SEO is one of a company’s most valuable tools to stand out and thrive online. However, mastering search engine optimization yourself can be easier said than done. Search engine optimization has become a critical component of digital marketing. However, some small enterprises still overlook it, with just half of them including it in their budget.
Multiple elements are involved in any optimization effort, from building backlinks to targeting specific keywords. With algorithms and trends changing, it’s hard for any business leader to stay ahead of the curve.
In this article, we’ll tackle the question of How much it costs to hire an SEO company or SEO services and the best practices when hiring one.
Seeking the standard cost of SEO services can be frustrating because the honest answer here is, “It depends.” Pricing can range anywhere across the board from $25 per hour to $10,000+ per month. No one can budget for an SEO project based on that kind of range.
SEO costing estimates
According to WebFX, most SEO projects cost between $400 to $10,000, depending on the service. These projects can range from working with an hourly consultant to hiring an agency for monthly SEO.
Stages: What determines SEO pricing
Size of the website
The size of your website is one of the essential factors in an SEO quote. A 10-15 page website will produce more work than an e-commerce company with hundreds of pages. This may appear unethical to charge based on the firm size.
For instance, Company that has a 15-page website will typically be on the lower end of the $400-$10,000 spectrum, while an e-commerce store with 50,000+ products should plan on a larger budget for SEO.
Company objectives
Some websites require basic structural work, while others have a results-oriented purpose requiring more resources. Suppose a company X has a $1,000,000 revenue and improves it by 10%. That’s an extra $100,000 for them. So, you will estimate the SEO rates accordingly.
Line of work
Certain industries are more competitive than others, and their keywords are also more competitive. So they require more effort and time, increasing the SEO costs.
Level of service
Each company sets its service standards, which can be time, project, or result-dependent.
Common SEO services
Background research
The first part of your SEO strategy is to think about who you want to target. Your content must be relevant, useful to your audience, and easy for new visitors to discover via search engines.
Getting to know your audience is crucial, so the background research phase should include gathering feedback to find out what your users want from your site. You’ll also need to conduct industry research, to spot current trends and get ahead of the game.
This process will give you an insight into the kind of content your audience is looking for and what form they prefer to consume the content in. In part, you can do the analysis yourself. But SEOs do this, too, along with other elements of the strategy.
Content Marketing
The essence of SEO is content marketing. The content of your website can be tweaked to increase SEO. Content marketing uses relevant content to encourage customers to take a specific action.
Drawing new eyeballs to your page after optimization encourages people to take action. It is the most cost-effective SEO technique. Many SEO businesses create content and distribute it to industry-relevant websites to gain backlinks to your website.
Keyword and competitor research
Keyword research involves thinking about how potential customers might search for your business. It is vital to identify direct competitors and check which keywords drive traffic to their sites.
Free keyword research tools could get the job done, but it is advisable to outsource SEO services for more comprehensive, in-depth research.
SEO services may include research, marketing, or technical SEO
Technical Search Engine Optimization
Technical difficulties are frequently detected during an initial SEO assessment, including a full-service package. Meta descriptions, title tags, alt tags, page speed, page experience, website architecture, schema markup, and other factors are all considered.
Each landing page should be as relevant as possible to at least 1-3 keywords from one group. There should not be pages optimized for the same keywords, as this causes keyword cannibalization.
Resource management
Resource management can sound daunting because of Google’s 200+ ranking factors, but the process can be simplified by focussing on the three main factors.
1. Information Architecture
SEO services for your information architecture should be geared toward the following:
Your site’s content should conform to best practices with an emphasis on:
Being unique and offering value.
Matching search queries.
Satisfying user intent.
Being of high quality.
Satisfying the fresh content Algorithm.
3. Backlinks
Link-building is when you get other websites to link to your site, driving referral traffic and telling Google that your site is worthy of citation (so you’ll earn a higher ranking). You can do this via great content, influencer reviews, and partner links.
Must be natural. Avoid popular link schemes like PBNs and paid guest posts. Instead, focus on building real links that boost positioning in the SERPs.
Quality is key: A lower number of High trust/High Authority/Relevant links can outperform a large quantity of lower quality links.
SEO Pricing Models
Before hiring someone, it helps to know how you’d like to work with them. Here are some of the most common options based on Upwork’s data.
Hourly basis
The contract for SEO services can be hourly. Most clients pay on an hourly basis when they want to bind the projects on an immediate basis. Because sometimes, the deadlines are fixed in advance, and the projects get delayed due to uncertainties. The average SEO cost per hour ranges between 80-100 USD.
Project basis
When you decide in advance to complete the SEO project and find an SEO partner to complete the whole project, the average SEO cost per project ranges between 5,000-30,000 USD.
