SEO Strategies to Increase Organic Traffic

I often meet with local business owners and marketing professionals to talk about digital marketing, and one thing that always is on top of their mind is, how to attract more customers. Then, we dive into digital marketing talk and naturally the theme of the conversation becomes, how to capture the attention of the target audience and get more website visits. Let’s take a look at some of the most effective ways to provide value to potential customers and boost your website organic traffic.

Before we dive in, let’s clarify that the strategies mentioned are geared towards organic search engine optimization (SEO)

On-page SEO is the practice of optimizing web pages for specific queries and keywords in order to meet user search intent, and boost website traffic. Off-page SEO is the process of building links to your site from other websites. Indirect SEO is the process of using social media sites to promote your site.

Writing attractive headlines is one of the first and a very important step of content writing . Even if you wrote the best blog post ever, no one will read it unless it has a compelling headline. Write headlines that grab attention. When writing content I often experiment with different headlines, sometimes up to fifteen different versions before I settle on the one that will generate the most traffic. So, during content creation process, it is important to think carefully and do the research about your headline.

Optimizing your website to be found by the search engines and outrank your competitors is still a good practice in 2022. Paying particular attention to the website URL structure, and having an SEO-friendly navigation structure that is logical for your business will help your users find what they are looking for. For example: If you have an eCommerce website, before building out the navigation structure do the research or hire an SEO to learn what keywords are your customers using, or what specific questions are they asking when searching for your products. For your money pages, focus on the top keywords first, then as you develop more content such as blog articles, think about using more specific long-tail keywords (more on this below). Doing so, helps Google better understand the content of your website, and creates a better user experience.

Meta descriptions – Meta descriptions are important onPage elements that help Google better understand what the content of your page is about. Naturally use the target keyword but don’t just fill your meta descriptions with keywords. With that being said, it is worth taking a good look at what your page is about, putting yourself in your user’s position and asking: Is this meta description a clear and concise summary of what the page is about? Does it meet the search query and help users find what they are looking for? Remember that Google’s goal is to serve web users the most accurate results, so Google at times could rewrite your meta descriptions. Here is how John Mueller of Google explains why Google rewrites meta descriptions in one of the office hour hangouts.

How you link your content between web pages matters a great deal and makes it easier for Google to find your pages, helps boost your search engine rankings, plus internal linking strengthens your overall link profile. What is important to note here is that your internal links take a different meaning when both pages that are exchanging links, cover similar or the same topic. Learn more about internal links

Assigning and alternative tag (alt tag) to images to describe their content, helps users and Google understand the context, in instances when images fail to load properly on the web page. For example: if you have an eCommerce website selling cleaning products, images placed on your product pages are a very important element, making it easier for your customers to interact with the page. Not only is important to use the image alt-tags, but also adding an image description can help you get founded in visual search.

Choosing the right keywords whether for your service, product pages or even if you are running paid ads ensures your website has a better chance to rank higher for niche terms, and increase conversion rates. Once you have determined the keywords based on user search intent, search volume and keyword difficulty, focus on relevant long-tail keywords and how to use those keywords when writing quality content. Long-tail keywords make up a large portion of most people’s web searches, so if you’re not targeting these keywords, you’re missing out on a lot of traffic.

Structured data offers huge opportunities to optimize your website and make it easier for search engine bots to find and index your pages. Structured data is not amongst the ranking factors, but the advantage you get by implementing the correct markup whether that is in your product pages, local business, review sites, or team member profiles is that you are making it easier for Google to understand the meaning of your pages, and those signals can lead to rich snippets and higher CTR. Learn more about why you need to implement structured data on your website

Rather than going after low quality backlinks that aren’t even relevant and won’t make a dent in your traffic or domain authority, why not focus on creating pieces of content that can help your website visitors solve a problem or gain more knowledge on a particular topic. High-quality content that is valuable and hard to replicate, will naturally attract other websites within or similar niche to link to yours, giving you a referral that Google values more.

Google Analytics and Search Console are goldmines of data that SEO specialists utilize to learn more about your website, customers, and uncover content ideas that are relevant to your business, like topics to write about, questions your customers are asking, etc..

I would like to emphasize here the importance of analyzing the keywords for the top pages that have the potential to bring more traffic to your website. Then dive into analyzing SEO metrics like the number of impressions and click-through rate, to identify pages that have high impressions and low CTR, with the goal to further optimize those pages.

So, you’ve written this great article or case study that your target audience would find really useful and love to read. Now you need to spread the word about it. This where owned media distribution channels like your website, blog, social media platforms and newsletters come in handy. Owned media channels are distribution mediums which you have full control over. How you distribute your content is a crucial part of your overall SEO content strategy. Some of the most effective ways to attract your potential customers are:

• Blog posts, case studies and news pages – publish fresh content and company news in regular basis
• Email marketing – sending out a company newsletter to your curated email list not only drives more organic traffic to your website, but also keeps your brand name on top of customer’s mind
• Infographics – Social platforms like Instagram, Pinterest are great channels to share visual content. According to Hubspot, customers are more likely to remember 65% of visual content, so creating visually compelling content should be treated as an important component of your content marketing.
• Video Content – Content displayed through video is highly engaging, attracts viewers of different demographics and drives volumes of traffic to your website. For example: if you have a blog post that talks about a cleaning product you sell, create a video where you explain how to use the product, and distribute it through your YouTube channel. Make sure to include a video description and links to your blog post.
• Distribute your content on social media – Make it a habit to post snippets of your content on your social media channels such as your company’s Facebook page and Twitter. Diversify your content and make it engaging.

To recap here are some of the proven strategies that every business can use to increase traffic to your website:

• Write Attractive Headlines that Grab Attention
• Check the OnPage SEO and URL Structure
• Make use of internal links and anchor text
• Don’t ignore the image alt-text
• Target keywords based on user intent
• Implement Structured Data
• Create Content that Attracts Referral Traffic
• Analyze The Data From Google Analytics and Search Console
• Use Owned Media Channels for Content Distribution