#4: Keyword Research

1 hour – Research keywords

Instead of just repeating what we have discussed in previous articles, we strongly recommend taking a look at our article, SEO 101: Understanding Basic Keywords.

This article discusses in detail how to perform keyword research for your website. Because it is an in-depth topic, you should use this information as a starting point.

1 hour- Create alt tags

Ensure that the alt tags for images are set up correctly, per Google’s recommendations, when using a dedicated mobile site to signal to Google which pages are desktop and which pages are mobile.

Using Yoast, you can ensure that the alt tags are set up on the mobile site so the images are properly read.

1 hour – Use appropriate anchor text

While alt tags are important for getting search traffic from the images on your website, anchor text is for the link text. You should make sure that the anchor text you use is appropriate for the page you’re linking to.

Anchor texts are also an important signal for Google on the value of specific keywords. Therefore, you can put an anchor text to a specific link highlighting a keyword for that content. It is a small thing, but can add up over time.

1 hour – Write unique titles

Each page needs its own unique title. This title should represent the best possible explanation of the page.

Make sure you avoid duplicate page titles, because this can reduce the ranking of both pages.

On WordPress sites, the title is also the H1 tag for the page. This means you should write user-friendly titles. While keywords in the title are important, they should not interfere with the readability of the page.

1 hour – Write a meta description

Every page needs a unique meta description of 156 characters or less. A meta description is the little snippet summary of a page that is shown in Google search results. A quality meta description helps you improve the click through rate of your results as well as increase your rankings.

Because Google wants to make sure your audience finds the page relevant to the search result, your meta description should provide an accurate description of the page.

1 hour – Apply schema tags to relevant pages

Schema is the structured data that major search engines use for specific pieces of content. Often used for products, locations, events, and other content pieces, it is a critical part of your search strategy.

This is because structured data provides a better SERP experience for users looking for your business.

Furthermore, using structured data (schema) where appropriate helps search engines better understand your content. This allows your website to appear highlighted in search results and not as just part of a list.

Schema allows your website to be better presented in SERPs. Moz.com provides detailed information on schema.org.

At the same time, not every website page needs or requires schema. Make sure your page fits into a specific schema category before working on a page. Otherwise, you might be wasting your time sending irrelevant traffic to your page.

Google has several tools to test your schema structuring.

Return to: Table of Contents for SEO Strategy