Result basis
In this arrangement, you hire an SEO firm to produce a specific result in terms of ranking.
You don’t have to pay anything until the target is met because some SEO tasks are more straightforward while others are a little complex.
Monthly basis
You can hire a team monthly when you have good relations with an SEO company, which could be due to past positive experiences. The average SEO cost per month ranges between 750-5000 USD.
Set goals: Manage the measurable
Before establishing a budget, define specific goals for a campaign. Your goals should include measurable results, a specified timeframe, and an actual measurement for success.
The general consensus is that the most important metrics directly impact the bottom line. Organic sessions, goal conversions, and revenue fall into that category.
Setting achievable goals for your SEO will help you plan and budget better
Goal setting could include improving organic sessions by X%, increasing conversions by Y per month, and/or increasing revenues by Z%. When setting goals, remember that:
“…in most cases, SEOs need four months to a year to help your business first implement improvements and then see potential benefit.”
A campaign with actionable goals makes it easy to develop a budget with which you can seek SEO services.
The Takeaway
SEO services and companies can be expensive, and many smaller websites may find this financially taxing. Because of this, it is easy for start-up companies with a low budget to fall prey to “affordable” SEO service advertisements that guarantee crazy results that sound too good to be true.
Here is our SEO pricing guide to help you find a great SEO plan.
Avoid agencies advertising ‘cheap’ SEO rates, like $100 or less
Pass on SEO plans that guarantee results, like page one rankings
Request deliverables alongside pricing to see what you’re paying for
Look for companies that customize their solutions to your goals and industry
Search for agencies that measure SEO performance and its ROI so you can see the impact of your investment.
You are now equipped with the basic guide to finding a suitable SEO service provider that suits your budget constraints. That said, you can confidently go out into the overwhelming waters of finding a legitimate SEO that will work with your needs.
Difference between long-tail and short-tail keywords in SEO
Introduction
We are on a quest to dig a little deeper into the different keyword types, focussing on long-tail and short-tail keywords. We’ve looked in part at some of the intricacies of SEO and the role of keywords in ranking on search engines like Google.
Keywords are the life-blood of search engines. You’ll need to conduct substantial keyword research to optimize your content to get more traffic and visibility in SERPs. But which keywords should you use in your metadata and web copy – short-tail, long-tail, or a combination?
Short-tail vs. Long-tail Keywords
The main difference between long and short-tail keywords is that long-tail keywords consist of four or more words while short-tail keywords contain one to two. These keywords are opposites because long tail keywords are targeted queries, and short tail keywords refer to broad topics.
Short-tail keywords
A short-tail keyword, also known as a ‘head term,’ is a general search term that typically contains one or two words and covers a broad topic. Short-tail keywords generally have higher search volume than long-tail keywords, which means they attract more website visitors.
Although head terms can receive lots of traffic, it’s not necessarily the highest quality since it’s a generic search that may not serve the right user intent for your product/service, leading to low conversion rates and a higher bounce rate. Short-tail keywords are also much more competitive, making it more difficult to rank for these terms, especially if your site has a low domain authority.
Characteristics of short-tail keywords
High Volume but low-quality searches
When it comes to volume, short-tail keywords will dominate long-tail keywords every time. The shorter the keyword is, the higher the search volume. You’ll get plenty of organic traffic if you could rank for a short tail keyword.
While these keywords have the potential to bring more visitors to your site, they may not be the qualified prospects you want.
Short tail keywords will generate a high volume of results for a short period of time. There’s also high competition because you’ll rank after the major companies.
High competition
Given the high search volumes, it’s no wonder everyone is trying to rank for short tail keywords; the reward is high. Competition for short tail keywords is highly competitive.
To give you a clearer picture, your content will appear after all the major brands like Nike, Addidas, or Sketchers for running shoe searches.
Unless your company is huge at the international level, getting into the first page of Google search results is tough.
Low Site Engagement
Short-tail keywords, because they are so broad, will attract some visitors that are not interested in your specific product or service, leading to very short visitor sessions and higher bounce rates.
Say you have a term that’s searched for a lot. Even if you get 10,000 searches and 100 clicks, your conversion rate may be one or two customers.
High Cost
Short tail keywords also have a cost factor that will get expensive. Google AdWords will charge you a pretty penny to get into the short tail keyword business for your common search terms. Because so many other people are buying them, you will need to pay a premium for your presence in these searches.
What are long-tail keywords?
Long-tail keywords can be extremely effective in bringing visitors to your site, but they can also be used to target users who are searching for your brand and intending to buy from you. These terms contain more than three words, target users at different stages of the buying funnel, and tend to be more descriptive – for example, ‘designer handbags for work’ or ‘which iPhone has the best camera.’
