SEO Techniques For 2014

For every search we make, there are a number of results that are listed on the results page. Some websites are listed above others but what determines the sequence? Search Engines have a complex system called ‘algorithms’ that evaluate each site and its contents on basis of a number of different variables. Google has more than 250 of these variables. Search Engine Optimisers make use of these variables to put their sites higher on SERP’s.

Nobody has been able to determine what exactly Google Algorithm follows to rank pages since it is the one piece of information that keeps the content original and the only information that spammers would love to get their hands on.
Then what is it that SEO workers use to make their page rank higher and succeed in doing so? Honestly, it all comes down to a lot of experience and being aware of the working trends through these years that aid these Optimisers to aim higher for the rank. Combined with these practices comes the very useful advices from more experienced SEO specialists.

The question remains, how would a new website owner or anyone for that matter find out which out of the 250 variables work for Google to rank good on Search Engine Results Pages (SERPs).

Top 10 SEO Tips 2014

1. Analyze your website

When you are struggling to get up on a list, you always have competitors working for the same goal. The most important thing to do first is keep reviewing your website. Make sure it is better than others in all aspects within your niche:

• If your website caters to a certain type of search then you need to ask yourself if your website has complete information regarding that search query.
• Also, what is it that your website offers regarding that search term than your competitors don’t have?
• Is your website trusted enough to be termed as the most reliable website for that particular area of information. Does your website have a better content quality than others? For instance, it could have more than mere text leaden pages. Probably, some supporting videos, PDF documents, images etc.
• Analyze user friendly content on your website i.e. which parts or pages from your websites are more visited than others and why?
• If you are going deep into the user analysis then you might as well check if users are attracting more traffic and is that traffic hitting back or they don’t seem to stay around for some time. If you are aiming for customers then it is important that they are interested enough to browse around.
• All the above questions are necessary for a benefitting audit for your site. If you can’t do it on your own then no need to worry. There are sites that provide SEO Audit service.

2. Keep Your Content Clean

Ensure clarity and ease of navigation through your website. Keep cleaning your site and remove the irrelevant content:

• You must follow Google’s Webmaster Guidelines to ensure that Google can locate, crawl through bots and put your website on a high rank accordingly. These guidelines are the most trusted source to get near Google’s analyzing variables. These will aid in improvements though technical and quality assuring guidelines.
• To make sure your website is easily accessible; get it authorized by W3C for a clear code. Since Google is always more interested in the websites that are more conveniently usable by readers who have some sort of imparity like visual limitations or dependence upon software to read websites.
• Use HTML tags using Title Tag, Meta Description, images etc. to make sure these tags have the search keywords that you are aiming to get a higher rank on the result’s page for. BE careful of over-optimizing your page by avoiding forceful addition of keywords through hidden and stuffed links. Keep it natural and needed.

3. Write a good Title & Description

SERP shows a list of results for a search query. Each result is displayed as a Title, a summarized description and the URL it can be accessed from. One of the variables Google uses for ranking is determined by how many times a particular page is clicked. This variable is called the Click-through rate (CTR).This means even if your page is displayed on the first page and it is not clicked by the searchers, Google will end up downgrading your page to a lower rank.
Users will click your page if your Title and Description are good enough:

• For the search your page is targeting, the Title and Description should be accordingly.
• Make use of Google’s helping guides like Google’s Keyword Tool to see which keywords are being actively used.
• Consider your short description and title to be the only picture of your page that reader can see as first impression.
• Inform the users about the advantages of visiting your website.
• In short whether users will click on your website depends upon the title and description of your page displayed on results page.

4. Create a natural link profile

Google is smarter than many bloggers thought it was. The recent updates in its algorithms have identified a lot of websites that had been engaged in illegal means of link building like buying them or being involved in link farming. If your site is also doing one of these practices then it runs the risk of being located by Google and banned to be displayed on the results page at all.

• Ensure only those links are added to your website that are actually needed for your niche.
• Keep yourself away from buying links thinking Google can be tricked to rank your page higher.
• Make sure the links that you are getting to your page are from a variety of sources and not just one place. Get some from directories, blogs and other relevant websites.
• It is always better to get links from sites that are located in the same country as yours and the place where most of your readers are located.
• The backlinks in your content should have anchor text that goes with your content. BE careful not to keep all the anchor text the same because it seems unnatural to Google. Make some of the text slightly less matching to your niche.
• Build links to only authorized and relevant websites.
• Don’t go for an overnight link building strategy. Let the process be gradual and relevant. Otherwise, Google bots will get the impression that bulk links have been purchased.

In case you are finding it difficult to analyze your link building criteria, you can always take help from tolls available online or acquire the aid of SEO professionals who are there to do the job for you. There are many experienced professionals that understand the complexities of link analyzing and building but stay aware of the sites that offer bulk links.

