Is your website doing its job?
By Julie Stanko, Valcort Digital Marketing Manager
It is rare to talk with a corporate leader who is enthusiastic about the performance of the company’s website, and we find great interest in our counsel on improving website results. 
Many people recognize that SEO (search engine optimization) is one of the essentials for the success of their website and digital marketing efforts. Most people understand SEO to be a search visibility strategy that is executed after a site is launched. But the groundwork of the SEO process should be the first step taken when building a website. This initial SEO process, known as a keyword analysis, will help identify the most valuable and highly searched keyword terms to be used in every aspect of your website and digital marketing efforts moving forward.
Here are 6 components of your website and/or digital marketing that should be guided by your SEO keyword research.
- Navigation. Your navigation titles (landing pages) will ultimately become the site URLs. Always think about how you can utilize the most relevant and highest trending terms within your URL structure. This can play a major role in ranking for high traffic terms. Also terminology if your industry uses (i.e., eye doctor, optician), location names (i.e., city, state, area), and resources (i.e., FAQs, glossary) offer traffic opportunities. Consider ways to build these terms into your site. This might include a LOCATION page or RESOURCE section.
- Images. Image SEO starts with the right file names. When creating your site, you
should be planning where each image will be placed and what keyword(s) should be used in the image names and alt tags based on the keyword emphasis for each particular page. This is something that should be a part of the site building process.
- Keywords. As you may know, the use of specific keywords within the content or text of a given landing page are essential to how well you rank for keyword phrases. Each page should essentially have just one or two specific targeted keyword terms (i.e., high-top kitchen table, square kitchen tables). Also, frequency and placement are critical. Words used towards the top of the page, H1/H2 headlines, and the recurrence of the terms will impact the success of your optimization.
- Metadata. Once one or two keyword phrases are identified for each page and content written, metadata should be crafted and added to the code of each landing page. These meta tags, which are restricted in length, help search engines understand your keyword emphasis, while describing a page’s content to those searching. This includes the title tags and meta descriptions. If these snippets are not added, your CMS usually auto-generate titles based on your actual page title (i.e., About Us | ABC Company) and the meta description is randomly created by search engines when your content is indexed. You will lose control of your listing display and ranking ability if you skip this SEO initiative.
- Blogs. Blog topics and the titles and content of your articles should be guided by keyword research. Continue to identify trending questions or searches conducted by your target audience and select your topics based on the most relevant interest. Then, write your articles utilizing keywords within your headlines and overall content. Always assess how your articles are ranking and tweak your writing techniques to improve your optimization skills.
- Social media. The same is true for all your social channel topics and posts. Use your initial research, but continue to conduct new research to stay fresh with the latest interests. Write your posts accordingly and optimize tags and hash tags to reflect your keyword interests.
So, you can now see how crucial your SEO keyword research can be to the success of your website and digital marketing efforts. The keyword analysis can be one of the most important investments to make for your online success. Are you considering a website design? Are you responsible for website or digital marketing content? If so, make sure your keyword research is thorough.
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We can help you with website development and SEO! Contact Valcort’s digital practice at jstanko@valcort.com.
Tags: digital, SEO, Valcort, website development