Long-tail keywords have a lower search volume than short-tail keywords. In other words, they are the ‘less popular’ search terms. However, they are more specific than short-tail keywords, providing greater detail to search engines and signaling search intent. So, although you may receive fewer site visits per keyword, long-tail keywords serve more specific results that are more likely to answer user intent and, as such, will attract higher quality traffic that is more likely to convert.
Characteristics of long-tail keywords
Low traffic volume
Traffic volume from long tail keywords will be far less. While long-tail keywords will generate a lower volume of visitors, this benefits a B2B company striving to reach a more targeted audience.
Low competition
The competition is also lower when you have decided on a long tail keyword. Since you are targeting specific keywords, your website has a greater chance of ranking higher in search engine page results.
High Focus
The targeted nature of your search traffic will be ideal for most businesses selling specific products or services. With more focus on the keywords your specific audience is searching for, your site is more likely to attract customers that will benefit from your business.
Low cost
Another added benefit to the lower traffic long tail keywords is that you will pay a lot less. Google AdWords has a reduced price for keywords that are less in demand. This means that you won’t show up nearly as high in general searches (until you become the preeminent name in your industry), but getting you there will cost you less.
High conversion rates
If you have people seeking your services specifically, your website will have a higher conversion rate for the traffic you generate. These conversion numbers will vary depending on your niche, but long-tail keywords make the process easier.
Moreover, your site is more likely to attract customers that return to check out other products simply because you spoke to their specific needs.
It is easier for your content to appear on this list. There is low competition and higher conversion rates for long-tail keywords.
How to make the most of your short and longtail Keywords
Getting the best results out of your marketing strategy means learning how to blend long tail and short tail keywords effectively.
Both seed and long tail keywords have a role to play in your SEO. Here’s how to make sure that you’re using each option correctly:
Use seed keywords to guide your SEO strategy
In the argument of long tail vs. short tail keywords, think of your “long tail” terms as the narrow focus points in your content, while your seed terms are the “broad” categories you need to look at. Both play their part in your path to a better presence online, but you’ll need to start with your broad terms to help you navigate where you’re going to go with your campaigns.
For instance, knowing that one of your short tail keywords is “Fashion” opens the door to dozens of long tail keyword opportunities. You can build off your short tail terms by looking at the location of your target audience, your customer’s pain points, and the terms your competitors are ranking for.
Know how to place both long-tail and short-tail keywords
Keyword Research is only the first step in a successful keyword strategy. You also need to figure out how to place your keywords throughout your online campaigns effectively. Keyword placement can be difficult because if you use your terms too often, Google may penalize you for “spammy” content.
There are plenty of great ways that you can combine long tail and short tail keywords in your content marketing strategy. For instance, if your long tail keyword was “How to create a brand logo,” you can place that in a blog post title and use your short tail keyword in the permalink: www.YourWebsite.com/blog/brand-logo.
Short tail keywords also work well in alt tags, meta tags, and social media updates.
Customer satisfaction
Remember not to get so caught up in the SEO strategy that you lose sight of the big picture.
Whether you’re using short tail or long tail keywords, your primary focus should always be giving your customers what they’re looking for online. Your short seed keywords will help to direct your ideas by giving you categories to explore. On the other hand, your long-tail keywords will help you to dive down into deeper topics and more targeted content.
Consider how your customers search for your brand and what they think about during each buyer journey stage. This will help ensure you don’t waste time on unnecessary keywords.
Answer The Public for the questions searchers are asking based on a seed keyword
Google Autocomplete and Related searches provide insight into results related to your keyword terms based on people’s searches.
SEMrush– Best freemium keyword analytics tool.
Ahref’s keyword tool is also a freemium tool that provides data on your keyword.
Summary
the basic difference between short and long-tail keywords is the number of words that make up each term or phrase. However, depending on the age of your website, advertising budget, and experience with SEO will determine if you should focus on long-tail versus short-tail keywords in your digital marketing strategy.
As a business, you must decide which terms are most relevant to your website and your ideal customer. After all, you know your business better than anyone
We discussed the importance of keywords in SEO in our previous article, and now it is time to look at why it is important to choose the right keywords for your web content.
With the right digital marketing strategy, your organization will quickly reach more customers, increasing your profits. A central aspect of this effort involves choosing the right keywords.
Understand your keyword types
Different websites and businesses have different keyword requirements. Before diving into the vast ocean that is keyword research, it is of absolute importance that you first understand:
Your business and content you want to post on your webpages
Your audience search intent
Understanding the type of content and your intended market will help you narrow down your research to the keyword types in your selected category. Please read our article on keyword types for more information on all the keyword types.