5.  Content plan

Previously, it wasn’t as important to have new content or be concerned with the amount users get engaged with. However, changes in algorithms have made it increasingly important to keep adding content to the site and keep tabs on the activities of users on your website since Google now takes that into consideration. In short, users should not only be visiting your site but also be interested enough to share the content.
Here are some questions you need to ask yourself:

• Do the users continue to stay on your page after clicking it?
• Do they get interested enough to share it with others?
• What is the average amount of time spent on your page by various users?
• Do they go through the entire content on your page?
• How many times is your page printed?

Google will analyze the content quality of your website on some of the above mentioned criteria. The better option is to plan ahead when it comes to content update: have a 12-months long plan to update your content according to the popular trends of the time in your niche. Add a variety of relevant stuff like blogs, articles, information updates, latest news etc.
Google Analytics gives you the service that will aid you in understanding what type of content you should have. If you are unable to get a grip of the data Google Analytics displayed, you can always ask the SEO companies to assist you with it.

6. Integrate Social Sharing

Social networking has taken over the world of internet surfing, you should make sure you are taking full advantage of this trend. Make your content easily sharable on these sites:

• The first step to link to these social networking sites is to add buttons to your blogs or services that allow the user to share the content easily.
• If majority of your readers use a selective social network then you must alos be there on that network through an interestingly engaging presence.
• The content that best describes your content or is most used by the visitors must be shared on these networks through your website’s page on that network such as Facebook, Google+ etc.
• To ad social sharing buttons to your blog you can get a lot of plugins available online such as AddThis or others.
• Professionals encourage bloggers to update or post more content every day. If your routine does not allow doing this regularly the you can use tools like Hootsuite to schedule your updates.
• Having a social media integration plan added to your content plan makes a good marketing plan to attract a target audience.

7. Marketing the content

Google bots detect the updates you make to your content but how would your readers know about the latest posts you have made? Here come your marketing strategies in. You need to inform your readers about these changes so they can read and share it on social networks. The more traffic you attract, the more natural backlinks you will receive.

• You authority on the search query you are targeting depends directly on the number of times you update the content.
• Come up with content that your readers would like to share. This will affect your ranking positively.
• Adding a resource library containing instructions, videos, images, case studies etc. would be a smart move on your part. Let your readers know about it.
• Engage in guest blogging i.e. share your content on other blogs as well.
• Add a link directing back to your blog on social networking sites. Don’t overdo it.
• The readers should be updated with the latest changes to your blog. Make an RSS for this purpose so readers can subscribe.

8. Promote the authority

Google has come up with a new variable that it gives a lot of attention to while ranking a page. AuthorRank  is the new factor that takes into consideration the individual contributors to a blog or website.

• Make an author profile of your content contributors by using author tags and attributing the specific content to specific persons depending upon their importance to your blog.
• Create a profile for the author on Google+ and link all the content posted by the author to that profile.
• Put in his Google+ profile number to the posts by the author to your page.
• Use author tags on all the other blogs as well such as guest blogging and social network sharing.
• The authority of an author consolidates with the number of posts he makes. The more, the better.
• If you can make your readers to share the author’s content more, the author Rank of that particular author will increase.

9. Create a mobi-friendly website

Reports suggest in certain areas of the world like South Africa 60% search queries are punched in through mobile devices and through social media networks on these mobile devices. With the advancements of mobile technology more users are moving towards mobile friendly websites than desktop sites and hence, their growth rate is very high comparative to desktop websites.
As per Digital Media Marketing Association of South Africa (DMMA), users had a total of 79 million page views in July 2012 through ten largest mobisites.
You must also put a thought in building a mobisite for your website:

• Avoid replicating your desktop website for creating your mobisite since users browse differently when using a mobile device. Build a mobile friendly version instead.
• Keep the information minimal and to the point. Users browse fast through mobiles and only seek the relevant piece of information.
• As much as you can, keep the page smaller and the most important content on the top so the users do not have to scroll much further down to find what they are looking for.
• For tasks that need some information from users must be kept as short and simple as possible. Users do not like to fill lengthy forms or pages to carry out the tasks they visited your website for.

10. Localize your content

Reports indicate that around 40% of the users intend to perform a locality based search query.  After typing in the search query users usually add in a postal code or geographic location to seek a local information.
For a location based business, you need to ensure that the locals of that area are the targeted traffic for your website since these people will be looking for specifics on your business for that area. Hence, you need to have a website that contains content specifically intended for that location:

• Check your location with Google Places since the first location based research is usually Google Maps results.
• To direct the results towards your website, embed Google Map for your location to your contacts page.
• Mention your full address and location information including famous buildings and street names on your contacts page.
• Add the location information in the HTML tags.
• Go for a < strong > tag for your location if you can otherwise make it bold for easy identification by Google bots and readers alike.
• Add your business in local business directories that users refer to.

Apart from these factors, there are a lot of other variables that can help your business rank high and stay on that higher rank for long. However, these are the best steps that you can utilize as you take your business to 2014, another year of successful blogging.