Have you heard of the anti-advertising movement?
Communities are beginning to notice the negative impact that outdoor advertising has. Giant billboards and ad-packed bus stops are becoming unnecessary eyes sores.
If you want your company to thrive, the answer isn’t to put up more flyers. Modern business owners understand that the true path to success is maximizing search intent opportunities or SEO.
Take Allstate, for example. The car insurance company has a beautiful blog that posts helpful insurance-related articles. If someone is in a car accident and needs to know what to do, a quick Google search is sure to turn up an Allstate blog with an answer. If you want your company to be the one with the answers, you’ll need to learn what search engine intent and optimization are all about.
What exactly is SEO, and how can you use it to create content that boosts your web traffic? Read on to find out.
Understanding the Goals of SEO
You know that SEO stands for search engine optimization, but what exactly are you optimizing?
Are you trying to optimize the online experience so that individuals visiting your website can easily browse your content? Or are you trying to attract people to your website in the first place by having the correct type of content available? The answer is a bit of both.
Search intent optimization and SEO are the same things. They present an opportunity to direct people to your website, by knowing what readers want and need. Once people get to your website, you can provide a pleasant visit with optimized pages.
Relevant Blog Example
To help you conceptualize what SEO is all about, it helps to review a few search intent examples, specifically for blogs. Let’s say, for instance, that you own a dog grooming business. To attract visitors to your website, you could post a weekly article about dog grooming tips.
Once visitors get to your website to read the article, you’ll need to make your services available to them. However, to avoid being salesy, you’ll want to provide your services in a helpful and relevant way.
For instance, perhaps you’ll have a link within the dog grooming article that takes them to your services page. At the end of your article, you can also include a strong call to action, where you direct readers to another part of your website.
From Search Intent to Sales Opportunity
If all you have is an excellent article, but you never direct readers to what it is you’re selling, then you’re missing the point of SEO. On the other hand, if all you do is try to sell people, instead of providing them with relevant and valuable information, you’re also missing the point of SEO.
You can think of SEO as an art form. You’re trying to blend together 2 worlds; The world of sales and the world of value. By providing value, and answers, you’ll be able to rise to the top of Google rankings.
Digital marketing experts can help you with a managed SEO plan. To cut out the middle man, though, you’ll want to look for all-inclusive services. The services should be easy to find like the ones on https://www.growthfriday.com/.
When a managed SEO company can provide web audits, content creation, and on-page optimization, you’ll know you’re on the right track. You should also request detailed reports with a complete SEO analysis.
The Power of Keywords
Do you understand how powerful keywords can be for search engine optimization? The right keyword can help you boost your rankings tenfold in a matter of minutes. Whereas the wrong keyword can attract the wrong type of audience.
How do you go about finding the right keywords for your website and the content you’re putting on it? There’s a ton of tools out there to help! The best part is that many keyword research tools are free and can be perfect when you’re just starting out with SEO.
Here’s a shortlist of some of the best free keyword research tools:
- GoogleTrends
- Semrush
- Moz
- Keyworddit
- Ahrefs Keyword Explorer
Along with the keyword tools on the list above, there’s also a lot of other reputable choices you can choose from. You’ll need to do a little bit of searching so you can find the perfect keyword tool for your needs. Then you can position the keywords to create a search intent funnel.
Keyword Features and Practices
One of the features a keyword tool provides is analyzing your competition. You’ll be able to see what keywords your competitors are using and how it’s helping them rank on Google. Then you can use this information to fine-tune your own website to include the correct type of keywords.
For instance, you’re going to need long-tail keywords, short keywords, and industry-specific keywords. You’ll also get to use secondary keywords that you sprinkle throughout the content.
A common mistake that many individuals know to SEO make is keyword stuffing. You’ll want to avoid keyword stuffing since this isn’t providing value to your readers.
What exactly is keyword stuffing? It’s the bad practice of cramming in as many keywords as you can in the hopes that your article will rank.
Above all else, you should always be putting value first when creating an article or on-page content. You need to think of what the reader needs to see and how your content can help deliver it.
Keyword stuffing makes articles wordy and awkward. If your content doesn’t flow, Google’s not going to boost your rankings. Instead, you’ll need to strategically place the keywords throughout the article.
We suggest putting the primary keyword in the introduction, a header, the body of the article, and the conclusion. You can then add in the secondary keywords wherever they fit naturally.
Choosing the Right Keyword
Where exactly do keywords come from in the first place? It all has to do with the questions people are typing into Google. F
or instance, almost every day, multiple people search “how to replace asphalt shingles.” Google notices the need to answer this question, so they’ll tell their ranking algorithm to look for relevant keywords relating to the question. For instance, asphalt shingles could be a short keyword.
