When you ask experts about search engine optimization, they can often get so caught up in the latest backlinking strategies and techniques that they completely neglect to mention on site SEO factors, which are extremely important and can massively affect a page’s strength in terms of SEO.
The best way to show you how to use on site SEO factors to great effect is by example, through out this piece I will be using the example keyword “mobile phone” to show you how to master the simple on site SEO factors that most web masters don’t know about.
Before we go any further, since the Panda update Google hates duplicate content more than anything so bare that in mind the next time you’re creating pages for your site or updating existing pages.
Keyword Usage
One of the most important factors of on site is keyword usage, if you are targeting a specific keyword then you need to let the search engines know.
– Domain Name – If you are targeting the keyword “mobile phone” and you have the domain mobilephone.com then you will have a huge advantage when ranking. This is probably the most powerful on site SEO factor, these are called exact match domains and are highly sought after. But even having part of the keyword in the domain will stand you in good stead.
– URL – Including the keyword in the page’s URL is also extremely helpful, this is why it is better to have an URL like mobilephone.com/bestmobilephone, instead of mobilephone.com/23542, the search engines prefer URLs that actually use the keywords instead of random numbers. This is a must if you are looking to rank for additional keyword on sub-pages of your sites.
– Title – You should always include the keyword in the title tag of your page, so if you were targeting the keyword “Mobile Phone”, you would need to make sure it featured somewhere in your title. The best place is at the very beginning of your title as this will be the first thing that most search engines ‘read’ on a page, something like “Mobile Phone – What Is The Best One?” is a great way to put the keyword at the beginning of a title without it looking unnatural.
– Headers – The keyword should also be used in headers throughout the article, this is not only beneficial for SEO but by breaking up your article with headers, it is also easier for the reader as it will not be one huge block of unreadable text. You’ll find it is easier to write articles that are broken up as well, since you only have to write small chunks, not one huge piece of content.
– Keyword Density – Keyword density is simply how many times your keyword appears in the content, this is measured in percentage and whilst it highly disputed, anything between 3% to 5% is a good keyword density for a page. Bare in mind that an extremely high keyword density will look unnatural and this will negatively affect your on site SEO, search engines aren’t stupid and can spot keyword stuffing a mile off, so don’t over do it.
Use Of Content
– Images – Search engines love it when you use other types of content and not just text. It is also better for the reader, as it brightens up the page and makes a site look more developed. You should also edit your images so they are named with the keyword you are targeting, you should always put your keyword in the image’s title and alt tags.
– Video – If there is a type of content that search engines love above anything else, it is video. If you have unique videos on your site then you’ll get a nice SEO boost. To maximise the SEO boost from using videos, make sure that videos include the keyword you are targeting in their title and also in their description, even putting the keyword in the videos upload file will help.