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How do you incorporate search engine optimization into your blog post writing?

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Question added by Samar Saleh , Community Manager , Bayt.com
Date Posted: 2014/09/13
Zahid Hussein
by Zahid Hussein , President , Sustainable Resource Foundation (SuRF)

1. Do Your Keyword Research

Trying to insert keywords into a blog that’s already been written is like trying to add sugar to a cake that’s finished baking. It’s not going to have the same level of cohesion it would if you’d added it while you were mixing the batter. Researching the right terms to use for your SEO blog posts can allow you to determine the topics and concepts that are driving the highest volume of search in your industry, and help you shape your editorial calendar accordingly.

2. Create an Editorial Calendar

There are legions of content marketers who live in fear of creating an editorial calendar. Never fear- they’re really not that time-consuming to create or maintain. Not only will your professional organization skills soar, they’re an important tool for creating SEO blog posts. You don’t need to create your titles in advance – and some inbound marketers believe headlines should be created last – but create topics around your keywords for the month. Gather resources, and consider which call-to-actions you’ll include with your articles. Some experts believe you should include both primary and secondary keywords in your calendar for the most SEO optimization benefit possible.

3. Create SEO-Friendly Copy

It’s impossible to discuss the idea of SEO blog posts without bringing Google’s quality guidelines. Create content that’s relevant to your keywords, but ensure it fits the following criteria above all else:

Write for people, not search bots: ensure your copy is natural and compelling.

Don’t be tricky: if your keyword is “content marketplace,” don’t try and cover conversion optimization.

Be Unique: Your content should have standalone value that your readers can’t get anywhere else on the web.

On-page content is just one factor in creating SEO blog posts, but it’s a pretty important one. Write well, incorporate your keywords, and make sure you’ve put in enough effort to create something remarkable.

4. Consider the Reader Experience

Formatting your content for clarity is definitely a content marketing best practice. As Samar Owais points out, “we all scan and skim online.” Use bullet points and numbered lists, add compelling images, and just say no to long sentences. Formatting your content into easily-digestible chunks actually serves a dual purpose, making your content easy-to-read and index!

The larger the text on the page, the greater the weight placed on it by Google, Bing or Yahoo. That’s a lot to digest, but remember that headlines matter more than subheaders, which matter more than text. Subheaders are an optimal place to use your primary and secondary keywords for an extra SEO boost!

5. Create a Really Wicked Headline

Whatever you do, don’t skip out on creating an epic and eye-catching title for your SEO blog posts. If you’re not convinced that headlines matter, consider the ubiquitous list website, Buzzfeed. Creating amazing titles is a huge component of their marketing strategy – and it really works! Incorporate your keyword, but be sure to pack a punch by using powerful or action-oriented words, numbers, questions or other factors that are sure to capture a reader’s eye on social media or in search.

In Blogger, WordPress, HubSpot and many other content management systems, your blog title will do dual duty as your page title. According to Moz, this is the single most-important factor in creating SEO blog posts. More than anything else, your title tag will communicate to Google what your blog is about.

6. Use Anchor Text

When uploading your blog for publication, don’t be shy about incorporating links to important pages on your website. An internal linking strategy won’t just provide your readers with an opportunity to explore more of your content, it will communicate to search engines which pages you consider important. As your individual pieces of content gain authority and links from external websites, the pages they point to will also gain better ranking.

Use your primary and secondary keywords to carry links within the body of your content, a concept known as anchor text. Be cautious, though – linking to the same page multiple times throughout the same blog isn’t a clever trick.

7. Tag Sparingly

Sorry to break it to you, but tags aren’t as important of a factor for SEO blog posts as they used to be. In the early days of content marketing, loading your pages up with tons of tags worked, and it was a great way to rank for similar keywords. Now, you’re more likely to create a messy user experience and annoy your website visitors than impress search engines. Joost de Valk writes that tags only improve your SEO in that they can improve your crawl rate (the number of times visitors click through to another page), and help you group associated posts. Overtagging could even cause you to get pinged for duplicate content on your website! So tag away – but do it sparingly, with your primary consideration being whether it adds benefit to the reader.

8. Include Gorgeous Images

Everyone loves visual content! Humans process images60,000 times faster than text. Adding images to your SEO blog posts can significantly improve the stickiness of your content, and lower your bounce rate. While the exact details of Google’s algorithm are top-secret, many SEO xperts believe that websites with a high bounce rate – defined as a visitor leaving without visiting a second page on the site – are heavily penalized. While some degree of bounce is normal, an incredibly high bounce rate can indicate low-quality content, deceptive titles, poor user experience, and any other number of ills to search engines.

To receive the full SEO boost possible from your images, save the file using your keyword as the file name. You’ll receive more benefit from an image called “content marketing services” than file-1090347. Be sure to include alt text to describe the images, too – Google uses these descriptive phrases to further determine the intent of your SEO blog posts. This is a crucial place to use your primary keyword.

9. Add Metadata

Meta descriptions are no longer directly considered by search engines in ranking pages, according to Moz. However, they’re a pretty important factor in creating SEO blog posts because these description tags are crucial for gaining click-throughs from search engine results pages:

Write a compelling, accurate description of your content that’s between135-159 characters in length to draw attention and clicks from organic search results.

10. Share Your Content

Once you’ve created optimized SEO blog posts, your work isn’t done. Sure, you can breathe a sigh of relief once you hit publish, but it’s now time to get to work sharing your content. Publish your work to your brand’s Facebook, Twitter, Google+, and Pinterest, and maintain an active presence on these networks to thank anyone who shares your article. Practicing great content promotion practices will allow you to fully leverage social signals to continue to improve your content’s ranking.

 

Ahmed Moussa
by Ahmed Moussa , Member of the Board of Advisors , Sanford Royce

By content writing, internal or external linking, Metadata, spread your words and name through the social media or else and keywording.

Amarjeet Sharma
by Amarjeet Sharma , Chief Digital Officer , Karmasthal Healthtech P Ltd

@Zahid had laid out quite extensively. I would have to agree with him.

Farhan Fawzer
by Farhan Fawzer , Freelancer , Upwork

If you use WordPress as your blogging platform, you can install Yoast SEO plugin and it's very much easier to optimize your blog post. 

Mohammad umair ansari
by Mohammad umair ansari , Manager, Digital Services , IHM Aurangabad

Use images such as charts, graphs, info graphics. Using images is one of the most effective SEO tactics that is often less spoken about. A well optimized image can also be a powerful tool.

But ensure you avoid using stock images as they can create a not so good impression. Try to use real-life image a it will be unique and Google loves things that are unique.Include keywords in your blog title. Plus in addition to main keywords, use those keywords that are someway related to main keywords as it will help when people search for them.

Ahmad Alhusainy
by Ahmad Alhusainy , consulting , Self-employed

by writing the right key words, if you know your area of blog writing, mentioning names, locations, title of the object or subject your writing about as well as understanding the possible key words people commonally use in search, as well as Blogpost will make your blog post easily access through showing in google search engine,

Nila Eslit
by Nila Eslit , Content Writer for Fitness web , George Allen

I do it through:

  • keywords
  • links (link whee)

 

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