SEO For Beginners: The Absolute Basics With an SEO Jargon Buster Download

I'm absolutely sure you've heard of SEO, but do you really know what SEO means and how it can help you grow your business?

So often, people try to blind us with SEO science to keep the smoke and mirrors in place to justify charging silly prices to set up and manage your SEO for you.

Or we just stick our heads in the sand and tell ourselves we're just not tech-savvy enough, or we don't have enough time, or quite simply, we have better things to worry about than some weird boxes at the bottom of your page!

But I'm here to tell you you REALLY should take some time to get your SEO set up. 

I'm going to give you a guided tour of SEO so you feel empowered by getting to grips with the fundamentals of this massively important element of your online life, so you can grow your business without being dependent on "experts" that make things needlessly complicated.

And then I'm going to share my SEO Jargon Buster with you so you quickly translate the geek speak you come up against when you're trying to get your website to show up on the first page of Google.

What Does SEO Stand For, and What Does it Do?

OK, so let's start at the very beginning.

SEO stands for search engine optimisation, and it's the process you use to get your website and content to rank as high as possible on search engines' result pages.

SEO is an organic process which means you don't pay for it. Unlike paid ads, you earn your ranking by optimising your website and content for search engines like Google.  

Why is SEO Important

I'm going to share some stats to show you how important SEO is and why you need to get it working its magic for you.

• Google currently holds almost 92% of the worldwide search engine market. (Statista.com)
• The first 5 organic results on Google's results pages get 68% of all the clicks. (Ahrefs)
• Only 0.78% of Google searchers click on results from the 2nd page. (Backlinko)
• 90.63% of pages get NO organic search traffic from Google because they are not optimised for search engines. (Ahrefs)
• 70-80% of search engine users ignore paid ads and focus only on organic results. (Searchenginejournal.com)
• Websites with optimised blogs see a 434% better chance of ranking well on search engines. (Hubspot)

The long and short of all this is that you need to get Google to put your website and content on page 1 of their search results. 

And more than that, you really should be aiming for spots 1 - 5, not through paid ads, but through organic rankings, which is what you use SEO for.

Oh, yes, and you REALLY need a blog!

So, now you know why it's so important, let me take you on a trip around the three most essential elements of SEO.

On-Page SEO

On-page SEO is all about creating content that will improve your ranking on Google.

To get on-page SEO working for you, you need to do your keyword research then carefully place those keywords throughout your content.

You also need to ensure that the content you create is what your target audience is looking for. 

You'll make Google happy when their users find exactly the result they were looking for, and they'll reward you with more traffic. 

Off-Page SEO

Off-page SEO is all about backlinks.

A backlink is simply a link from one website page to another.

You get backlinks from building relationships with other people running businesses in your niche and creating the kind of content people want to share.

It's an SEO strategy that takes a bit of time.

Still, it's well worth the effort as it has a massive impact on your domain ranking (DR), which is basically, how much credibility Google gives you as a website and is a big factor in whether or not you get onto page 1 of their search results.

Technical SEO

OK, the final frontier of SEO, the technical stuff...but don't close your eyes and stick your fingers in your ears!

Here are some first steps you can take to make sure you're getting to grips with some of the basics of SEO

Make Sure Your Title Tags Are Filled Out

Your title tag is what shows up in Google's search results.

You fill this out in the SEO section of your blog or the web page you're creating. 

Add Your Meta Description

The meta description for your page or your blog is where you tell the searcher what the content you've created for them is all about. 

Look at the example above again. The piece that starts "Technical SEO refers to" is the meta description, and you need to make sure that you include your keyword in this description.  

Again, you fill this out in the SEO section of your page.

Use The Right Headings

You need to make sure your page or blog has an H1 heading, as this is your primary header. You need to include your primary keyword in this heading. This header is essential as it tells Google's bots what your content is all about, and it's also an invitation to readers to click on the page and find out more.

Make you only have one H1, and then use H2 for subheadings and H3 for points below them.

Fill in the Alt Text

Alt-text is what you use to describe images on your page or in your content. It helps with the readability and is important for visually impaired people as Google can verbally describe images to people if you add this text. 

It's also great for seeding your keywords, but use them sparingly; the last thing you want to do is keyword stuff your alt text. It's a No from Google.

And Don't Forget Your SEO Jargon, Buster

So, I've taken you on a whistle-stop tour of SEO, and I hope that now you can confidently answer the question of "What SEO is anyway"!

This has been a super high-level introduction, and I'd love to teach you more about how to get started with SEO for your website and content.

But why don't you head over to your website and look around, maybe even venture into your site's settings to check if you're making the most of your website SEO-wise?

But don't go in without your SEO Jargon Buster! Just click the link to download it and keep it to hand whenever you encounter Geek Speakers!

https://www.sbuchanansmith.com/SEO-Jargon-Buster-Download-Page