An Overview Of SEO (Search Engine Optimization)

Are you looking to master Search Engine Optimization and make a highly profitable career out of it? Well, you've come to the right place. Read on to know what SEO is, how it works, why it's so important, and if the field is right for you.

In simple terms, SEO is using various methods to get more people to see a particular website or page online without paying them. However, this is a fast-paced job. There are constantly new ways, so it is important to be aware and keep learning. First, let's talk about the basics of SEO which include three things:

1. Understanding how search engines work
2. Research and Analysis
3. Website Optimization

How do Search Engines Work?

Imagine this - The house you are in is covered with webs full of spiders. You are in 1 room looking for certain information. The spider in that room will crawl through the web and connect with other spiders, eventually finding what you want.

Can you picture it? This is exactly how search engines work! The house represents the internet/web. The rooms are the pages. The spiders are bots that crawl all over the web to find the content you want.

But there is so much content all over the internet, and going through all of them is time-consuming. All content is ranked on relevancy. This is where SEO comes in handy. It improves the rank of your page on the search engine list, so it comes up faster.

Currently, Google is the most popular search engine in the world. Ranking higher on google increases the number of clicks on your website. To get your website on google, first find your sitemap, a list of all pages on your website. Then create a free Google Search Console account and submit it.

Steps to great SEO:

1. Set your website correctly with a good domain, web host, logical site and URL structure and most importantly, user friendly.

2. Cover the four facets of SEO: Keyword Research, On-page SEO, Link Building, Technical SEO

3. Keyword Research: This includes learning what your audience is looking for, the terms they use when searching for it and how often those terms are used.

4. On-page SEO: Using the keywords found during research on your website will make it easier for the audience to find you. But that's not all - how and where you use the keywords is also essential - which means the content must be relevant and relatable to the audience. This includes a descriptive URL, a compelling title tag (clickable headings in the search results) and optimized images (compressed, well-named, and with alt. text.)

5. Link Building: Other websites/pages lead to your website via links. These are like confidence builders for the audience. They see pages other than the website talking about the website. An excellent way to do this is by blogging on other sites. Find patterns in competitors strategies and use effective ones.

6. Technical SEO: This is mainly helping your website get listed on search engines like google.

   Now that we covered the basics, you can check the success by measuring the increase in traffic using Google Analytics.

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