If you are not using these 6 simple tips to boost your SEO, then you are missing out!

In this article, I am going to share 6 simple yet effective tips that will boost your SEO.

We all want to be found on Google but it’s not as simple as you think. You can’t just have a website and automatically rank on the first page, it’s a lot of trial and error and a lot of work that goes on behind the scenes. Thankfully in this day and age with technology evolving daily, there are a few simple tips that can boost your SEO instantly.

1) Quality Original Content

This should always be the most important factor on your website, sure a good-looking website is great but it is pointless if you do not have Quality Original Content. Content is king and it always will be, search engines love it, Google’s mission is to make the best, relevant information easily accessible to the world.
So tell your story as best as you can and Google will rank you based on your quality and originality.
You can find an article I wrote regarding How to Create Content for Google  (P.S It ranks number 1 on Google)

2) WordPress

Let me state that most of these tips work better with a WordPress site,  there is a reason why WordPress is the No.1 used CMS in the world. WordPress currently powers 37% of the internet with some 19,545,516 sites built on WordPress. Data Source: https://trends.builtwith.com/cms.
I have previously built sites with Joomla and some other website builders and I can safely say that my WordPress sites rank much better than my Joomla sites used to, plus with great plugins out there like SEOPress that make your SEO so much easier, you don’t want to miss a trick by using any other platform.

3) SEOPress

SEOPress has a free version and a premium version, I personally use the Pro which is really inexpensive compared to the other alternatives, however, all the info shared in this article relate to the free version, I know Yoast is the most popular SEO plugin for WordPress but I just found it too clunky and haven’t regretted switching to SEOPress. you can check out how it compares to Yoast below.

SEOPress is a great SEO plugin for WordPress and it makes it easy for your website to be SEO friendly.
It allows you to add SEO titles, meta descriptions and a keyword to each Page or Post, SEOPress also allows you to add meta descriptions and images for Facebook and Twitter. You can easily create a sitemap and robot.txt files. This plugin on its own will help you boost your SEO considerably.

4) Website Speed

Let’s face it no one likes a slow-loading website and Search Engines definitely don’t like it. Research shows that you have around 7 seconds to get a users attention on your website if your site takes longer than 7 seconds to load not only have you missed out on getting your customer’s attention but the likelihood of that prospect ever returning has diminished. In today’s fast-paced world no one has time anymore, so by having a fast loading easy to navigate website not only will you please search engines but you will please users as well.

These few simple tips could significantly increase your website load times:

• Choose a good reputable host
• Optimize all your images
• Choose a fast loading theme
• Use caching on your website
• Enable GZip compression
• Use a CDN ( Cloudflare offers a free option )
• Reduce the number of plugins you use on your site

Use tools like Pingdom or GTmetrix to monitor and get suggestions to increase your website speed.

5) Google my Business

Every site should have a Google my business page.

As you can see in the example above, when I type in ” Online Marketing in Pietermaritzburg ” my Google my Business Page shows up first and my organic search listing also shows up first.
Your Google my business Page also shows quick contact details as well as working hours, it also stands out compared to a normal organic listing this could be critical when a user is looking for a business just like yours. By having so many options that are: Google my Business Listing, no1 rank on Google listing, it is safe to say that a user will likely click on one of my profiles i.e my Google my Business Listing or my website which shows up first in Google Search.
You can set up your Google my Business Listing here.

6) Google Maps

If you are targeting local clients then you have to have a Google Map embedded in your website heck even if you not targeting local clients you still want a Google Map embedded in your website. With so many WordPress plugins out there, there are many plugins that will help you easily install a Google Map. I prefer embedding a Google Map direct from Google.

As you see it is super simple, just type in your address in Google click on the map then click on ” menu” and click on ” Share or Embed Map ” copy the embed code and add it to your website.
P.S This will work on any website it does not have to be a WordPress site.

Conclusion

No matter how much marketing or social media work you are doing, your website should always be your hub for all your online activities. So having a website that is easily accessible and optimized for Search engines is essential.
With great free tools out there it’s never been easier to get your website ranking higher on search engines. If you not online yet, now is the best time to start.

I hope these simple tips will help you boost your SEO.