You’ll see a traffic boost soon!
Where to Use Keywords in SEO Writing
So, now you know what SEO and SEO writing is. Apart from that, you are also familiar with the basics of SEO writing. Now, it is essential that you get a hold of where exactly to use keywords in SEO writing. Here is where keywords should always appear when you optimize your content for search engines:
1. Titles, headlines, and subtitles — this is a must.
2. If you have success to Metadata, this also where keywords should appear.
3. External links to other pages that are significant to your keyword (always rename the link to include the name of your keyword).
4. Internal links that lead to other articles on your website (the same rule applies here with renaming the link to include your keyword’s name).
5. In the alternative text of the images in you have them included in the text.
6. Throughout the article paragraphs (not too many in a single paragraph).
Frequency of Keywords in SEO Writing
This is a very important thing when it comes to properly using and placing your keywords and keyword phrases. Needless to say, Google doesn’t really like keyword stuffing which means that using your keywords over and over again will highly likely make your SEO rank poor.
SEO writers and many other experts in the field seem to disagree when it comes to the right keyword placement within the text. The optimum varies from 2.5% to 7%. In other words, it’s best to be careful not to overstuff your text with keywords, but at the same time make sure you have just enough. However, a great thing is that there are some tools that can help you with that. Wordpress’ Yoast plugin will guide you and tell you exactly how stuffed your text is with keywords. So, you can follow that and customize to have just the perfect amount.
Which Free SEO Tools Should You Use?
1. Answer The Public
This amazing SEO tool lets you find more than 150 keyword ideas within a matter of seconds. Answer The Public collects all questions that people ask on blogs, social media and forums and they turn them into keyword ideas. This is a great tool to start your keyword search.
2. Animalz Revive
If you need a tool that will tell you which content on your page is outdated and how to update it, Animalz Revive is the perfect choice. With this tool, you won’t have to scroll through Google Analytics manually anymore. Give it a try.
3. Seobility
Whenever you need to check for search engine issues on your website, use Seobility. It searches through your entire content and spots all the issues for you such as blocked pages, slow loading pages, technical SEO issues, etc.
How to Make SEO Writing Interesting to Your Audience?
So, now that you know the basics of SEO writing techniques, the next logical thing is to learn how to make your SEO optimized content interesting for readers. Here is how to do it:
- Know your target audience — this is definitely one of the most important things to know. If your website is all about travel, it is logical that your readers like reading about traveling and the world’s destinations. Hence, make your content talk about that and you’ll be sure that the target audience you have is at the right place and that they are reading something they are interested in.
- Write about topics that interest you — if you are writing about things that you personally like and you are optimizing your content smartly with the tips shared above, you are destined for success. Readers like reading topics that writers are emotionally attached to.
- Be honest — this always goes a long way with readers.
What Other Factors SEO Writing Include?
As an SEO content writer, you’ll need to understand that your website’s ranking on search engines isn’t entirely regulated on your SEO content. There is a variety of other factors that can make or break your SEO rank. Some factors include how old your website is, how others interact with it, how often different websites link to your content and share it with their readers, and so on.
There’s one tool that can help you with ranking your keywords better — SEMRush. It will find all the keywords that your competitors’ rank for. By entering one single keyword, you’ll get a result of a couple of thousands of keywords. Use them along with your main keyword and your SEO rank will skyrocket!
Conclusion
There you have it, SEO writing techniques you need to know about if you want to optimize your website content for better ranking results. All you need to do is make sure you optimize your content for SEO by following these tips and tricks. Finally, this will give you a strong online presence that can significantly benefit your business for many years to come.