31 May Simple Ways to Optimise Your Blog Posts
Writing a high quality blog post is a skill. You need to follow a style that keeps your reader interested from start to end. There needs to be headings, subheadings, and clear paragraphs. If you fail to grab your reader’s attention, they are not going to like, share, or tweet your post, and the purpose of your blog post will die. However, writing about an interesting topic in an appealing style matters, but it is equally important to optimize your blog post for search engines in a way that it becomes visible in search engines and boosts rankings of your website or blog site.
Many people think that writing to attract your audience and writing for SEO purposes are two different things but that is not the case. Providing your readers something interesting will enhance user experience and make your readers to share it with others on social media, which in turn will also help boost your rankings. To write high quality blog posts, keep the following tips in mind:
- Take your time before you decide what to write.
- Know the purpose of your post and be clear about what you want to share with your readers.
- Create a clear structure of your blog post and know what you want to write in different sections.
- Use paragraphs and express a new idea in each paragraph while maintain overall flow.
- Write unique content and ensure that you never copy/paste from other sites.
- Pay attention to the length of your article – Google likes long articles but do not go overboard with the idea.
It is also a good idea to link your blog post to previous content and you have to update your blog regularly to make it work well in search engines. However, you also need to take other steps to optimize your post specifically for search engines. Here are some suggestions:
Keywords
Identify your primary keyword and be sure to use it in the title of your blog as well as in the headings. It is also a good idea to have your keyword mentioned in your domain name to make it appear in Google. It always improves your chances of making your post visible in Google when you use your primary keyword in the first 100 words of your post. It is also important to use synonyms and secondary keywords within your post. You can also find long-tail keywords and sprinkle them in your post to make it do well in search engines. Just do not overuse these keywords or your post will sound spammy and unnatural.
Be sure to conduct research before you select your keyword. You can use Google Keyword Planner and Keyword Research Tools for help. Once you have found your keyword, use it properly.
- Use a keyword in the title of your blog post.
- Use keyword in your URL to make it relevant to the post.
- Use your keyword in Meta description to provide Google and your readers with info about your post.
Links
It is important to add links to other posts on your blog in your blog post. Cross-linking is important and helps spread authority across your site. Pick anchor texts carefully and never stuff them with keywords. Adding external links to your post will also improve authority of your post. Inbound links to your blog post will show Google the relevancy of your content, which plays a role in determining your rankings.
Images
Make sure to upload optimized images on your blog. Adding relevant keywords in your image file names and description will help make it visible in Google. You should also consider adding an “ALT” tag description for images that you embed in your blog post. An image’s ALT text is the info that appears when you place your cursor over an image – you see a small box that explains the image and helps search engines interpret the meaning of that image. Larger images look good but take time to load, so keep them small without losing quality. Also, be sure to use image types Google can index – it includes GIF, BMP, PNG, JPEG, SVG, WebP.
Mobile Accessible
You need to ensure that your blog is readable across different devices, including smartphones, desktops, tablets, and other mobile devices. Statistics show that 61% of mobile visitors use Google to find a site that is easily readable directly on mobile. It is therefore a good idea to stick to a responsive design and ensure that you have one URL, which ensures that inbound links do not end up being scattered across different domain names.
Google Sitemap
Ensure that the side navigation bar is visible on all pages. It makes great sense to provide access to your archives and previous posts on all your pages. Creating a Google Sitemap will also improve the chances of getting indexed by Google. You can make use of WordPress plugins to create a Google sitemap with ease and make it accessible from every page of your blog.
Bear in mind that writing high quality posts with interesting and valuable content is now more important than ever. Good content improves your chances of getting better rankings in Google, and it also leads to more Facebook likes, tweets, shares, and return visitors to your website. So, write top-notch content and then optimize it maximize the SEO friendliness of your post for better results.