Every SEO content writer writes with a view to rank content at the top of search engines like Google, Bing, or Yahoo. It requires a skillful blend of creativity and SEO technicalities. As search engines are frequently upgrading their algorithms, it is crucial to stay updated with the latest SEO strategies.
So here are some proven SEO content writing strategies to rank it highly on search engines.
Start with Comprehensive Keyword Research
An SEO strategy depends on effective content and researchable keywords, which can be long-tail or short-tail. A study by Ahrefs revealed that 90.63% of web pages don’t get traffic from Google, where over 70,000 search queries take place every second. The reason is its poor keyword targeting.
To introduce effectiveness, thorough keyword research can help a lot. Identify high-traffic and low-competition keywords relevant to your audience. Tools like Ahrefs and Google Planner can help in discovering phrases that users search for. Google Trends can also enable you to access popular keywords at a specific time. It can be helpful in discovering its upstreaming and downstreaming for specific keywords. Besides, competitor intelligence tools can also let you see what keywords their domain currently ranks.
Create High-Quality, Relevant SEO Content
You cannot post anything on the website or anywhere online. Google Core updates clearly state that the content should be valuable for users. The whole SEO content experience starts with the headings of the post, which are considered H1 by Google web crawlers. You may use H2, H3, H4, or more to classify subtitles, which elaborate the summary of their body. It is noteworthy that the body of these title tags should have a relevant description with the right keywords.
HubSpot reported that companies introducing 16+ blog posts every month register 3.5 times more online traffic than those who post 0–4 monthly blogs or articles.
Before writing, search out the burning questions on the topic you’re going to cover. Try to add complementary pictures with relevant content in not more than 58 words for each question (though the question is not there as an FAQ). Schema design should be there according to the type of content to enable this feature. This hack will allow your content to be featured as snippets.
Ultimately, you should remember that SEO content is for real-life users, not search engine bots. So, share concise, accurate, and easy-to-understand information.
Optimize On-Page Elements
When you think of on-page SEO, it covers a wide range of elements like title tags, meta descriptions, headers, and URL structure. All these elements play key roles in achieving visibility and engaging traffic, which continuously progresses. They should be optimized as per the algorithms of search engines.
For title optimization, it is necessary to make it answer users’ intent. You may make it more interesting by adding numbers like the Top 5 Tips, 5 Effective Ways, etc. An offer like a free trial in that title can be tempting, so you can add it.
A study by Backlinko revealed that webpages with a meta description witnessed 5.8% more clicks than those without. So, optimizing meta description requires knowledge of its character limit, which is 150–155. Google or any other search engine focuses on understanding what the page is all about. So, always keep it short and integrate target keywords into it. You may make it compelling by adding a CTA like Explore This Blog. But don’t use AI content, as Google shows a red flag to it. You may use QuillBot or any other AI detection tool to get rid of such spam.
FAQs, or frequently asked questions, can be the best hack to engage intended users. You may create a section separately just below the blog or article and answer the burning questions related to it.
Considering the significance of keywords, they should be naturally integrated as if they are a part of organic narration in the SEO content. But never ever try to stuff keywords, as their density also counts.
Internal linking is also significant and must be done wisely. Integrate relevant links from contextual posts and trustworthy sources, which can be reports, studies, or news from trusted sources.
Use Engaging Visuals and Media
For effective writing, it is necessary to be expressive in an engaging way. Incorporating images, infographics, and videos can help in expressing the users’ intent. While adding, ensure that the video or image quality is excellent and that it is optimized. The ALT tag with relevant keywords is necessary to enable crawler bots to understand what it is all about.
If it’s a video, add hashtags, a proper description, titles, and everything else required to explain that video. These practices get 94% more views, according to a study by Brain Rules.
Ensure Mobile-Friendliness and Fast Loading Times
It has been observed that 61% of Google searches are happening on mobile devices. So, you cannot ignore the significance of Google’s mobile-first indexing update. It, for sure, favors responsive websites that are laser-fast when it comes to loading online. Ideally, it assigns a top ranking to a mobile-friendly site, which hardly takes three seconds to load.
Build Backlinks and Social Shares
Backlinks remain key ranking boosters. The incoming links to your website from high-domain-authority websites with excellent page ranks get more attention from search engines. It is simply because the incoming traffic will be relevant and the bounce rate will be minimal. So, relevancy and user intent will be there that indicate Google will rank such web pages up.
A Moz study finds that the top-ranking webpages have 3.8 times more backlinks than those with 2 to 10 positions. This study signifies the importance of juice links. Search engine marketing experts focus on integrating keywords with high search volumes and sharing them on forums or social media to boost rankings directly.
Regularly Update and Repurpose Content
The freshness of the content is the secret recipe for ranking at the top of searches. Google’s E.E.A.T. and core updates indicate that the content must have credibility. It should consist of authentic sources and descriptive details from reliable sources so that people can find valid information. You can check its impact through descriptive reviews, which often attract and show high dwell time. It makes it crystal clear that the users are finding the intended details that they are looking for. They spend time and show engagement, which is a positive signal for Google to rank that content.
Conclusion
The aforementioned strategies are proven and helpful in achieving high visibility and top ranking on Google. Overall, SEO content is not only the presentation from the writer or merchant. Nor is it the display of what web owners are selling. It is for users. They must be happy to find valuable information that they wanted to search for. And once they find it, they love to stay there, spend some time reading, and also inquire. SEO content serves this purpose.