On-page SEO: Introduction, Optimization and Tools

On-page SEO Guide for 2021:-

What is On-Page SEO?

On-page SEO (also known as “on-site SEO”) is the practice of optimizing web page content for search engines and users. Common on-page SEO practices include optimizing title tags, content, internal links and URLs.

Why On-Page SEO is important?

Human beings have super short attention spans. If your content isn’t one of the first listings, 99% of customers will never see it. 

Basic SEO is essential; it drives large numbers of visitors to your site and helps improve the traffic. 

On-page SEO is important for bringing any website or blog to a higher rank in search engines and to increase organic traffic from search engines. On-Page SEO comes with all the things that a site is used to optimize for search engines, to crawl and index webpages.

 It uses both content and technical elements to improve the quality of a page, so the more on-page SEO you do, the more traffic you'll get to a website and the more relevant that traffic will be.

Factors affecting On-page SEO:-(Directly or Indirectly)

1. Website should be Crawlable
2. User Friendly URL's
3. Well Targeted Content
4. Keyword Optimization
5. Website Optimization
6. HTTP's
7. Image Optimization
8. Readability & UX
9. CTR (Click Through Rate)
10. Mobile Friendliness
11. Quality Outbound Links
12. Website Structure

How to Optimize on page SEO?

These steps are listed based on importance, so don’t skip a step. Also, remember that creating new optimized content on a weekly basis is critical to achieving long-term success with SEO.

Step 1: Choose Keywords  

Read the page’s content and identify two  keywords that are most relevant to the overall page content. Choose one primary keyword relevant to the page’s content and one variation of that keyword (e.g. plural variation or two closely related keywords) per page. If you can’t identify one primary keyword for a page, you’ll need to create new website pages to separate the different content. If it’s not clear to you what page is about, then your visitors and the search engines won’t be able to understand the page either.

Step 2: Page Title

• The page title appears as the blue, bolded, underlined text on a Google search results page, and also on the top left the browser bar. The page title should follow these guidelines: 

•  Be under 70 characters with no more than two long-tail keywords per page title 

•  The primary keyword should appear first  Each keyword phrase should be separated by pipes (|) 

•  Each page title on your website should be unique 

•  Except for your homepage and contact us page, each page title should NOT include your business name. 

Step 3: Meta Description

Meta descriptions are what appear on SERPs describing the content of the page being linked to. While these descriptions are not used by the search engines to determine rank, they are used by your visitors to determine how relevant your website is based on their search query. Think about when you search: You almost always read (or at least skim) the description of each link before deciding to click, right? Make sure you include your keywords and the main call-to-action right in this description.

The meta description should follow these guidelines: 

•  Be under 150 characters (but not under 100 characters; take advantage of the space you have) 

•  Incorporate the primary keyword and at least one secondary keyword 

•  Provide a valuable, compelling reason for why someone should visit the page 

•  Include keywords in a conversational format; don’t just cram in keywords for the sake of listing them 

Step 4: URL

• Use the primary keyword in website's URL.

• Each word in the URL should be separated using dashes (-).

• e.g. www.examplesite.com/techy-dgital-marketing

• .Connect URL to the page title .(not exact)

• Avoid numeric labels.

• SEO friendly URL's improve the user experience.

• Characters in a URL should be in lowercase.

• Never include special characters(@,$,&)

Step 5: Heading Tags

The page should have one H1 heading tag that incorporates the primary keyword, and should align with the page title and the URL or the page. This H1 tag should appear at the top of the page and should be the first thing people see when they arrive on a page.

Step 6: Page Content 

Use your primary keyword a few times throughout the page’s content. Don’t overthink keyword density or placement, you should mention them naturally. Try to bold or underline the keyword at least once. This has an effect on how relevant the keyword is to the page. Also use the secondary keywords in the content.

Step 7: Add a Call to Action 

Every website page, including your blog, should have at least one call to action above the page’s fold (Don’t make your website visitor scroll down to see the call to action). Calls to action can help SEO by creating an internal link on your website to a specific landing page. Most calls to action are images; therefore you can optimize the image filename and alt text for the primary keyword you’re targeting on the page.

Step 8: Internal Links or External Links

Internal Links -If you mention the primary keyword of this page on other pages within your site, then link to this page using the primary keyword as the anchor text.

External Links-An external link is any link that goes to a different domain. For example, example.com and someplace.com are considered external links to computerhope.com.

Step 9: Images 

Any images used on the page should be optimized so that search engines can “read” the image. Optimize the most prominent image on the page using the primary keyword, and then use the primary and secondary keywords for any other images. Images can be optimized in two ways: 

File name: Each word should be separated with dashes (-), e.g. inbound-marketing-software.jpg .

ALT text: The alt text should match the file name, without dashes, e.g. Inbound Marketing Software.

On-Page SEO Tools:-

Let’s look at a few free tools to help with everything above before we wrap things up.

1.Google Keyword Planner:-The Keyword Planner tool is designed to help marketers discover important keywords and to find data for certain keywords like search numbers, competition, and ad pricing. 

2.Yoast SEO:- Yoast SEO is one of the most widely popular WordPress plugins. It is an powerful tool that can help you make your site as search engine-friendly as possible. Add titles, meta descriptions, OG tags, and structured data to posts and pages.

3.Google Analytics:- Google Analytics helps you to keep a track of all the content that receives views and shares.

4.Ahrefs Webmaster Tools:-Find missing issues with title tags, meta descriptions, alt text, and OG tags across your site.

5.Ahrefs SEO Toolbar:-Analyze the structure of other top-ranking pages.

6.SEMrush :-SEMrush is the comprehensive SEO toolkit that, amongst many other things, allows you to keep on top of all technical matters related to the optimization of your site.

7.Google Search Console:-Google Search Console is a free service offered by Google that helps you monitor, maintain, and troubleshoot your site's presence in Google Search results.

8.Mozbar:-The Mozbar is a free browser extension that provides on-page access to Moz's link metrics and site analysis tools.