How To Define SEO – You Really Need To Know This!

Are you new to online marketing, and hear everyone talking about SEO? Are you wondering why you really need to know this? Stay with me as I explain to you how to define SEO, and why it’s so important.

When I started affiliate marketing, I heard this term a lot. At first, it seemed intimidating, but really it’s not. As you learn the proper techniques about marketing online, you’ll start to realize what SEO means for your website and why you need to use it.

It’s how you achieve success!  This is where I achieved success.

Definition of SEO For Online Marketing

“SEO stands for Search Engine Optimization. SEO is a series of strategies and techniques used to increase the quantity and quality of organic traffic (potential customers) driven to a website, thereby earning a high-ranking placement on the search results page of a search engine — such as Google, Bing, Yahoo and others.

The artist in me wants to say “it’s the art of making our content beautiful to attract our one major client, Google”

OK, now let’s break this definition down some more:

• Search engine meaning Google, Yahoo, Bing, etc.
• Optimization meaning the methods you use to bring not only quantity but quality organic searches to your website.
• High ranking placement meaning your goal to be in the top positions of these search engines (on page one of your Google search).
• Quality meaning genuinely interested people in your product or service.
• Quantity meaning a lot of these genuine visitors (traffic).
• Organic meaning traffic that you don’t have to pay for.

Why Concentrate On Google?

Even though you want great SEO practices for all search engines, Google has the lion’s share of all searches.

If you check out NetMarketshare.com, you’ll see that as of February 2019:

1. Google has 74.38%
2. Baidu has 11.91%
3. Bing has 7.92%
4. Yahoo has 3.45

These are the top four search engines with Google taking the majority.  So when you want to do everything you can to get a higher ranking, it just makes common sense to do what Google requires, right?

How Does Google Know?

There’s a lot of things going into that one little term, SEO, isn’t there? And now you’re probably wondering how search engines like Google would even know you’re applying different strategies.

Well, there’s a very complicated explanation of search engine algorithms, or I could just show you an awesome video that breaks it all down for you in easy to understand language.

You need to think of search engines like Google as the librarian of the internet. They need to scan every book in the world to know what’s inside them. And to do this, they’ve developed a system (algorithm) to give the visitor the best answer to their question.

If you own a website, search results matter. The higher you rank, the more visitors you will get. The key to ranking high is using SEO. This means that:

1. Your words matter (keywords) – they need to accurately describe your product or service.
2. Your titles matter – they summarize what your page is about.
3. Links matter – if links come into your website, it tells Google you have good information.
4. Words in links matter – it tells Google where your links lead for future ranking.
5. Reputation matters – seeing increasing amounts of fresh, engaging content and links.

These are the basic SEO techniques to become successful.

Now, remember, even though you want to do everything to please the search engines, it’s important to write your content for your reader, not Google.  If your content isn’t valuable or answer your reader’s question, it will be poorly ranked, OK?

So you can apply the strategies and techniques, but write as if you were helping out your best friend!

Let’s break down the optimization strategies in more detail with some actionable steps…

Let’s Look At What Good SEO Means

Because we want to focus on what Google requires of our websites and content, why not go straight to them and ask?

They provide a very detailed “Starter Guide”, which may be very overwhelming and confusing to a new website owner.  So I’d like to go over the basics to get you started.

When you have more experience with optimizing your content, you can go back to this guide and review what Google is expecting.

How Do I Get My Site On Google?

Thankfully, this is free and easy.  You don’t even need to submit your site to Google for them to find you.  That being said, there are ways to help them find you, as well as give you great analytic reports to show you your overall successes.

The first thing you should do is link your site to Google Analytics.  You can set up your free account, then set up your property.

You can even add their app to all your devices, so you can check up on your business from anywhere you wish.

After this, consider using the Search Console to help Google find you faster.  This will also give you informative reports about your site’s performance.

Whenever you write a new article, you can submit it for URL inspection, and request to have it indexed.  Submitting a sitemap of your website is also important.

Please don’t confuse this with their older search console when we used “Fetch as Google”.  This won’t be available after March 28, 2019.

Take Action:

• Read this how-to guide to set up Google Analytics
• Read this how-to guide to set up Search Console
• Create and submit a sitemap

How Do I Use Keywords?

The first important thing to find is a proper keyword or words that will determine what your content will be about.  Or… consider what you want to write about, then look for a great keyword to use. These keywords are necessary for ranking purposes.

Remember not to stuff your article with these keywords.  That will only work against you because Google will think your spamming.  And they won’t rank a spammy article.

Your keyword should be put in:

1. Your Title (as close to the beginning as possible).
2. In your first paragraph.
3. In an H2 or H3 heading (your content topic headings).
4. In your “alt text” of your images (where they make sense with the image).
5. In your Meta Data description

Take Action:

• Consider using a Keyword Research Tool to find the best keywords.
• Please read LSI keywords and Long Tail Keywords for more SEO help.

How Do I Write My Content?

It’s very important to write useful, valuable content for your readers.  Your blog should be compelling and interesting.  It should deliver the answer to your reader’s question (what they originally typed in the search bar).

Remember when you read textbooks in school?  Pretty boring, right?  So don’t write your content like a textbook.

Be conversational!  Write as if you are talking to your best friend.  

Your reader’s know what great content is, and will want to share your blog with others.  This is how you start to brand yourself and earn authority in your niche.

