By Colton Eva
Have you ever felt frustrated because your digital marketing campaign doesn’t seem to be taking off because your ads doesn’t perform well in organic search rankings?
There are hundreds of thousands of search queries typed into search engines daily, underscoring the fact that you have thousands of other brands to contend with online. And when the number one spot in the SERP (Search Engine Results Page) has a click-through rate (CTR) of around 31% you’d want your content to really be there at the top, outshining the rest.
If you’re looking for SEO strategies to improve your organic search rankings, look no further, as we have listed down the best ones you should use!
- Authenticity is everything.
Creating substantial and relevant content is crucial in securing search engine rankings. But apart from these, your content must also be authentic — how your content resonates with audiences is what would encourage site traffic and engagement.
Furthermore, originality is a must if you want your content to be noticed by audiences and prioritized by search engines. Posting duplicate, similar, or repetitive content can affect your organic ranking on SERPs; anti-plagiarism tools can help you ensure that you only post original content on your webpage.
- Master keyword research.
Around 51% of smartphone users have discovered a new product or service by using a search engine through their phones. No surprise there, especially as search queries including the terms “where to buy/purchase” and “near me” have increased twofold since 2017.
Keywords are basically the lifeline of your SEO marketing campaign, so it’s imperative that you conduct effective keyword research to optimise your content. When creating a keyword list, think of the keywords most relevant to your product or service that prospects would likely search for. Run an assessment on competition and traffic among the keywords on your list — tools such as Google’s Keyword Planner can help with this.
A specific example would be blog posts. Longer copy in articles is usually preferred over short ones, as this enables you to weave more keywords and outbound links into your content. As a bonus, this helps with relevance and in encouraging visitor conversion.
- Speed it up!
If there’s one thing potential customers hate, it’s slow page load times.
You literally only have 3 seconds to capture your audience’s attention online, and around 80% of visitors don’t go back to a site that takes an eternity to load. And on Google’s part, it’s so smart that it can actually detect the pace at which your page loads.
Of course, speed is also a major factor in the mobile-friendliness of websites. Google prioritizes mobile-friendly websites in its ranking; here are some strategies to do it:
- Perform mobile tests
- Make sure it’s designed for touch — constantly clicking on the wrong links can ruin the user experience
- Use effective and accessible CTAs
- Optimise images
- Optimise, optimise, optimise.
Speaking of accelerating load times, optimising page elements such as images is a surefire way of improving site speed. Plus, intricately composed images effectively catch and hold visitors’ attention.
It’s not only your images you should optimise — your titles, too. Your meta title is what is displayed as hyperlinks on SERPs, on tabs, and on the top area of browser windows whenever your webpage is launched. Additionally, using header tags will help segment big chunks of content, improving readability.
Google’s algorithm detects a web page’s meta title most relevant to the keywords/phrases searched and prioritizes those with the keyword included in the title’s first 50 characters. To drive brand awareness, one of the best practices in meta title creation is also including your brand name in it.
- Build winning links.
In search marketing, link building is almost at the heart of improving organic rankings. Guest blogging is a common way of doing this; when you receive links from websites with high domain authority, the higher your ranking becomes. This is based on the theory or premise that pages won’t be cited as a resource if they weren’t credible ones — an otherwise effective way of marketing as in a way, host websites vouch for your content.
Making Your Way To The Top [Spot]
So that’s it for our top tips on improving your organic search rankings! As SEO and organic traffic are more effective lead generation tactics compared to other strategies — at least for 61% of B2B marketers who said that “SEO and organic traffic generate more leads than any other marketing initiative” — you definitely need all the help you can get.
You can start with optimising your content, doing keyword research, tracking the right metrics, or partnering with an SEO consultant that has the right tools and expertise to boost your rankings. Best of luck in reaching the top spot!
