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Do you feel as if no matter how much time and energy you devote to SEO, you aren’t getting anywhere? It could be because you are using the exact same tactics as your competitors, which means you won’t see many results. Most companies that are attempting to improve their ranking know to use certain keywords or build their links in a certain way, but there are some SEO techniques that aren’t as common. If you want to finally get ahead with SEO in 2017, incorporate some of these tips and tricks that your competitors don’t know about into your strategy:
Create an app
Why would you create a mobile app to help your ranking in search engine results? Using a tool known as Firebase App Indexing, Google will now include your app in search results and direct users to install it if they don’t already have it on their device. This is one more opportunity for you to rank for certain keywords. For example, if you perform a search for “order a pizza,” the Pizza Hut app will show up on the first page of results. This could be your brand taking up two spots on the first page—so why not build a mobile app in 2017?
Don’t forget about your images
Marketers are often so focused on keyword stuffing and link building that they forget images need to be search engine optimized, too! Spend a little time optimizing your images to boost the ranking of your entire website. How can you get started? Checking the titles of your images. When you save an image to your computer, it is given a default name that often has nothing to do with what’s being shown. If all of the images on your site have titles such as “Image1” or “DSC1001,” they won’t help you improve your ranking. However, if you change the title to something more relevant, it could boost your ranking. For example, if you’re trying to sell watches, give each image a title such as “women’s diamond watch” or “leather band watch.”
Pay more attention to landing pages
Are you forgetting to optimize your landing pages? If so, you’re making a major SEO mistake. Take a look at your landing pages and make sure the content is valuable, relevant to who you are targeting, and at least 2,000 words. This wouldn’t be a bad place to use a long-tailed keyword, either. Incorporate these changes into your landing page, and you will have a leg up on your competition.
Use SEMRush to your advantage
Beat your competitors at their own game by finding out exactly their top organic keywords. No, you don’t need to plant a spy on their marketing team—you just need to learn what tools to use. SEMRush is a free tool that every marketer should have bookmarked on their computer. How does it work? Simply visit the website, and enter the URL of the competitor you are interested in learning more about. You will then be shown a dashboard with a ton of information on how your competitor is doing. The main things you need to pay attention to on this page are the “Top Organic Keywords” and “Top Paid Keywords” sections. Use this information to see how customers are finding your competitor and what keywords you should consider targeting.
Repair broken links
You should always be on the lookout for both internal and external broken links. Internal broken links are those that link to a page on your site that no longer exists or that has moved to another location, whereas external broken links are those that link to a nonexistent page on another website. If search engines spot a lot of broken links on your page, they won’t view you as favorably, so it’s important to get these links fixed as soon as possible. Don’t worry—you don’t have to manually search through every link on your page to get this job done. Use one of the many tools available, such as BrokenLinkCheck.com.
Answer questions
If you ask your search engine a question, you will probably get a list of results that includes a few links to popular question and answer websites, such as Quora. Search for questions related to your company that do not have an answer yet or only have weak, poorly written responses. Then, take the time to write out a thorough and relevant response to the question. Find a way to naturally fit in a link to your website without making it look spammy or self-promotional. Posting responses on these websites are beneficial for two reasons. First, you are introducing your website to the large number of people who visit this site and view it as a valuable resource. But, you are also placing one of your links on a website that is viewed as reliable and trustworthy by Google and other search engines. It only takes a few minutes to set up accounts on these question and answer websites, so find the time if you truly want to get ahead of your competitors.
Clean up your code
Search engines will penalize you if you have too much code or errors in your code, so review your website’s coding to ensure you this is not affecting your ranking. Why does Google care about your code? Too much code makes it difficult for a page to load, so you will be penalized for having a slow load time. Incorrect code makes it harder for a search engine to crawl your site, which will negatively affect your ranking. To check for errors in your code, use a tool such as W3 so you don’t have to manually go through all of the code on your own.
With these tips, you can finally gain ground against your competitors, and they’ll be clueless as to how you did it! For more information regarding unique and effective SEO strategies, contact us to schedule a free consultation.