When Google crawls your post, they are looking for original material that is easy to read.  They want to see fresh and unique content.  So you don’t want to have duplicate versions of your content on your site.

Oh, and take care with your spelling!  There’s nothing more frustrating than reading through a bunch of spelling errors.

Take Action:

• How to Write Great Content
• How to Find Article Ideas
• Use Grammarly to ensure your content is free from grammatical and spelling mistakes.

How Do I Create Great Titles

Your title is what will both attract your visitor, as well as tell Google what your article is about.  You don’t want to be misleading here.

If your title doesn’t represent your content, you won’t get targeted traffic.  Meaning, the people coming to your blog will be expecting something entirely different than what your business is about.  They’ll just leave and you’ll be missing out on potential customers.

Sometimes it’s tough coming up with an interesting title.  But luckily there are ways to help.  There are tools online that will generate title ideas for you when you insert your keyword.

And sometimes you just need to check out your competition, to see what they’re using.  This can give you great ideas, just don’t copy, ok?

Take Action:

• Tools like Title Generator is free to use online.  Give it a try!

How Do I Get Backlinks To My Site?

Personally, I prefer to acquire backlinks naturally.  The more valuable content you write, the more likely other people will find it and refer to it in their own articles.

You could also help by adding one of your blog’s URL when commenting on someone else’s article.  Before you submit your comment, it will ask for your name, email address and URL.

Another way would be to start commenting on forums related to your niche.  Once you prove yourself by providing many great comments, you might be able to start leaving your website or article link with the comment.

What I personally DONT recommend is buying backlinks.  Many marketers use PBN’s (Private Blog Network) as a way of cheating the system.  According to Monitor Back Links,

“PBN backlinks are links built from a network of connected websites and blogs. These sites are commonly owned by the same person, who’s using them all to build links to their money site. They also have a choice to sell PBN links to other site owners for extra profit.”

These are bad news, and eventually, Google will catch up with you.  You see, these PBN sites are primarily set up to deliver backlinks rather than deliver valuable content.  And Google’s algorithms are getting smarter all the time.

If Google detects that you’re using purchased backlinks, your ranking will tank!

Take Action:

• Keep writing great content and your backlinks will come naturally.
• Beware!  You’ve been warned about using purchased backlinks… 🙂
• Find forums in your niche and start engaging with them.

How Do I Use Links In My Content?

Google loves it when your reader understands why there’s a link placed in the text.  What I mean is the anchor text tells them where the link will lead.

For example, if you want to link to another relevant page on your site, then place the link naturally in your sentence.  The same goes for any off-page links.

If you look at this article you’re reading now, you’ll see my links in “green”.  And notice that I’ve attached the links to a relevant word description in the sentence.

Sometimes I will add them to a button or an image, but usually, they are in text form.  And this tells Google exactly what my links are pointing to, for better SEO!

Take Action:

• Keep your anchor text short and descriptive.
• Only link to relevant articles or sites.
• Be careful not to link to sites with poor reputations.

How Can I Improve My Reputation (Authority)?

This will happen naturally, over time, if you are consistently writing fresh, valuable content.  When your visitors start to trust you, they’ll return.

When your content gets noticed by others in your niche, they’ll start to refer to you as an authority on the subject.

And when you start getting backlinks from sites with great authority of their own, it all rubs off on you.

These are all the natural ways of building a positive reputation and gaining authority for your website.  Keep building their trust, and it’s a win-win. Always be open and honest, and never, ever, try to deceive for the sake of making a few bucks.

“Trust takes years to build, seconds to break, and forever to repair.”  Unknown

Take Action:

• Be consistent with your content publishing.
• Make sure your content is correct and reliable.
• If you discover a product you recommended is no longer reliable, stop promoting it and tell your readers why.

I know this is a lot to remember, and there’s so much more as well.  But don’t worry!  I know where you can go to get the best training online!

OK, Where Can I Find The Best Training?

There are many places online you can search to get information. I caution you though. Much of it is outdated or has ridiculous costs. You could try to piece it together here and there, but then the advice you receive could contradict one another.

It can get very overwhelming and frustrating. I know. I’ve been there. I’ve been down the wrong path a couple of times and have lost some money in the process.

I want to share with you what I’ve found because, for the first time, I’m in the best place to learn about online affiliate marketing.

This is an honest-to-goodness, amazing platform. They provide:

• Your education in step by step, easy to follow classes.
• The tools you need to create and host your websites.
• Their own powerful keyword research tool.   
• Excellent support from the founders as well as an active, live community.
• and much, much more…

Everything under one roof so no bouncing around for information.

I especially like their dedication to updating all their courses and information. Search engines like Google will often change their algorithms to weed out the shifty and dishonest.

Many other online courses are still using old techniques that won’t help you. They might even hurt your chances of success because Google will penalize you.

Conclusion

There are many things to learn and apply when it comes to SEO, so why not let a proven training system show you how to be successful.

This is currently the world’s most powerful platform to learn everything you need to know to have a successful business.

The owners are sincerely wanting you to succeed and it shows by their willingness to communicate with you, one on one.

There are no upsells or surprise costs.  In fact, you can start for free!  No credit card necessary.

So why not give it a try? You have nothing to lose and everything to gain.  If you click on the image below, you can read all about it.  And when you join, I’ll be there to say HI, and help you for as long as you need me to.

Does SEO make more sense now?  Please let me know by leaving a comment or question below.

And if you know anyone who can benefit from this, please share.

Your friend,

Suzanne

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