Importance of choosing the right keywords
Keywords play a huge role in connecting websites to their audience and getting the much coveted organic traffic. For this reason, it’s important to understand keywords and the delicate science of choosing the right keywords for your content.
Search engine algorithms and keywords
Good ranking of your site on search engines will depend to a large extent on the choice and use you make of your keywords and key expressions.
Google and its competitors are no longer satisfied with simply filling pages with keywords without giving structured information. The days when it was enough to put them on the fly and stuff keywords (keyword stuffing) are over.
A few years ago, choosing your keywords carefully and placing them regularly in your text was enough. Then, ranking on SERPs with mediocre content was possible, but the Google search algorithm has evolved from its toddler days. It has adapted to giving priority to user experience and can now recognize and promote quality content that meets searchers’ expectations.
As it has become more demanding, it is clearly in the interest of readers looking for quality writing, concise texts, and good overall architecture. To get better positioning in search engine results and therefore have better traffic, content writers must ensure that they:
Are meeting the expectations of Internet users.
Are informative and didactic.
Answer a searcher’s most immediate questions.
Use quality keywords to satisfy Google.
Once you understand your market and search intent, you can look at keyword types and how to place them in text.
Target your ideal customer base
You must target the right audience to succeed when creating a business or website.
For example: Suppose you start a website about “baseball.” So writing articles about “softball” cannot make baseball fans interested in your website though these are similar topics.
You want to create exciting and relevant content for your clients and prospects. Keyword research will help you figure out what your audience is looking for. Then you can write or create content around that.
Builds social media shares and increases visibility
After doing the relevant keyword research, you can provide people with the proper information about what they want using the right keywords. When your audience connects with your content and finds it relevant to them, they are more likely to share it on their social media pages. In this way, your website will grow and advance organically. This will need less effort in the area of link building.
People tend to share what they like on their social platforms like Twitter and Facebook. So, if you are creating articles or images, then be sure to add the right keywords that will entice your audience.
Provide Credibility and Help Build Page Authority
Using the right keywords also helps build credibility. Using the right words, phrases, or jargon gives the impression that you are an expert in the subject matter.
Keywords are essential to avoid sounding amateurish. Keywords help build page authority, giving website visitors an immediate sense of being at the right place to have their queries answered.
Improve your ad targeting
Keyword strategies are highly beneficial for paid search, not just organic SEO. When you run online ads (which place your website or landing pages above organic search results), keep your keyword strategy in mind to ensure your keyword terms align with your business goals.
Choosing the right keywords for your content has several advantages
Google still ensures that any keywords used in targeted ads are relevant to a searcher’s needs. Choosing the right keywords to make your ads appear on search results is crucial.
Keep Up with Competition
When it comes to the Internet, content is king. Good content is rewarded by both the search engines (with higher rankings in search results) and the users (with more traffic to the website).
If you want to keep up with competitors and be relevant long-term, then keyword-enriched content is what you should concentrate on. You can meet your competitors head-on with the right keywords and have a strong foothold in the online marketplace.
Increased conversion
If you create content your audience finds interesting; they’ll want to learn more and might interact with other web content on your website. The conversion of traffic to your site to potential customers can only be possible if the content they interact with is correct.
It is not enough to use a bunch of irrelevant keywords to your web content or slap any selection of keywords to your text. Choosing the right keywords can mean different interactions with your website.
What Not To Do With Keywords
Keyword stuffing
As mentioned before, keywords are important for visibility. However, over-optimization can prove to be counter-productive. Search engines now can easily recognize sites that provide poor-quality and irrelevant content.
Overdoing it will only hurt the user experience. So, don’t try to be smart because search engines are smarter. You should undoubtedly incorporate as many keywords as possible, but only the useful ones.
Optimize all pages on the website
Unless your website has only one page, it should be taken as a whole, and each page should be interconnected. This will maintain a seamless flow of information and make it easy for users to navigate your site. Thus, avoid gaps or information asymmetry and don’t work on each page in a silo.
Keyword don’t dos
Don’t use off-topic keywords.
It is a no-brainer that your content should not have keywords unrelated to your subject matter. You could bring in shampoos and oils if you write about hair care, but you cannot talk about electric switches! The importance of keywords is to help search engines show relevant content to the target audience. If your content has irrelevant keywords, it won’t appear for the right searches. And, no customer would be happy to see an unrelated page while searching.
Don’t just use keywords anywhere in the content.
It should not appear forced. Keywords should be incorporated to maintain the natural flow of the content. If the SEO keyword importance hampers the readability of the content, there is no point. Keywords must be related to the subject matter and should make sense. Conduct a thorough keyword search before beginning the writing process.
