Although website optimization is not a new concept, a lot of people have never heard of it. However, this shouldn’t be too surprising as it is only relevant for online entrepreneurs.
Optimization refers to a process where you improve your website and pages on it, so they are more likely to appear at the top of Google search. Every minor thing can have an impact on search engine optimization (also called SEO), from domain purchasing to content creation and hyperlinking.
In this article, we will review 7 tips for optimizing your website.
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Table of Contents
Get the right domain name
The process of optimization starts with the domain purchase. Ideally, you should get a domain name that contains keywords relevant to your industry. For example, if you have a tech blog, your domain name should include something like “tech,” “technology,” or “IT.”
If you still don’t know what to do, you can always hire a domain brokerage company to help you out. These experts understand the market and can easily find the right name for your business.
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Create a good website structure
The rule of thumb is that you should reach any page on a website in three clicks. In other words, a user should be able to quickly reach any content on the site. Having a good architecture sets the basis of a responsive site, and it is important for all other optimization processes.
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Perform keyword research
Before writing your first blog post, you need to perform thorough keyword research. This allows you to find all the phases that your potential visitors are looking for. Keep in mind that keyword research is a continuous process. Even after creating a list with relevant phrases, you need to revisit it every once in a while.
Nowadays, there are a lot of tools that can help you with the process. A lot of people like AhRefs, but you can also use Google Keyword Planner. During the process, an optimization expert is tasked with finding phrases that get a lot of traffic but are easy to optimize.
Make sure to use the exact phrases. Even the smallest variation can affect your optimization efforts.
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Create content based on these phrases
When we talk about content, we usually refer to articles. However, keep in mind that content can also be used for videos and images.
Before making content, you should always check what your competition is doing. All the articles need to revolve around previously mentioned keywords. In other words, you should never create something that doesn’t have a chance of ranking. Writing articles for writing’s sake will not get you far and can even cause some other issues such as content cannibalization.
Nowadays, for an article to rank, it needs to provide a great user experience. You want to create content that people will actually read, and after reading it, they would continue to other pages on your site.
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Consider website speed
When a person opens a web page, they want to view it as soon as possible. According to data, if they wait for more than two seconds for a page to load, they will quickly close it and search for something else. Due to poor user experience, your website will be downgraded, and it will become very hard to rank it in Google and other search engines.
There are a few tools that can hasten your pages. Basically, you should remove all the unnecessary elements to make the page lighter (for example, images).
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Make your website mobile-friendly
People are more likely to browse the web on their phone than on a desktop computer. The number of mobile users has significantly increased over the years affecting the optimization process.
As you probably know, web pages look different when you open them on the phone compared to when you open them on a desktop computer. This often causes a discrepancy where certain elements will not be usable on mobiles. To circumvent the issue, you need to optimize them so that mobile users have a similar experience as desktop users.
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Get as many links as possible
Links or hyperlinks connect different pages of your website, streamlining a person from less important sections to more important, selling pages. They can also be used to point to relevant content on other websites.
Getting as many links as possible from external sites is a good way to increase your authority. In a way, Google sees links as a vote of confidence. When a big site links to your page, this means that the content is of a high quality and should probably rank higher within the search engine.
