The 5 Basics Any Marketer Needs To Know About SEO

Search engine optimization has seen a dramatic shift in the last decade. Search engines are less focused on keywords and more focused on the searcher’s intent. The goal is to provide users informative and educational content. In short, the content must be meaningful. As an online marketer, you would know the changes that have taken place from algorithm updates, to increase in search queries on mobile devices. Nowadays, secure websites are being ranked on top by Google. The key to churning out business success is adapting to these changes as and when they are presented.

You may be struggling to keep up. Here’s a crash course on what SEO marketers need to know about the basics of SEO to be successful in 2017.

Content is still a stronghold

There’s no doubt content continues to be a major stronghold in search engine optimization. You must be aware Google penalizes websites for offering low-quality content. SEO marketers need to re-focus their energy on producing creative, authentic and high-quality content. Content that is readable, inspiring or just plain funny. It must be content that draws in people. Search engines look for good quality content and will deliver to users if it fits the criteria.

Earn links

Paid links do not hold any value, neither do they account for much. No, you need to earn it. Otherwise, it might just hurt your business. Easy links will not get you into the good books of Google. What you can do instead is to earn endorsements. Unnatural link building is waning off and natural link building is gaining traction. You need an external organization or business to say, ‘I’m recommending this article or website.’ However, if a journalist or blogger writes a press release to promote your brand this certainly has value and will be considered legitimate.

Speedy websites

Your site needs to load quickly. Speed matters! No one wants to spend more than ten minutes waiting for a website to load, when there are sites that will load in just 20 seconds. People do not have the patience they had even 5 years ago. Everything is at our fingertips, so why should we waste time on website upload. Pages tend to slow down due to poorly implemented JavaScript. The faster your website loads the better the user experience will be. This also leads to lower bounce rates.

Keyword scattering

Keyword optimization should be scattered with meaning. Do not use keywords as fillers. They should be scattered properly, in the right place and with real meaning. If keywords do not make sense within the structure of the sentence, search engines will not pick it up. Less is more!