March 8, 2017

Why Keywords Aren’t Everything in Online Success

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Michael Jenkins
Michael Jenkins

CEO - Shout Agency
[email protected]

Overview

For a long time, marketers associated search engine optimisation with keyword research. That is because in the past, placing the right keywords would increase the success most marketers had with search traffic.

Instead, today businesses need to take a more holistic approach to search engine optimisation Sydney beyond keyword rankings and keyword analysis. This means you need to take a long-term approach to creating a relationship with those who search for content you have on your site.

To do this properly we discuss 5 steps to help you along the journey.

5 Steps to Online Success

1. Do not expect immediate results

SEO is not just plug and play. Getting the best results takes time. That is because creating long-term value for customers does not happen overnight. In many cases, it takes years to drive enough traffic to make a difference. That is why over the past few years, SEO has shifted to a long-term approach versus the black hat approaches that many companies used a decade ago.

This strategy will not be effective immediately. There are things you can do to tweak your success, but it takes a good strategy to get to the top. If you need help developing that strategy, then give us a Shout.

2. Use anchor text for internal links

To add a little clarity before we dive into this discussion, anchor texts are keyword-based links. For example, this link to Neil Patel is an anchor text. While you should use anchor texts in moderation, they can help your rankings.

When you use anchor texts to link together articles and pages on your site, you give Google and Bing a more complete picture of the content on your website.

Therefore, as you link an article on SEO to one of your keywords, you give Google hints on which content is the most important, as well as the pages most deserving of traffic from the search engine.

3. Mobile-optimized websites

We have discussed the importance of mobile-friendly websites ad nauseam, because of the changing importance of mobile searches by users. Because of Google’s mobile-friendly shift, voice queries have become a dominant form of searching for content. Since people talk very differently than they type, this means keyword searches are not as valuable on mobile devices.

Instead, we need to focus on the context of a user’s search. This means that creating content that provides a lot of value and is relevant to your target can help you improve your search traffic.

While we would definitely argue this is something you should do for all of your search efforts, the case is especially true for mobile searches.

4. Social signals

No one can argue against the effect that social media has had on search engines. Nowadays users are as likely to see a relevant tweet, Quora answer, or Facebook page show up in searches as they are other websites.

That is because social media provides certain signals that traditional websites lack. There are a few reasons for this.

First, social media sites have a lot of page authority. No one will argue that Facebook does not have enough authority. That is why over 1.6 billion people are on the social network.

Second, even though links on Twitter and Facebook are no-follow, the content does carry more weight with Google. That means you might not get backlinks from Twitter; however, if you get a lot of retweets on an article, your search traffic can increase. One other benefit of this extra attention is that it could provide you with more links from other sites that source your quality content.

5. Broken link building

Nothing is worse than going to a site and finally finding the information you want only to discover that the link is broken. You just wasted time on the site, and now are suspicious of all the information you received from them.

Make sure you do not do this to your website’s visitors. Check the links on your site on a regular basis to ensure that you have as few broken links as possible.

Otherwise, you can not only harm the trust you have with visitors, but Google might also penalise the pages with broken links.

Final Thoughts

Keyword research still plays a part in the search engine optimisation mix. However, as you can see from this article, it is not the be-all, end-all to your online marketing success.

If you really want to build your search engine traffic, then you have to do more than just quality keyword analysis. You need to have a mobile website with quality content that can generate interest from others to prove to Google that you are worthy of being followed.

Are you ready to implement these steps for online success? If not, contact us at Shout for a free consultation and meet our SEO Brisbane team and Melbourne SEO team to craft a strategy to help you succeed.

Book a free 45 minute consultation today.

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        Shout logo in grey

        As Founder and Director of Shout Web Strategy, Michael Jenkins is at the forefront of digital marketing. Since it’s inception in 2009, Shout has built a strong reputation as one of Australia’s leading strategic SEO agencies, assisting online businesses to formulate, implement and track successful marketing strategies. Michael is a respected thought leader and digital strategist, specialising in online strategy, corporate SEO, Google retargeting, email and conversion rate optimisation, and online reputation management. Follow Michael on Google+, connect with him through LinkedIn or visit the Shout Web Strategy website.

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