Your website’s rank for the correct search queries will determine how much traffic you can drive to it. After all, many internet users — a whopping 75% — tend not to look past the first page of search results. SEO is a must-have part of any digital marketing strategy to grow your company. With so many people using the internet to search for what they need, it’s impossible to ignore SEO.

In our recent State of Content Marketing Report, 67% of content marketing professionals surveyed indicated that improving SEO performance is a top priority for their company. Another 73% stated that they use their SEO skills and tools frequently to improve content marketing results. To remain competitive, it is important to learn how to improve your search engine rankings.

Do you feel lost? Continue reading to learn SEO tips and search engine optimization strategies that even novices can use in their work. These non-technical SEO tips will help you see quick results.

1. Create Content Around Primary and Secondary Keywords

Keyword research is the heart of any SEO strategy. Keyword research is the key to creating great content. Searchers will find your site by knowing how to use both primary and second keywords.

Your landing page should have your primary keyword as its main focus. The page should contain a strong description and possibly connect to your brand. These keywords should be the main focus of your content.

Secondary keywords are words that support the primary keyword and can be included in your content in a natural way to improve your search ranking.

Start your keyword research by identifying long-tail keywords that are relevant to your audience. Say you run a DIY home improvement blog. Using our Keyword Overview Tool, you can start by searching for “DIY home improvement” as your target keyword and then expand to include more keywords from there. You’ll see the search volume and difficulty of ranking for your primary keyword in your area, along with related terms that you might be interested in.

2. Use Short, Descriptive URLs

There are also some not-too-technical ways you can optimize your SEO efforts when it comes to on-page SEO. For those just beginning in SEO, it is easy to improve your SEO rankings by structuring your URLs.

A URL that is effective should:

• Use keywords: Your URL should contain one or more keywords that you are targeting.
• Be easy to understand It should be easy to read and cater to the human eye.
• Be concise Using shorter URLs is preferable. Keep them under 60 characters. Search engines won’t accept URLs longer than 60 characters, which could cause you to be pushed further down the results pages.

3. High Authority Websites Have High Quality Backlinks

Link building is an important component of any SEO strategy. It’s also relatively simple to begin. Backlinks are an important ranking factor. They come in two types: nofollow and follow, with the latter having more ranking weight.

Backlinking refers to the linking of other websites to your website as a source for information. These links are a sign to search engines that you are an authority on a topic and should be pulled up in the rankings. Higher rankings in online searches will be achieved if your website has more quality links.

Bloggers, journalists, and other companies will recognize you as an expert in your field, and may link to your content. However, this doesn’t always happen instantly. You may have to do some research before you start.

You have many options to create links to your site. Here are some strategies to consider:

• If you have something to share or an interesting infographic, consider writing a guest blog post for other outlets.
• Reach out to publishers for any data or research you have done to support your site content.
• Look for directories and listings in your industry and get your company listed. It may mean joining professional associations, networking groups or business organizations. However, it increases your credibility.

How do you determine where to get backlinks? Use our Backlink Gap Tool to compare the backlinks for your site with four competing URLs. This will allow you to compare which websites link to your site more than your competitor, and vice versa. To help you target high authority sites with your initial link building efforts, you can organize the list by authority score.

4. Try to Rank for Featured Snippets

Google’s Featured Snippets are a highly desired spot that digital marketers want to reach when it comes search engine result pages (SERPs). Featured Snippets are at the top of Google search results, and they have a high chance of attracting lots of organic traffic. Optimizing your content is key to achieving this position.

First, decide what content you would like to be a featured snippet. Choose something that will make internet users click on the link. You should also carefully examine the keywords in Featured Snippets. Studies show that a piece of content that asks a question is more likely to have a Featured Snippet.

5. Format Your Content for Search Engines

While the words you choose are important, how you present your content is equally important. You want your content to be clear, concise, understandable, and easy to read. However, search engines will also require that you adapt your formatting. To improve your organic search ranking, you will want to use headings and subheadings in your content.

It is important to know how to organize your paragraphs and sentences. A sentence should not exceed 20 words. You shouldn’t have more than 20 words per sentence, but you don’t want your paragraphs to be too long either.

6. Do Not Forget Page Titles and Meta Descriptions

Keywords have a significant impact on the content you create, but did you also know that they should be included in page titles as well as meta descriptions? These two elements are basic HTML components that can help you optimize your page and pack a punch. They’re also easy to edit for beginners.

Most platforms offer an easy way for you to modify your page title or meta description. WordPress offers two boxes, “SEO title” or “meta description”, that can be edited.

These items will show up in search results. These short sections could be enough to convince an internet user to click on your site. This is a lot of power in so few words. Make sure your words are powerful.

7. Take Out Anything That Loads Slowly

Did you know that page load times can impact your SEO? Higher bounce rates are common for pages that take longer to load. 

Google PageSpeed Insights is a free SEO tool to check the speed of your site. You can add your URL to get a range from zero to 100 with 100 being fastest. You can also compare the speed of your mobile website to your desktop site.

Do yourself a favor. Take a look at your website. Do you have any plugins or elements that slow down your website’s load times? You’ll see an increase in traffic if you remove or restructure them.

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