Whereas, “How to replace asphalt shingles” could be a long-tail keyword. You can then use keywords to maximize global and local search intent opportunities.
Let’s say you own a realty company, and you want to help homeowners learn how to make their houses valuable as possible before selling them. Any articles that would benefit homeowners would be of value to your readers.
You could search for keywords homeowners are using, to come up with a topic idea. Perhaps you’ll write a blog post about how to sell a house as is, or how to sell a house for cash. By providing these articles on your website, you’ll be able to attract the correct type of reader.
Once the reader is on your website, you can then use internal links and on-page optimization to help direct them to the service or product you offer. If you’re a realtor, you can plug your services in the conclusion. Now the readers can call you for help, or
Creating the Right Type of Written Content for SEO
Coming up with blog post ideas and content can be creatively taxing. The good news is that it gets easier with time.
According to the University of North Carolina, freewriting is a great way to help your ideas flow. In other words, plan on creating a couple of rough drafts before you have a finished article.
During the rough draft phase, you can be as free as you want, letting every sentence make it into the article. Don’t judge yourself. You can cut out the fluff during the editing phase to provide a clear and concise blog post.
Entice Readers
Understanding search intent means knowing what type of content to create. But, how can you entice busy readers to absorb all of your content?
One of the best ways to hook readers is by starting off each blog post with a strong introduction. You’ll also want to break up the entire article body by using 3 sentence paragraphs.
If your paragraphs are 5 sentences or longer, it can intimidate readers. All they’ll see is a wall of text when they want fast answers. If you’re going to rank number one, you have to give the reader what they want.
You’ll also want to include headers that are relevant and captivating. Readers should quickly scroll through the article and stop on the header with the information they want.
Using Free Resources to Improve SEO Content
You can use copywriting tricks to make your blogs captivating. There’s a lot of free writing tips and resources online that you can use when crafting blog posts.
For example, have you ever heard of the copywriting framework AIDA? The acronym stands for attention, interest, desire, and action.
If you create blog post introductions that follow the AIDA format, you’ll be able to motivate readers to keep reading. Keep in mind that when people read things on the internet, they’re usually looking for fast answers. So you’ll want to keep your blog post introduction short and sweet.
We find that a hundred words or less are the best way to go for intros and conclusions. For the attention-grabbing part of the article, use a statistic that will grab the reader’s attention.
Then you can generate interest by expanding on what that statistic means. You’ll need to connect with what the reader wants or needs for desire. What question brought them to this article in the first place?
Finally, action is where you’re going to motivate the reader to continue reading the blog so that you can fulfill their desire.
Use a Strong Call to Action to Direct Website Traffic
The introduction is what’s going to get your reader to keep reading. But it’s the conclusion that will get the reader to take an action that benefits your company.
What type of action do you want the reader to take? That’s going to depend on the nature of your business.
If you want the reader to buy something from your company, you’ll need to include an internal link that directs them to purchase. In the conclusion, you can tell the reader to reach out to you today to find out what products are right for them.
If you don’t need the reader to purchase something or sign up for something, then you’ll want them to explore the rest of your website. You can include links within the conclusion that take readers to another relevant blog post, so they can enjoy more of your content.
You could also request that the readers share your blog post. As long as your content is engaging and helpful, the readers will likely share it with friends and family. The more shares you can get on social media, the better your online presence will be.
Going Beyond Blog Posts
Optimizing your website content and creating valuable blog posts is just the start. To take your SEO game to the next level, you’ll also need to learn how to use backlinks to your advantage.
Backlinks are a part of Google’s strategy. Remember, Google cares about providing readers with the answers they’re looking for. They want the answers to be helpful, relevant, and enjoyable to read.
If you have a relatively new website, it can be difficult for Google to determine whether or not you’re providing the correct type of content. One of the fastest ways to earn Google’s trust is by having solid backlinks. You can think of backlinks as a type of networking system.
A strong backlink is like somebody’s referring you to a friend. It’s a way of letting Google know that your website is valuable to readers.
Here’s a shortlist of the different ways you can set up a backlink strategy:
- Use infographics
- Guest blogging
- Editorial backlinks
- Business profiles
- Backlink service
When you combine the strategies above, you’ll be able to improve your website’s authority at a rapid pace.
Rise to the Top
As you can see, there’s a lot that goes into understanding search intent for SEO purposes. From finding the right keywords to crafting captivating articles, you have your work cut out for you.
Try one of the free SEO tools we suggested in this article to see how you can boost your company’s online visibility. If you need expert advice, you can also reach out to an agency that specializes in SEO.
If you’re looking for more ways to get your company’s name out there, we can help. Take a look at what the rest of our website has to offer!
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