Let's start with the basics... for those of you who don't know SEO stands for search engine optimisation. Most of us know that this essentially means how to rank higher on search engines, but once you start looking at what really goes into SEO, it can get pretty complicated. Living in the age of digital business as we do at the moment, you should at least have a basic understanding of how SEO works. By ranking higher on search engines, you are giving your product or business the best visibility possible to your users and others searching for similar things. So, to help you out, here at Appifany we've put together our most frequently asked SEO questions and answers.
Because there's so much that goes into SEO, it's a constant learning journey. And keep in mind as well that SEO strategies and tactics are different for every business and also industry. There are of course general strategies that are helpful to all, but do some research into your particular niche as well. Keep reading blog articles such as this to learn as much as you can. If you can also find out what SEO tactics your competitors are using, this will be extremely valuable in understanding how to compete with them in this space.
If you need an extra helping hand with implementing the correct SEO strategies to generate more user acquisition, engagement and conversions, here at Appifany we can help you out! We have a partnership program where we can help take your business to the next level by working together to improve your SEO and profits!
The Most Frequently Asked SEO Questions and Answers
1. Why is SEO important?
Essentially, the higher you rank on search engine platforms, the more traffic you will generate to your website resulting in more business. That's the aim anyway.
2. How does SEO work?
As I said above, there are a lot of different things that go into search engine optimisation. Search engines look at what results are most relevant to the search, what webpages have the highest quality score, etc. Really, a search engine is trying to give their users the best results to match their search terms. Therefore, if your website is search engine optimised, search engines will read it as relevant and of high quality. These are just a couple of the main things that will benefit from proper SEO strategies.
3. Can I do SEO on my own?
Yes you can. If you are willing to do quite a bit of research on your own to really improve your SEO, then you should be able to do fairly well with it. No one knows an exact, perfect SEO formula or strategy to ensure your website is the highest organically ranking one. However, there are so many different little tricks and factors that go into it! By knowing as much as you can and continuously learning is the best way to ensure SEO improvement on your own.
Getting on top of your SEO though can be quite intimidating with everything that goes into it. Also a strategy that works really great for one thing or one business may not work so well for another. If SEO isn't something you feel comfortable trying to tackle on your own, contact us here at Appifany. We can help improve your SEO and in turn your business traffic and hopefully profits.
4. Can I track my SEO?
Yes, you can definitely track how well your SEO strategies are working! By having an analytic tool such as Google Analytics, you can track all different kinds of things about your website and users. Most importantly for SEO, these analytic tools allow you to track your webpages' rankings.
If for example, you've tried to boost SEO by blogging, creating articles, interlinking and focusing on keywords, you might want to track:
If those articles are bringing more people to your website?
Are people going to those pages?
How long are they staying on the page for?
Has this increased traffic to your website?
Are the article pages organically ranking on search engines (aka generating more traffic)?
Posting blog articles to your website isn't an SEO strategy in itself either by the way, you need to include SEO tactics into your articles. For example, back-linking and interlinking might be one of your SEO tactics in order for your article pages and your website in general to rank higher for relevant searches.
5. What are backlinks?
Backlinks are links that are directed to your website from other sites, which increases your domain authority. The more external sources you have back linking to your website, the more reputable you become to the search engines, which is a factor towards improving your quality score and domain authority. Backlinks are a key building block to SEO, so if you'd like some more information, check out our article on Link Building for Beginners.
6. What's the difference between backlinks and inbound links?
Backlinks and inbound links are actually the same thing. It's inbound links and internal links that are different. An internal link is a link that you place on your website that directs you to another page in your website. Inbound links or backlinks are important for SEO because they:
Reduce bounce rate
Improve user experience (UX)
Develop site structure
7. Do articles on your website affect SEO?
As mentioned above, interlinking between articles can really help improve your SEO. Just having articles or blog posts alone on your website won't necessarily improve SEO. It is important that you include a range of SEO tactics, such as interlinking, keyword optimisation, etc.
In terms of article length, it can vary a lot depending on industry. For example in the lifestyle industry, article lengths are usually longer whereas with other industries you can be more short and sweet. For example, one of our clients, Boattime Yacht Charters, which is a whale watching and private yacht chartering company, their articles on whale watching don't need to be as long. Some recent research suggests that the optimal article length for SEO is between 1500 - 2000 words. Keep in mind this is quite long though, so if your audience is only going to read short articles, do what's best for your readers and audience.
8. How long will it take for SEO strategies to start working?
This is a difficult question, and one that we don't have an exact answer to. It's also one of the top most frequently asked SEO questions. Theoretically though, SEO strategies that you implement should show results pretty quickly, and you will be able to track this through an analytic tool, like Google Analytics.
9. What is Google Analytics?
Google Analytics is the most popular analysis tool to track statistics and traffic of your website. Being able to analyse the data gathered from your website and users is extremely important. It allows you to truly understand your audience and continue the growth of your business.
10. Is bad SEO an actual thing?
Yes, definitely. If your website or webpages aren't search engine optimised then you probably aren't ranking at all on search engines. So, yes having bad SEO or not having any SEO strategies at all, is an actual thing and not a good one. In the age of digital business that we live in, you need to have good SEO strategies in place to be competitive.
11. Does having a sitemap help with SEO?
Not directly, although it does help Google's ability to find and index your webpages. Having more pages indexed though can help to improve SEO, as you have more pages that can be ranked and tracked. And being able to easily have this information structured by having a sitemap, is definitely beneficial.
12. What factors contribute to SEO?
The list of what factors into SEO is very very long and no one outside of Google knows the exact formula, and how much weight each factor holds. That's why it's important to do some research into what strategies you can easily implement, what's best suited for your business or industry, and what your business needs at a certain point in time.
There's definitely still a a few more frequently asked SEO questions that we receive here at Appifany, but there's the main ones. If you found this article helpful and want some more information on SEO, check out our SEO Guide Article on ranking for high value keywords.
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