Basics of Blogging for SEO in 2023
SEO Blogging Basics for 2023
If you've recently decided to incorporate a blog into your small business website (or plan to do so soon), congratulations! A blog is one of the most positive things you can do for your business. It positions you as an expert, draws traffic to your website, and can increase sales.
However, having one is much more than pressing "post" after writing about a topic. It also involves learning the basics of blogging for SEO, a.k.a search engine optimization.
You've probably heard of SEO a million times and its importance for small businesses. Correctly setting up your blog for SEO is the best way to ensure your site appears at the top of search engines. To do so involves:
analyzing your audience's search intent;
formatting it in a way that encourages high-quality traffic; and,
writing your content in a way that makes your audience want to open and read it.
In the following, I'm going to talk specifically about the basics of blogging for SEO and how you can start seeing positive results and getting traffic on your small business blog from the start:
According to SEMrush.com, "Search intent (also known as searcher intent or keyword intent) is the reason why a user types a particular query into a search engine."
Uncover User Search Intent
First and foremost, let's go back to the term search intent, as it drives the bulk of SEO. According to SEMrush.com, "Search intent (also known as searcher intent or keyword intent) is the reason why a user types a particular query into a search engine." So, before you start writing about a topic, you need to know why a user would be looking for it and what terms they are looking for to get information.
Since search engines aim to provide relevant results, understanding your audience's search intent will help maximize your chances of getting to the top of those results. Sites such as Google Trends and Answer the Public are beneficial in blogging for SEO as they analyze search intent and search engine trends and help you uncover the keywords your audience is searching for. This leads me to the following topic:
Choose the Right Keywords (and use them correctly!)
Knowing the specific words and combinations of words users search for in a given topic is critical to blogging for SEO. Those are the keywords that you want to focus on in your blog post, as they will help boost your site to the top of engine rankings. UseTopic and Keysearch are excellent tools for finding, analyzing, and optimizing your blog content for topic keywords.
While there are many keywords you can choose, you will only want to focus on one primary keyword or keyphrase per page. Google Trends can help find which keyword choices are the most popular and trending. Words with the highest search volume will help increase the traffic to your blog. Once you have your keyword, you must use it correctly throughout your blog. This means:
Using it in the title, main page link, image captions, alt text, and meta description.
Using it in the first sentence or paragraph of the blog post.
Using it naturally throughout the text (you want to sound like a human, not a robot)
Avoiding keyword stuffing (using the same keywords or phrases repeatedly throughout your blog)
But before you start writing, it helps to know the best way to format your page to encourage clicks and make it easier for your audience to read through it.
Format Your Page the Right Way
Choosing the correct format for your blog posts is another critical component of blogging for SEO and improving its readability to meet the expectations of your readers. By analyzing your competitors' blogs around the same topics, you'll see how they visually format their pages and structure their posts, what headers they use, and if they use components such as images and videos.
In addition to the visual layout, you'll want to think about how to format your content. This includes analyzing what voice to use, what questions to use, and how to place your keywords in the headers and paragraphs. Lastly, formatting your content involves analyzing what types of links to include, incorporating relevant images, and how long to make each post.
Link to Other Content
Linking to other interesting and relevant content within your site and blog is another essential component of blogging for SEO. Not only does this expose your audience to more of your expertise or products, but it also helps your search engine rankings.
And while you want users to stay on your blog and see more of your content, it is just as important to share links to other sites, also known as backlinking. In fact, Google has stated that backlinking is one of the top factors they use in ranking sites. But there is such a thing as a "good" link and a "bad" link. You want to focus on building good links that:
Come from relevant websites
Include relevant keywords within your text
Are "do-follow" versus "no-follow" links (more on this here)
Come from a unique referring domain
Include Photos
Yes, photos make a big difference in blogging for SEO as well! Images make your content more interesting, visually appealing, and engaging to your audience. It also makes your blog more attractive for search engines, making it easier for them to read and find.
And while image SEO is an entire topic on its own, below are a few basic tips to remember:
Use high-quality, high-resolution images relevant to the page's topic.
Ensure your images are the appropriate size (so they don't slow down load times).
For each photo, include descriptive photo captions, file names, and ALT text (the written description of the image that appears if it fails to load.
Make sure your captions and ALT text include your keyword!
Make Sure It is Long Enough
Last but not least, when blogging for SEO, you'll want to keep the word count in mind. And while the overall word count can vary based on the topic, the absolute minimum your blog post should have is 500 words.
But at the end of the day, you want to write for your user before writing for search engines. So, while it is good practice to aim for 1,500-2,000 words per post, it is more important to ensure the information you provide is relevant, engaging, and answers what your audience wants to know. If you need to go above and beyond that word count to get your message across, by all means, do so. Your audience will appreciate it!
While blogging for SEO is a very complex topic with several components, these basic tips will help you start on the right foot. For more tips and tricks for getting your website or blog SEO on point, I invite you to download my FREE SEO guide. Or, contact me today for a free 30-minute consultation to chat one-on-one!