Conclusion
Keywords are important in content strategizing. As a web content creator, whether copywriter or general writer, knowing your keyword base and ensuring each web copy uses the right keywords is your responsibility.
The right keywords will move your website from the ordinary, sub-par content provider to a well-respected, high-ranking site that is relevant and trusted to your target audience.
Keywords in SEO are single words or short phrases representing the search queries people use in a search engine. They are used to inform website content to increase relevant organic search traffic.
When effectively researched and optimized, keywords act as a conduit to connect your target audience with your website.
Elements of Keyword Research
There are three main elements to pay attention to when conducting keyword research.
1. Relevance
Google ranks content for relevance. This is where the concept of search intent comes in. Your content will only rank for a keyword if it meets the searchers’ needs. In addition, your content must be the best resource out there for the query. After all, why would Google rank your content higher if it provides less value than other content that exists on the web?
2. Authority
Google will provide more weight to sources it deems authoritative. That means you must do all you can to become an authoritative source by enriching your site with helpful information content and promoting that content to earn social signals and backlinks. If you’re not seen as authoritative in the space, or if a keyword’s SERPs are loaded with heavy sources you can’t compete with (like Forbes or The Mayo Clinic), you have a lower chance of ranking unless your content is exceptional.
3. Volume
You may end up ranking on the first page for a specific keyword, but if no one ever searches for it, it will not result in traffic to your site. Kind of like setting up shop in a ghost town.
Volume is measured by MSV (monthly search volume), which means the number of times you search for a keyword per month across all audiences.
Importance of keywords to SEO and marketers
Keywords matter to Google and SEO professionals because they help you as a website owner to:
Identify the target market
Create useful content for your target audience
Improve search engine rankings by assisting Google in understanding what the webpage content is about
Get content out to the right audience at the right time
Drive more qualified organic traffic to your web pages
Increase conversions by helping consumers find you rather than your competitors
Keyword research helps you understand how your target audience might describe and look for your products or services. It also shows how people ask for more information on your topics when using a search engine.
With these words and phrases, you can come up with ideas for new content. You can also optimize your web pages to match a searcher’s intent and answer a searcher’s questions.
Keyword research and optimization can improve your chances of showing up on the first page of the search results. Data from 2020 shows that most title tags on Google’s first page contained keywords that exactly or partially matched that search query.
Keywords Are Clues
The importance of keywords in SEO is partly due to their importance outside of it. Forget about keywords, rankings, traffic, or even your website for a minute. How would you operate your business differently if you knew your customers’ true feelings? How influential would those insights be to your marketing strategy?
When in a focus group, taking a survey, or responding to something on Twitter, we all tend to let our answers be impacted by how others may perceive them.
What about when we’re searching?
The combination of anonymity and immediate access to a wealth of information paves the way for a sober look into what we truly want. It’s Data-Driven Truth Serum
At its core, keyword research is a robust market research tool that can be leveraged in many different ways, not just informing website content.
To get the most out of keywords, you must look beyond the direct, literal translation and also pick up on the implicit clues to gain the true intent of each keyword.
Keywords are what drive traffic to specific URLs.
In SEO terms, keywords are the words businesses will specifically “target.” You may have also heard the term “target keywords.” Keywords ranking in Google Search will determine which words and phrases are searched frequently. This will help when it comes time to optimize your content.
So now that we’ve covered the basics of keywords, let’s cover their importance to search engine optimization.
Search engine algorithms are pretty intelligent. They can now auto-detect keywords and rank pages automatically based on keyword optimization. The more keywords you sprinkle throughout your web content and blogs, the more likely people will find your site via search engines.
This means that when a website is optimized, it “speaks the same language” as its potential visitor base.
Marketing Trend Insight
Effective keyword research can provide insights into current marketing trends and help you center your content on relevant topics and keywords your audience is searching for.
Traffic Growth
When you identify the best relevant keywords for the content you publish, the higher you will rank in search engine results — the more traffic you’ll attract to your website.
Customer Acquisition
If your business has content that other business professionals are looking for, you can meet their needs and provide them with a call to action that will lead them into the buyer journey from the awareness stage to the point of purchase.
By researching keywords for their popularity, search volume, and general intent, you can tackle the questions to which most people in your audience want answers.
Keywords and Conversions
one of the great myths of SEO is that using keywords creates spammy website content that turns off visitors. Nothing could be further from the truth.
Using relevant keywords, your website content uses the same language as users when looking for your products and services. In fact, keyword research often provides great insight to marketers by revealing that users describe products, services and applications with certain terms that do not appear in the website content. By focussing on user language, websites create content that resonates with them, making the content easier for them to understand and giving them the confidence to inquire further or place an online order.
