2013 SEO Success Factors

With just a little over half of the year left, SEO Specialists need to step up instead of slacking off. SEO has had enough time to become widely known, and it's now a race for that top ranking spot, getting there isn't easy - but your efforts will pay off! Here's a few tips on how to stay ahead:

• Google is more interested in user behaviour than ever. Decent user experience data can be a crucial ranking factor of the future.
• Make sure the all your basic SEO elements are in place:

1. Minimized loading time on all pages
2. Easy-to-use navigation
3. User-friendly URLs and logical page arrangements
4. Flexible page resolutions - from 800x600 to 1280x1024 and beyond
5. Easy to read pages with the most prominent content above the fold
6. Footer - Navigation links - Quick contact data.
7. Have a consistency to the entire website

• There's more quality content on the Internet than ever, now people are so accustomed to quick social networking browsing, they DO NOT read, but scan-scan-scan and faster and faster!
• In short – create nicely formatted pieces of content that help you achieve your content goals – signups, purchases, etc.
• On-page factors is a must for your site to be found in search. And as more and more on-page factors tend to influence the way search engines evaluate your site - you have to keep a close eye on each and every one of them.
• Basically, you need to combine the bunch of well-known on-page techniques with a number of innovations storming into SEO now:

1. Search-Engine Friendly URLs
2. Optimized Titles, Descriptions & Images.
3. Unique Content
4. A Sitemap
5. Socially Shareable Content.

Always Remember:

A few things to keep in mind for on/off-page SEO:

Quality: All pages must have substantial quality content.

Research: Have you researched what are the most valuable keywords for your page?

Engage: Does your content engage with users or do they bounce away quickly?

Fresh Content: Always have fresh content & introduce hot topics to keep users interested.

HTML Titles: Do your HTML Titles contain keywords and relevant topics?

Description: Does the meta description describe what the page is about accurately?

Headers: Remember to have the relevant keywords in Headers, Subheaders & Header Tags.

Structure: Have a structured layout to enhance listings.

Stuffing: Stop excessively using keywords.

Crawling: Make sure Search Engines can easy crawl your website.

Duplicate: Avoid duplicating content.

Links:  Only link to trusted, quality websites.

    

2013-ITWWW-Odette Nieuwoudt