Keywords vs. Topics
SEO has evolved over the last 10 years, and keywords have become unimportant to our ability to rank well for the daily searches people make. Google has been taking steps since 2010 to remove keyword data from analytics data.
Although this is true, in the eyes of an SEO professional, it’s a different approach. Rather, it’s the intent behind that keyword and whether or not a piece of content solves for that intent.
But that doesn’t mean keyword research is an outdated process.
Keyword research tells you what topics people care about and, assuming you use the right SEO tool, how popular those topics are among your audience. The operative term here is topics — by researching keywords that are getting a high volume of searches per month, you can identify and sort your content into topics on which you want to create content. Then, you can use these topics to dictate which keywords you look for and target.
Final note
When optimizing your content, keep in mind that the relevance of the keywords is far more important than the density of the keywords: Quality over quantity, people.
A common mistake is for people to get a little keyword happy, but the key is to be strategic about it.
Writing SEO content is an intimidating task for many writers. From topic selection and gathering research to writing the post and pressing “Publish,” the writing process often demands hours.
That’s why if your post doesn’t earn the traffic you expected, it can be a major letdown. Fortunately, search engine optimization is a way to combat low traffic. SEO writing optimizes the content on the page so that search engines will more easily crawl its content and judge it favorably. It is given a better placement in the SERP.
SEO writing is a form of writing that helps websites become more visible to major search engines. A highly visible website with good content appears on the first few pages of results when someone searches for that topic.
Why Is SEO Writing Important?
SEO writing is done to help content rank better on Google. If the content is not optimized, it will come up several pages back in a search. For your content to rank, it also needs legit search engine optimization.
Put another way: Amazing content + on-page SEO = SEO writing.
The higher a website ranks in search engines, the more people will visit its site. More visitors means more organic traffic and, potentially, more leads. SEO content-writing jobs are increasingly in demand, so understanding what the job entails means you will be a more valuable asset to any company that hires you.
A study by Sistrix found that the number of clicks that pages get depends not only on getting onto that first page of search results but also on getting as high up on that page as possible. The first result on the first page gets clicked on by more than 28% of people doing the searching. After that first result, the percentages go down with each spot on the page. So you need your site to be one of people’s first results.
Writing for SEO is also important because it is a marketing technique that keeps going for the life of your website.
Content SEO crossword with marker on transparent wipe board.
Many people do well with PPC advertising, but if they stop paying for that advertising, it will no longer bring traffic.
Defining key terms
SERPs: Search engine results pages. In other words, the Google page contains all the results users can click on after a query.
SERP position: The exact ranking in Google Analytics. For instance, Position 14 would refer to page 2 of Google since only ten listings typically appear on Page 1.
Anchor text: The hyperlinked words or phrases directing traffic to other web pages.
Search queries: Words that users type or say into search engines.
Search volume: The number of times a term is queried per month.
Click-through rate: Percentage of clicks for a SERP result relative to how many times searchers saw that search result.
Conversion rate: Percentage of people who complete the desired action (a click, a purchase, etc.) divided by the total number of people who visited that page.
How to write for SEO
Keyword research
The first step before writing new content is to decide which keywords to target.
This process is known as keyword research, and it’s essential for a simple reason. You need to write content around topics people search for; keyword research will tell you that.
When you do your keyword research, the outcome will be a set of SEO keywords; both focus keywords and long-tail keywords that people type in search engines.
The easiest way to do this is to:
Go to Google and search for your chosen topic.
Visit the top 5 pages and analyze the type of content they provide.
Use keyword research tools such as ahrefs, Ubersuggest, etc., to find out for which keywords those pages rank and the traffic they get. We have provided a list of the best free Research tools to use in the market.
Then depending on the results, decide which main keywords you will target in your content.
Using a tool, find out the associated long-tail keywords and LSI (or semantic keywords)
Write engaging content
It seems easy enough, yet so many websites make content for all the wrong reasons. Write content that appeals to the interests of your target market or answers their questions. Not all posts need to be about your product or service, but they all should be industry related. Assert yourself and your company as an expert in your industry by writing SEO-friendly content that is interesting and informative, and do it better than your competition.
You need to make sure that you understand the user intent. In other words, your content should match what users want to read for the particular keywords.
One of the ways to find out is to go back to the Google search results and look for patents. For example, if you are writing an article about ‘SEO tools,’ you will notice that almost all results are about lists with ‘Free Tools.’
This means that Google has found out that when users search for tools, although they don’t include the word ‘Free,’ they intend to browse lists of Free tools.
This also means that if you target this keyword, you must adjust your title and content accordingly. Otherwise, you minimize your chances of rankings for that term.
Create headings using long-tail keywords
One of the characteristics of SEO-friendly content is that it’s easy to read by both search engines and users, and headings help in that direction. Most users won’t read your content; they will scan through it. Having meaningful headings, you help them find the part they want faster.
Search engines follow the same pattern, especially for long-form content. They scan the page and look for certain elements to understand how a page is structured and what topics or keywords the content is covering.
To make their job easier, you can use predefined heading tags in your HTML like the H1 tag, h2 tag, and h3.
Usually, a page has only one H1 tag used for the title, and the rest of the content has H2 for the main headings and H3 for the sub-headings. To further improve the SEO friendliness of your copy, try to use some of your long-tail keywords in the headings.
Use your keywords strategically.
Here is an excellent tip that most SEO writers fail to follow. Once you are done with the first draft, you need to go back and revisit your post introduction.
Your goal is to ensure that your target keyword is included in your opening paragraph. The reason is that Google always considers that content above the fold and high on a page is more important than content found down the page.
By adding your keywords in the first paragraph, you give a big clue to Google as to which keywords to associate this page with. It’s also good for the users since you can help them understand that they are on the right page.
Use LSI or related keywords.
The latest algorithms look for common words that accompany the keywords you use.
That lets the search engine know that the content is about that topic. If you aren’t sure how to use these companion words, study latent semantic indexing and put that knowledge to use.
Optimize images
A great web page may include several different ways to impart information. These often include other types of media to back up and expand on the information in the text.
The use of videos on the page is excellent for this purpose. Using helpful pictures is also useful to readers.
Too much gray text can be monotonous for people to read. Breaking it up makes it flow better and allows for easier reading.
Adding images to your content makes it more exciting and easier to read. While this is not directly related to SEO writing, it can help in several ways:
Users are more likely to share content with high-quality images on their social media networks than content with no visuals.
You can use the image alt text to give more clues to search engines about your content.
When properly optimizing your images, you have more chances of appearing in Google image search for your target (or related) keywords.
Links: use them (internal and backlinks)
Using links as information citations is a common way to show where the information came from.
However, your site should not be using information from low-quality sites. If you have links to spammy sites, the information on your page will also be assumed to be spammy.
Always link to high-level websites that are popular in their own right.
The overall goal of search engines is to make good information universally available. When you link to good sites, you show search engines that you are connected to other sites and get your information from useful sites.
Most SEO content writers forget internal linking. An internal link is a link that points to a page on the same website. When you publish a new page, it has to match your site’s topics. This improves relevancy and rankings.
Although internal links are not as powerful as SEO backlinks, Google uses them to understand what the linked page is about.
Final word
The success of your content marketing or copywriting campaign will depend on the SEO writing strategies you put in place.
Anyone can learn SEO writing. Mastering SEO writing is easy through practice and following some basic SEO principles. As with any other SEO-related project, it requires a lot of time and research, but the result (your website ranking high on search engines) is worth the work you put in.
If you’re a blogger, you’ve asked yourself how many words an SEO-friendly blog post should contain. Does the overall length of your blog matter for SEO? How would that impact your writing? The ideal blog length has been a topic of discussion for years. The short answer provided by Google for this brain-itching question is simple “it depends.”
What Google means is you shouldn’t restrict yourself to a character count that’s either too low or too high. However, Google has clarified that word length is not a ranking factor. However, any seasoned blogger will tell you that there is an ideal range for how long your blog posts should be. The main variables to consider when deciding how long your posts should be are:
Your audience
the structure of the post
Subject matter.
Searcher intent.
Subject matter
The ideal length of a blog post on a recipe for a food blog will be different from the ideal length of a post on the best foods that promote good eyesight. The subject matter demands are different for both these articles, so wanting to write them with the same length in mind might be a tall order.
Audience and intent
Another factor to consider is your audience and their search intent. Likely, a person looking for the perfect recipe to make dumplings does not want to read lines of tiresome text to get to the point of making them. On the hand, a person looking for foods that promote good eyesight might be looking for a lot of information on the foods chosen and the data backing it up.
You also need to consider that person’s level of intent; are they looking for basic discovery information, or are they trying to buy something right now in as few clicks as possible? Your content will reflect that person and their different stages of user intent.
What do statistics say about word length in SEO?
The ideal blog post length for SEO should be 2,100-2,400 words. According to Hubspot, the average length of their 50 most-read blog posts in 2019 yielded an average word count of 2300. Even though global attention spans are narrowing, long-form content still performs exceptionally well in search.
But before you go writing your 2,300-word blog post, keep in mind that not all blog posts need to be this long. Data suggests that 16 of 50 read posts fall under 1,500 words, so there are still plenty of opportunities to get your posts ranked even with a lower word count.
Advantages of writing SEO posts with longer text
Room for more
For best practices, writing posts with a word length of 1000 words and above is better for ranking. When your text is longer, Google has more clues to determine what it is about. The longer your (optimized) text, the more often your focus keyphrase appears. This is no excuse for keyphrase stuffing, though! If you optimize your copy naturally, your focus keyphrase will pop up here and there throughout your text. Longer posts provide versatility and give more room to fit more headings, links, and images.
Help in ranking for long-tail variants
A longer text might also help you rank for multiple long-tail variants of the keyphrase you’ve optimized your text. That’s because, in a lengthy text, you probably address various topics. Your article, or your other posts that take a deep dive into the subtopic, will have a chance to turn up in search results for the long-tail variants of your keyphrase. If you do some intelligent internal linking, you can boost traffic to the extensive post you’ve written. This will help you drive more organic traffic to your site. Check out our article for more information on SEO and ranking.
Avoid thin content
Although word length is not a ranking factor, if a page consists of few words, Google is more likely to think of it as thin content. All search engines want to provide answers to people’s queries. Thin content is less likely to offer a complete explanation and satisfy the public. Consequently, it will probably not rank very high.
The same goes for product pages and product descriptions in your e-Commerce online store. While these don’t have to be as long as a blog post, making them long is a good idea.
The ideal post length for lead generation
There’s often a disconnect between the posts that generate traffic and those that generate leads or new contacts for your business. Posts that get more traffic do so because they’re searched for by a wider audience, which sometimes means the topic you’ve written about is more generic and doesn’t align closely with your business. According to research, the ideal length of a blog post intended to generate leads is 2,500 words. This number was approximately 500 words longer than the average length of the most-read blog posts.
Writing longer content works in your favor for a blog post intended for lead generation. Longer content reinforces your knowledge and authority on a subject — particularly if it’s a keyword or a topic for a particular audience. When your coverage is more in-depth for these ideas, you increase your chances of ranking better — and while your audience might be smaller, your chances of converting readers into leads are far more significant.
Focus on quality, not quantity
Too many people emphasize the average word length for articles and the misunderstood importance of having more than a certain number of words on each page to rank well.
Give users what they want regardless of how many words it takes to say it. If it feels like you’re writing uninteresting copy to inflate the word count, know that your readers can feel it as well.
Google can recognize content that contributes little to no added value to the web. That means longer posts can hold your site back in search if they don’t say anything useful.
Ideal blog post lengths for different blog types
there are different types and formats of blog posts, so the ideal word length for blog posts can be determined by the kind of blog post you’re creating content for.
How-to blog posts
How-to blog posts should be between 1,000 and 2,000 words. Because how-to posts describe how to do something, the ideal length of the blog post depends on how difficult it is to do what you’re explaining how to do. For example, this blog post on how to search for something on google has 1200 words.
Listicles
Listicles, or list blog posts, should be 2,300-2,600 words. List blog posts are probably the most approachable format for new bloggers. Anyone can make a blog post just by listing off and explaining a few examples, tools, resources, or ideas for a given topic. Regarding the length of these blog posts, the rule of thumb is the more examples, the better.
Pillar blog posts
Pillar pages should be around 4,000 words since they are supposed to cover significantly more content than an average blog post.
A pillar page is your attempt at being the all-encompassing guide to any subject available on the Internet as a blog post. These posts serve as a “pillar” to a cluster of blog posts related to the topic explained in the pillar. You can learn more about pillar pages by watching the video below.
What-is blog posts
“What is” posts, or blog posts that answer a question (such as the one you’re reading right now), should be between 1,300 and 1,700 words (which this one is!).
These posts are the poster child for making blog posts “as long as they need to be.” When readers search for what, who, or when something is, they typically want a quick answer or explanation. There’s no need to bog down readers with too much information.
Minimum blog post length
There is no official minimum for blog post length, though Yoast recommends at least 300 words. Data suggests that writing longer posts should be the rule rather than the exception for your blog. This practice will help your website build authority in the eyes of search engines, which can help shorter blog posts rank better.
Summary
Google’s algorithm prefers more content word count compared to shorter content posts. It is not about quantity but quality. If you generate enough content for excellence, you’ll be able to rank in the top SERP results.
SEO is getting more complex and more innovative. A strategy is necessary to achieve long-term success. Whatever your approach, the message is loud and clear: your articles require a checklist of SEO items for them to rank well.
Word count appropriate to the goal and audience might help you get there faster, but it won’t guarantee results on its own.
Make sure to produce the best possible quality content optimized for SEO, and do it consistently.
